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Carmilla never thought having children would be easy.
She knows better.
But she will never, ever be used to it being difficult.
Having just Aurora, or later, just Jonny was difficult enough. But having siblings? Well.
Siblings are just only children but worse.
She should have known this, should have predicted this, but well… Carmilla is used to having two only children. And that may seem like a paradox, but its true.
She’s had two only children. Aurora grew up alone under her care, and her Jonny, of course, grew up on new Texas without siblings. Since him, they’ve have traveled the stars alone. Just the two of them.
Now?
Now, she has three children. Concurrently. At the same time.
Up until recently, Carmilla’d been certain Aurora was gone, lost, dead. She hadn’t even told Jonny she has ever existed existed.
Up until recently, Jonny had been the only other person aboard a vessel under her command beyond the occasional science experiment.
Up until recently, she had a dead daughter, and an immortal son. Separate. Both only children. Now? Now she has a not-dead daughter, a pissed off, more-than-slightly-jealous son, and… And Nastya. Anastasia. Nastya.
Nastya. Who she hadn’t quite fully intended to immortalize, to mechanize, but.. The poor girl had just kept bleeding, and bleeding, clutching onto Carmilla’s hand and saying she didn’t want to die. Eyes wide, terrified.
Nastya. Who didn’t want to die. She was so young, so so young… Only 17, Carmilla knew.
(So Carmilla fixed her.)
(Drank every drop of blood from the girls veins, and replaced it.)
(Carmilla fixed her.)
(It wasn’t quite that impulsive. Months she’d spent keeping an eye on the girl, keeping the hemophilia in check. They tried to kill her. Death didn’t quite take.)
(And now it will never take Nastya either.)
Nastya. Her new daughter. Nastya.
Not Anastasia. Not Ana. Nastya.
Her Nastya.
Nastya has thrown a wrench in the works. Turned this whole thing upside down, and inside out. She is, as Carmilla has become very aware over these last few months, very, very much, a youngest child.
Stars, Carmilla has been exhausted.
Stars, she’s had to break up fights the likes she hasn’t so much as thought of in aeons.
Not all of them violent! Most of them petty, and so thoroughly stupid she hardly knows how to take it.
Jonny hadn’t taken to her divided attention as well as she hoped he might, so of course, he’s been lashing out. Throwing things. Burning things. Finding guns from who knows where to scream at her with. Bullets from crevasses within the ship she somehow hasn’t found and confiscated.
She should have expected this, of course, but she’d been so preoccupied first with trying to establish a solid line of untampered with communication with Aurora, then second with ironing out kinks within Nastya’s mechanism, that she, metaphorically speaking, let things boil over while not even standing in the kitchen.
She needs them to get along.
Or at least tolerate each other.
So that’s how they ended up here.
Nastya sitting curled up on a chair, a thin frown on her face, she stares warily at Jonny, who has tossed himself across the couch like he hasn’t a care in the world. Jonny glares at her, eyes hard, gun in hand as he tosses it between his palms.
“So,” Carmilla starts, hands folded in her lap as she regards them. “Do either of you know why I’ve called this ship meeting?”
Nastya opens her mouth, but Jonny beats her to the punch by shooting the ceiling.
“Jonny!” Carmilla snaps, “That’s not-“
“Because because because,” He talks over her, “Because Doc, you brought this fucking, weird ass princess onto our ship? And made her immortal? And you’re finally going to tell me that actually, we don’t need her! And that this is all a joke and you’re going to make her leave? Because we were doing fine before you brought her here. Why don’t I get a say in this shit. I’m first mate. I should have a say in this shit. Like new crew members.”
“No, Jonny.” Carmilla sighs.
He groans, and collapses his head into his hands, leaning over his knees, “Then I don’t want to be here.”
Carmilla turns to Nastya. “Nastya, why do you think you’re both here?”
“Because d’Ville here is a piece of shit?”
Why must they be so rude. She’s trying to raise them better than this.
“…Closer,” Carmilla admits, “But no.”
Jonny jolts up, already waving his gun again, (she really needs to figure out where the hell he keeps his bullets.) “Oh, so you take her side. What the fuck, Doc, I knew it, you’re just fucking replacing me. Fuck you. You used to listen to me—”
“Jonny.” Carmilla interrupts, raising a hand, “Kindly, shut the fuck up.”
He bristles.
“Please?”
“Fuck you.” He says, but thankfully, fucking blissfully, he does.
“You’re both here because we are going to negotiate a truce. We’re going to go over your grievances with each other, communicate, and figure out how we can have peace.”
Jonny groans, “Fuck that, Doc, I’ll be back later,” points his gun to his own temple.
“Jonny-“ Carmilla starts, going to snatch the gun, but in the half second it takes her to cross the room, he pulls the trigger.
Carmilla braces herself for the gunshot.
But, there isn’t one.
Just the empty click of an empty barrel.
Jonny makes a garbled shout of frustration, goes to stand, but Carmilla’s hand on his shoulder anchors him in place.
“No, Jonny. You’re staying.”
He meets her gaze, infuriated. “Doc.” He all but growls.
“Jonny.” Carmilla squeezes his shoulder, does not let him stand.
“Doctor.” He points his gun at her. Carmilla knows it isn’t loaded, so she doesn’t move.
“Jonathan.” She repeats.
He squints at her, then huffs, holstering his gun before crossing his arms. “I fucking hate you, you’re awful, and this is terrible. Fuck you. I hate my life.”
“I know.” Carmilla agrees returning to her seat.
And so there was silence, punctuated by Nastya staring at Jonny uncomprehendingly.
Carmilla claps her hands together, and the two of them turn to face her. “Alright, both of you. Who would like to start?”
As she expected, neither of them say a word.
“Right. We’re flipping a coin. Heads or tails?”
Still, they’re quiet.
“Jonny, Nastya, you’re tails, Jonny you’re-“
“Wait,” Jonny interrupts, loud, “I want to be tails. And we’re using my coin.” He pulls a coin from his pocket, throws it at her.
Carmilla snatches it from the air just before it pelts into her cheek.
Rude child.
“Then you can be tails.” It’s a weighted coin, Carmilla can tell the moment she holds it, but she can afford Jonny this, for peace’s sake. He’ll be talking anyway. Neither of them are leaving this room until some sort of resolution is made.
Jonny grins like he’s getting away with something, and Carmilla flips the coin.
Predictably, its heads. Jonny looks smug. He looks to Nastya.
Nastya sighs, stares up at the ceiling. “What is there to say? You are an asshole, d’Ville. You are a violent, dull man. You run around with your gun and pick fights for no reason. Doctor, I simply mind my own business, and he is rude to me. I do not see why we must reason things out, especially when he is entirely unreasonable.”
“I am not unreasonable, you told me to stop shooting in the fucking armory.”
“You were not shooting the targets.”
“So fucking what! It’s the armory!”
“You are a bad shot.”
“Oh fuck you-“
“Jonny. It isn’t your turn to speak.”
“What so I can’t defend myself, Doc she’s just insulting me,”
“You can, when it is your turn.” Jonny grumbles unintelligibly, and Carmilla nods to Nastya to continue.
“He is a terrible person. A murderer. And I do not like him.”
“Alright. Thank you for sharing, Nastya, Jonny-“
“Prissy little princess bitch here thinks she can just walk all over our ship like she owns the place. Tell me what to do. Like what the fuck, I’m first mate, what is she even, a passenger? She can’t order me around. She’s not even a fucking princess anymore, we like, fucking staged an entire revolution, Doc! Her whole royal family is dead, but she keeps fucking acting like she owns the place. And! And I’m like 200 years old, fuck her! She’s fucking seventeen. And you’re fucking prioritizing her, Nastya gets to pick what we eat, Nastya is still adjusting, Nastya this Nastya that, fuck her! I hate her! I didn’t ask for you to bring another goddamn lost soul into our lives, I fucking hate her anyway.”
“Anything else?”
“She has awful music taste.”
“Alright?”
“And she’s can’t even kill people right. You saw how useless she was.”
“She doesn’t need to kill people, Jonny.”
“We’re fucking SPACE PIRATES, Doc, shut UP. Of course she needs to kill people.”
“I’m a scientist. Not a pirate.”
“Uh huh. Why do your wanted posters say pirate, then, huh? Explain that, Doc, explain that.”
“Regardless, Jonny, anything else?”
“She said my hair was ugly.”
“Alright. So, and correct me if I’m wrong, but what you’re saying is you feel like Nastya is overstepping because you’ve been here longer than her, and that she’s bossing you around, and that I’ve been giving her too much attention.”
Jonny pauses in place, eyes a bit wide.
“And Nastya, what you’re saying is that Jonny is rude, and that you don’t like him on a personal level, or understand why he acts the way he does.”
Nastya nods.
“So, how can we fix this? For one, Jonny, perhaps you should give her the benefit of the doubt. Yes, she is.. new. Inexperienced. But I think you two have more in common than you think.”
Jonny groans.
“And you, Nastya, should try to interact more rather than presuming he hates you.”
“He does though.” Nastya argues.
“I do.” Jonny confirms.
“He does.” Nastya repeats.
Carmilla sighs. “I want, next time we make port, the two of you to just try to get along. For one day. Go on a walk, perhaps go to a museum, just… try? For a single day, for me?”
“Nah.” Jonny shakes his head. “Doc, you’re the one who fuckin put metal in her veins. Live with the fact I hate her.”
“I agree, Doctor, it seems unlikely that we will ever get along.”
“In fact, Doc, fuck this! Fuck this whole conversation! I want to go get drunk, and if you’ll excuse me, I’ll be on my way-“
“Now Jonny—”
“I agree with Jonny, Doctor Carmilla, this isn’t going to go anywhere.”
“Damn right it isn't!” He agrees.
Nastya stands, and Jonny, a moment later, follows her.
“Wait one second, you two,” Carmilla wheels herself in front of the door, blocking them in. “We need to reach at least some sort of compromise here,”
“We don’t.” Nastya confirms, sidestepping around her, “I am more than content to ignore Jonny forever, and he is fine ignoring me, is that right, d’Ville?”
“Of fucking course it is.”
Carmilla puts her head in her hands.
Then they’re out of the room, and she’s left with no children to try and mediate between.
Fuck.
From behind the door, she hears them still talking:
“Can you believe the nerve she has, Nastya, what the hell was that, an intervention? She should know by now those don’t work on me.”
“I think she may be tired of us fighting.”
“Well- fuck that! And fuck you, too, it’s perfectly reasonable for me to hate you, you’re all- you’re new.”
“And? It isn’t like I’m going anywhere…” As the two voices grow quieter, Carmilla shifts her gaze towards the stars visible through the window in the hull.
She really does hope the two of them learn to get along.
It will be a long, long eternity if they don’t.
Hours later, Carmilla has decided to grab herself a blood bag from the fridge, a bit of an evening stack, but pauses before entering the kitchen.
She hears laughter.
Nastya’s laughter.
“And then,” She hears Jonny say, which freezes her in place, “The fucking moon beast, because that’s what it was, a beast, roared. This fucking thing was--- it was like, a dozen feet tall, and faster than the goddamn devil, and its maw, Nastya, this thing’s fucking mouth was bigger than a goddamn horse-“
“What’s a horse?”
“What.”
“What is a horse?”
“You don’t- You don’t know what a fucking horse is?”
Carmilla stands just out of sight, listens to their chatter, and well..
Carmilla smiles.
And turns away.
She has blood in her lab, anyway.
No point in possibly jeopardizing this.
All’s well that ends well, and all that.