Damien only returned home because he had been driven awake by a strong desire to lay in his own bed. Not that there was anything wrong with the luscious, velvet couch he crashed on in Alec’s mansion. He just had an inexplicable desire to sleep in his own room and to get the inevitable conversation he’d be having with Thanatos over with. When he had appeared in his room, Thanatos was in the corner by the closet. He was slipping his phone back in his pocket.

"Fuck.” Damien immediately regretted his decision to return. He wanted to get the conversation over with, but only after having slept off the Vodka. Vampires like their Bloody Marys. They also injected Holy Water in their veins for fun, but it didn’t do anything for him.

“Where. The hell. Were you?” Thanatos’s voice whipped across him like an icy wind.

Damien sighed and sat on the edge of his bed.

Death said, “I couldn’t teleport to your aura. I couldn’t sense you anywhere! I called Hypnos, and you were not in Dream. I searched the swamp. Me. Personally. Trudged through muck looking for you!”

Damien fixed his gaze on Thanatos’s sparkling, mud-less white shoes and trousers.

Thanatos continued, “Wondering if you had somehow managed to die! If you did something reckless, if the Fates had found their way back and returned you to Tartarus, or if you had simply skipped out on this reality altogether never to be seen again. I didn’t know, because I couldn’t find you!”

“Sorry. I- I apologize. I-”

“I don’t believe you! If you were truly apologet-”

“Why the fuck do you care?” Damien bolted to his feet. “Don’t you want me to leave and spare us all the trouble?”

“I was frustrated, Damien-”

“Because you people are never satisfied!”

“Do not make this about the fucking human condition!” Thanatos towered inches away.

“That’s what it is! What else would you call it?”

“It’s called worry, Damien. It’s called being afraid. It’s called it’s never been my job to keep something alive before, and I don’t know what the hell I’m doing. It’s the best I can with what I’ve got. Now, where? Did. You. Go?”

Damien gave him a wicked, crooked smile. “I got fucking shit-faced with Alec VanGarrett and crashed at his mansion in Darkside, Dad!"

Thanatos became still and stood erect, and Damien realized he had made a mistake.

“You... did what?” Thanatos’s voice was calm and smooth, his hands folded neatly behind his back.

Damien shrunk a bit, not knowing what was going to come next. He cleared his throat. “I-” He cleared his throat again and blinked, trying to shake off the drunk. “I hung out with... Alec... at his mansion... Well, first at his blood bar, and then at his-”

Thanatos walked from the room.

“...mansion.” Damien cocked his head and followed after him. He followed Thanatos into the library where he was lighting up a cigarette. Damien stood at the doorway and foolishly continued. “I thought Alec was inconsequential to you?”

“Yes. He is. He’s an insignificant pin prick, which is precisely the problem. You spent time with that little- Do you have no standards for the people you surround yourself with? When I found you, you were living with sewer rats. Before that, a swamp witch, and now it’s Hypnos’s dream-junkies and Alec? Alec?”

“I don’t get this. Are you jealous or something?”

“Is that a joke?” Thanatos blinked.

“Well, it’s either that or Alec’s right, and you really are elitist...”

“I’m not elitist. I am the great equalizer. I just don’t want my son around someone so... entitled, naïve, and questionable. It’s not elitist. It’s realistic. Imagine a so-called prince calling me elitist. This is all beside the point. The point is that you intentionally sought out Alec to spite me-”

“What?” Damien was confused and offended. “No. I just took myself to the first random bar!”

“Then you subconsciously did it to spite me.”

“Oh, bull shit!”

“Language! Damien! And it’s not, as you say, bull shit, because of- Well, what is that phrase you’re so fond of? Ah! The universe is never so lazy!"

“For fuck’s sake. So- So what? What do you want? Should I stay or should I go? Should I obey or go against orders? Just tell me what you want! Tell me what to do! Tell me how you wish to play house and I’ll play. I just...” Damien’s eyes were fading off into the distance, and the world was getting fuzzy around his peripheral.

He shouldn’t have spoken to Thanatos this way. Thanatos had been treating him so well, and now it was all going to go away. He had taken it all for granted and would be punished for it. He knew better. Stay quiet. Yes sirs. No sirs. Do as commanded. Whatever was commanded. Why did he go with Hypnos? Why did he go with Alec? Self-sabotage. Glutton for punishment. But, Thanatos had wanted him gone because he disobeyed. He shouldn’t have done that. This was going to hurt so much... Damien’s heart was beating so fast, he began to see spots in his vision, like a smoldering roll of film.

Thanatos brought a finger to his lips. He was nodding to himself. "Playing house... That’s what this is to you? Playing house. That’s what you think this is tome...” Death sniffed and cleared his throat. He frowned at his son. His son who looked so much like his mother. His son who looked small and petrified and confused, who was thousands of years old. Who had been enslaved and alone. Thanatos thought they had been making headway, but Damien still didn’t trust him, of course. And the moments Thanatos had thought were moments of improvement had actually been moments of contradiction and confusion for Damien. Damien was still just trying to give Thanatos what Thanatos wanted to hear and see. Those moments hadn’t been genuine. Thanatos was failing. He was failing his son. He could never understand what Damien was feeling or thinking.

This is why Death takes life; why he doesn’t create it. He should have never been a father. The Fates did this to destroy him, and it was working. He wouldn’t let the Fates destroy him or his son any more than they already have. He was no good for the boy. He couldn’t be what Damien needed him to be. He couldn’t be a good father. It was against the balance of things. This was the extent of his emotional breadth. And it was not enough.

Damien stood still and quiet, waiting for his punishment.

Thanatos took a deep breath. He swallowed. He had to do what he had to do. What would be best for his son.

Suddenly, they were standing on a concrete stoop in front of a townhome on the old side of New Bedlam.

Thanatos knocked at the door while Damien took in the sudden change of scenery. “Where are we?” Damien asked apprehensively.

“Loki’s house,” he said.

“Why- Why are we at Loki’s house?”

Loki answered the door and looked back and forth between them with his brows stitched together. “Good. I see you found him.”

Eros walked up behind Loki to see who was at the door.

“Indeed,” Thanatos said and pushed his way in. “Damien.”

At that cue, Damien followed him inside, giving Eros a nod as he entered.

Loki was making a series of indistinct, questioning noises as Thanatos set a black duffle bag onto one of their sofas.

“You have a spare bedroom, yes?” Asked Death.

“Yes...”

“Great. Damien will be staying here.”

Damien tilted his head. “What?”

Loki pointed at Damien. “I second that. What?"

“Let’s talk in the kitchen.” Thanatos headed towards the kitchen without once making eye contact with anyone else in the room.

Loki didn’t follow right away. With his hands held out, waiting for an answer to fall into them, he gave Damien and Eros an apologetic look for Thanatos’s behavior before finally walking through the double doors into the kitchen.

Damien’s eyes stared off past the floor. He swallowed the ache that came with being right. He was being sent away. It was time to be moving on. A curse that could never be undone. He should be used to it by now. A hand fell on his shoulder. It was soft and well-intentioned, but his nerves crawled anyway.

“What happened?” Eros asked.

Damien answered firmly. “I fucked up. Too many times. That’s what happened.”

“I’ll put the kettle on. Do you want to sit down?”

Damien shook his head.

But Eros insisted, “You should sit down.”

Damien nodded, and he moved to the stiff Edwardian sofa next to his duffle bag.

Eros slipped into the kitchen. He glided past the two large men congregating by the kitchen island, to the sink, to fill up the kettle.

“You’re not a terrible father,” Loki consoled. “I should know. I have a cupboard filled with Worst Father of the Year coffee mugs. Hel sends them every year. She thinks it’s funny. Just look at what she’s been through, what all of my children have been through, because of me! You’re in a tough situation. You’re doing the best you can.”

“My best is not enough. And you and your children still have a genuine bond despite it all. I... I’ve made up my mind. At least until I can figure out how to go about handling this.”

Eros interjected, “The best way to do it might just be to do it.” He looked up to see Thanatos’s Death stare and Loki’s eyes begging him to stand down.

Thanatos brushed Eros off and returned his gaze to Loki. “He is both trying to give me what I want and rebelling at the same time.”

“Children do that,” Eros quipped as he turned to put the kettle on the stovetop.

“He doesn’t trust me. He said we are playing house. He doesn’t believe any of it is real.”

Eros smirked as he turned back to face them. “And the best way to prove him wrong is to shove him off on someone else?”

Thanatos snarled. “I need time to reevaluate the situation and my approach to him.”

“But what about what he needs?” Eros pried on.

“This is what he needs!” Thanatos snapped, fully acknowledging that Eros was in the room now.

Eros snapped back, “To get dropped off at a stranger’s house when you get overwhelmed?”

Loki begged Eros with his eyes. “Darling, maybe now’s not the-”

“No.” Eros said, “I’m not going to coddle him like you do. I don’t have to jump when he says jump.”

Death gave him a sweet smile. “How would you like me extending your probation?”

Eros leaned back against the counter. “How would you like to fall in love with an ass? Oh wait... You’re already in love with yourself, aren’t you?”

Loki’s eyes darted back and forth. “What the hell is wrong with you two?”

“Are you kidding?” Eros asked Loki. “What’s wrong is that he is running away, like he always does. Not even going to try. Just expecting you to take in his son. No consideration for you or for Damien, and you’re just accepting it? No questions asked?”

Loki looked back into Eros’s eyes. His jaw set, and his nostrils flared.

Eros hadn’t seen Loki upset with him in a while, but the look didn’t last long.

Loki turned to Thanatos and said, “It’s no problem. We’ll take care of him. Whatever you need.”

Eros’s jaw fell open.

Thanatos gave a heavy sigh of relief. “I appreciate it. I just need-”

“Some time.” Loki put his hand roughly on Death’s shoulder. “I know. I’ll take care of it.”

Thanatos said to Loki, “There are some things you need to know-”

Eros shook his head. “Unbelievable!” He stormed from the kitchen and headed back towards Damien.

Damien was staring off into space, wringing his hands and rocking back and forth.

Eros sat down on the opposite sofa and said, “Damien, you did nothing wrong.”

Damien’s eyes pulled up at him through his lashes. The look was menacing and caused Eros’s skin to crawl.

But Damien glanced back to the ground and said, “Irrelevant.”

Then, Eros relaxed and sat there with him, waiting for the kettle to whistle.