The War General

36

I sat across the bed from Juko while the triplets played on the floor. They were surrounded by a bunch of my old toys Juko had dug up out of the castles basement. It was a convenient distraction for the moment because our children were hitting their terrible twos and they were driving me up the walls.

Just this morning I had caught the boys shoving a shit load of toilet paper and clothes down the toilet. Ultimately it took Juko two hours to unclog the pipes and fish out all of their soiled clothes. Eden had a bad habit of scribbling on the walls with old pencils and crayons and all three of them had some strange obsession with my old stuffed animals. One in particular was a frog that neither of them liked to share so I had to hide it because if one of them had it and the others saw then they'd all want it. Akeno also had this bad habit of screaming like a mad man, I was pretty convince the child liked to hear his own voice.

It was a stormy night and soon enough the triplets would need to be put to bed. Though they were growing fast and needed as much sleep as they could possibly get I wanted them to have as much free time before they slept for hours on end.

"So I'm guessing this means we have no choice but to head back to Unity." I say as I picked Eden back up to get started on her hair. Her hair was by far thicker and coarser than mine so I tried to keep her hair in cute little twists.

She cries for a little until I grab a toy and sit her in between my legs to finish off the last three twists in her head.

"We don't have a choice, we don't have many resources here and I need to see how J3 is going to affect them. On top of that we need to make sure Eden hearing isn't deteriorating, I have hopes that she might just need a hearing aid and possibly surgery in the near future."

I nod my head slowly, we had found out not too long ago that Eden could barely hear us and it made my heart break. Juko being the Jack of all trades conveniently knew sign language and so he had been teaching the four of us ASL. It was actually pretty easy to pick up on but that didn't mean I was perfect at it. It was still a work in progress but I had no choice if I wanted to communicate with my baby.

"I understand, when do we leave?" I ask as I dip my fingers into some hair butter to add to Eden's thick strands of hair.

Juko pauses for a moment before answering, "next Monday. I had Leon and Uri come by a few days ago and drop off a car. I just need to head out and get us some more supplies before we head back to Amorite."

"The closest town is nearly a days trip away by car."

"Yeah, I think I'm going to head out tonight and be back by Tuesday morning to get some more supplies. We're running low on food and water."

I raise a brow looking out the window of my bedroom, it was storming horribly outside and the wind was gusty. I could barely stand on my own two feet without stumbling from the wind.

"Are you sure that's safe, maybe you should wait until the storm dies down." I suggest.

Juko shakes his head and leans back against the headboard, he looked tired and I felt bad because he had already done so much for me and our children. "It'll save us time so we won't have to worry about stopping once we make our way back home." He says running his hands through his hair. It was getting longer and was nearly shoulder length. "The kids are also going to need clothes for the trip since they destroyed them." He says stealing one of my hair hands to tie his hair up. A few loose strands fall from the ponytail and frames the sharp edges of his face.

"I really think you should wait for the storm to pass Juko."

"It's going to be raining well into next week, we don't really have a choice."