"So that scary guy is the god of what?" Rachel asked, stopping with a piece of popcorn halfway to her mouth.
She sat beside Tamara on the couch, watching television until the conversation caught her attention.
"Death," Tamara said, eyes still on the TV. "He's annoying, and he's not exactly easy to kill."
Rachel lowered the popcorn. "Then isn't it strange that you fell for him?"
Tamara finally looked over, a small smile forming. "Well, I did try to eat him when we first met."
"Eat him?"
"Yeah. I used to eat humans."
Rachel edged a few inches away.
"But I don't do that anymore," Tamara added, noticing the reaction.
Rachel eyed her suspiciously. "Why did you eat humans in the first place?"
"I'm a mermaid. Humans were part of my diet. Not exactly unusual where I come from." Tamara shrugged.
"That changed when Daniel dragged me out of the ocean. After that, things got complicated."
Rachel studied her, still processing that she was sitting next to an actual mermaid. "Wait, you're really a mermaid? You actually grow a fish tail when you get in water?"
"Yes. Water doesn't magically make me a different species. My body just changes when I'm submerged."
Rachel glanced at the glass of water on the table, then back at her. "So if water touches you, you turn into a mermaid?"
Tamara gave her a suspicious look. "Not exactly. And don't test it with that glass."
"Most of the women in this house aren't exactly normal, if you're using common sense as the standard," Tamara said, nodding toward Evelyn, seated across the room studying an ancient parchment.
"That's Evelyn. She was the first to meet Daniel, years ago. The two of them ended up dealing with, you know, those Egyptian mummies that came back to life and started trying to eat people."
Rachel's eyes widened. "Wow... mummies?"
"Yeah. That was one of their first big messes." Tamara pointed toward Elizabeth. "That one's kind of from the same world as me."
"Same world?"
"Yeah. Daniel explained it to me once, but he made it way more complicated than it needed to be. Calls it an alternate world or something. I don't really remember the proper name."
Tamara wasn't exactly known for remembering complicated explanations. She pointed toward the others. "That's Sylvia, that's Diana, and the last one you already know."
Rachel looked around the room again. Evelyn was studying an ancient Egyptian text like it was an ordinary afternoon activity.
Elizabeth came from another world. Tamara was a mermaid who'd once considered humans food. Diana was an Amazon warrior, and Sylvia was... well, Rachel still wasn't entirely sure what to make of her.
Then there was Daniel, who apparently treated all of this as a normal part of his life.
Rachel looked back at Tamara. "This is a really strange family."
Tamara smiled. "Yeah. You get used to it."
Rachel was still looking around the room when the familiar voice surfaced inside her head.
"Wow. You really did fall into one hell of a house."
Her expression tightened. "Yeah, but you're part of the reason I'm here. You didn't exactly come out to stop me."
"Hmph. Don't get too comfortable just because you're here. That doesn't mean I can't do anything."
Rachel looked down at the popcorn in her hand. "What are you talking about?"
The voice quieted, but a warning still ran under it. "Soon, the danger will come for you. When it does, even he might not be able to stop it."
Her hand tightened slowly around the popcorn.
"And when that happens, they'll either die because of you or they'll leave you."
The bitterness in the voice was unmistakable as it continued.
"Just like your mother did. She lied to you your entire life, and she never told you the truth about who your real mother was."
Rachel's expression fell. She looked across the room at the others, still carrying on as if nothing had happened.
For a moment, the warmth of the room didn't feel quite as safe as it had before.
***
So, did that work?" Caitlin asked, looking at Daniel after they'd finished running through several tests and treatments.
"Nope. I think it made him worse," Cisco said, watching Daniel carefully from beside the console.
Barry wasn't there — he'd gone back to the CCPD, leaving Caitlin and Cisco to deal with Daniel's condition.
"Yeah, it definitely got worse," Daniel said, looking between them. "Letting you work on my brain was probably a mistake."
Caitlin frowned. "I was trying to help."
"I know. But whatever you did clearly didn't fix the problem."
Daniel pushed himself off the medical bed and stood, expression darkening as another hallucination crossed his vision.
Dark energy gathered around his hand, and a sword slowly took shape from it.
Cisco stepped back immediately. "Okay, that's new."
Caitlin took a step back too, watching the weapon while keeping her voice calm. "Daniel, put the sword away."
He looked at it for a moment. "Since my brain is causing these hallucinations, I'm not going to keep dealing with it."
Cisco stared at him. "Please tell me you're not thinking what I think you're thinking."
Daniel raised the sword slightly.
Caitlin understood immediately. "You're not cutting your own head open."
"I'm not planning to do anything complicated. I'll just destroy the part causing the problem and regrow it."
Cisco's eyes went wide. "That's your solution?"
"Unless you've got a better one."
Caitlin glanced at the medical monitor, then back at him.
"We don't even know if the problem is the physical tissue. The energy that hit you could've affected your neural activity. Destroying your brain might not remove whatever caused it."
Daniel considered that. "Then what do you suggest?"
She looked at Cisco. "We figure out exactly what that energy did before you start cutting pieces out of yourself."
Cisco nodded. "Yeah, I'd really prefer that plan. I've seen enough crazy stuff in this lab, and somehow you're still managing to top the list."
Daniel opened his mouth to argue — then stopped.
The strange images that had been appearing around him were gone.
He looked at Caitlin, then around the room. Everything looked normal again. Even the pressure behind his eyes had faded.
"Umm... I think those nasty hallucinations are gone. My headache too."
Caitlin checked the monitor and frowned as his readings returned to normal. "That's strange."
Cisco looked between him and the screen. "Why'd they suddenly disappear?"
Daniel shrugged, and the dark sword dissolved from his hand. "Don't know. Don't care." He rubbed the side of his head once more, just to make sure the pain was really gone. "Feels normal again, so I'm taking the win."
*****
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