And he is having the time of his life. Getting virtually shredded is almost as much fun as getting actually shredded.

"Yeah," says Zeus, "I told you it was a good game." He grabs his water bottle, drains it, heads for the sink for a refill and helps himself to a couple apples out of the fruit bowl. "Next time we can use a bigger handicap, I'm still too fast for you to have a fighting chance."

"You hungry?" inquires Harley. This is something of a joke.

"Nope, couldn't eat a bite," says Zeus, and then he consumes nearly half of his apple in a single bite, "especially not one of your omelets with ridiculous amounts of cheese in it, such a thing would definitely go to waste, even if it had, like, mushrooms and peppers in it."

Harley gets up off the couch, gives Zeus the squishiest imaginable hug, and commences making an omelet.

"Waste of effort!" says Zeus around apple. "Your labors will be in vain! I am eternally full!"

"Pshhhhh," says Harley.

"Also I suspect you're going to poison me and my food taster's away on important business." The first apple is gone now. "So I couldn't eat that anyway. And, and I am suddenly a vegan. Also it's Ramadan and I've just converted to Islam. And I have developed multiple spontaneous allergies." He begins apple the second.

"Liar," he says affectionately. "Hungry, terrible liar."

"How dare you, I've the Princess's own honesty," says Zeus. (Knowing the princess personally hasn't made him more willing to call her by name, and besides, this is a common figure of speech now.)

"Liiiiiiiaaaaaaaaaar," sings Harley.

"Poisoning chicken-murdering infidel," snickers Zeus. "Who... I can't think of a good word for the allergy one."

"Terrible, uncreative liar," says Harley. "The gravest of sins. I should take away your omelet."

"Noooooooo," cries Zeus, discarding denuded apple cores and falling dramatically to his knees, hands clasped, "anything but that, I'll be good, I'll fetch your slippers for you."

Zeus blinks politely. "I was thinking you should make me an omelet, but now I'm really curious where you got that conclusion."

"I'm already making you an omelet!" Harley says cheerfully. "Look, it's an omelet, it's going to be so tasty."

"It smells fucking amazing," says Zeus, hauling himself to his feet.

"Yep! No but anyway, did you not know I want to make out with everyone? I thought we covered that like a year ago," he laughs.

"Yeah, I guess you did say 'everyone', I didn't think that meant me, we all know I'm not really a werewolf but actually a figment of your imagination," says Zeus easily, flopping into a kitchen chair and leaning hopefully in the direction of unfinished omelet.

"You're the best imaginary figment ever," Harley agrees. "And I would totally make out with you."

"Checking, checking... Still prefer to kiss only people with breasts," says Zeus. "It's this weird, uncommon kink I have, you probably haven't heard of it."

"If that's what you want for your birthday or something, I dunno, I'd see what I could do," snorts Zeus, "I'm not sure it's a thing that can happen, though."

"...No, I mean my lack of boobs," snorts Harley. "Like, I know this may come as a shock to you, but magic exists! I could totally have boobs. I should have boobs sometime," he declares. "I bet they're fun, they look fun."

"They're definitely fun to be in proximity to. I don't care to own my own set. I mean, I don't know what to feed them or how often they need to be walked." He taps his chin. "That'd be interesting, anyway."

Zeus is instantly engrossed in his omelet. It is the best omelet. Harley is the best omeletter.

[Who wouldn't be, this is fucking delicious,] says Zeus.

[You are the best. This omelet is the best. I conclude that you are this omelet.] He pauses between bites long enough to grab Harley by the arm and bite his wrist, not hard. [I may have miscalculated.]

He cackles.

Zeus returns to the much more rewarding task of biting his omelet instead. [This is so tasty that I don't even care that you definitely poisoned it and I shall suffer sickness unto death. What a way to go.]

"Yeeeep," laughs Harley. "I would be the best assassin, people would just line right up to be poisoned."

[You could be an executioner. People would tell you what they wanted for their last meal and then eat up their sentence.] Zeus has never lived in a world where the death penalty was standard - at least not for anyone for whom a choice of last meal would be meaningful - but there is always fiction about the past.

He giggles so hard he has to sit down. On the floor.

Zeus makes short work of the omelet despite its wolf-appropriate portion size. "Thank you," he says warmly, "you are great and that was great and I am no longer in danger of withering away to a wisp of nothing."

"I am great," beams Harley. "I'm so great. I'm amazing."

"I'm amazed," says Zeus in mock astonishment, flinching as though Harley is very surprising, "I cannot figure out how you happened, it must be magic that is even more magic than regular magic. Double magic. That is the only explanation for you and how amazing you are."

Harley scoots over and hugs his leg.

Pat pat pat. "Remind me which of us periodically turns into a tail-wagging fluffy canine creature?" he asks dryly.

"Me," he says firmly.

"Oh, okay, then this makes perfect sense," says Zeus, "nothing incongruous about this picture, I must have been daydreaming."

"Very good, you get a -" Zeus scans the kitchen for something to stand in for a dog treat, and settles for a bit of mushroom that didn't make it into the omelet. "Facsimile of a biscuit."

"I love you too."

"I bet you'd kiss somebody without a face, if you could figure out how the hell to do it," says Zeus. "I dunno, it's... I am aware that mouths work the same on everybody? I just don't ever feel like putting that knowledge to practical use. No matter how hot Xanthe insists it'd be."

"I would absolutely kiss somebody without a face," Harley agrees, grinning up at him.

"Pack telepathy makes it kind of confusing because I am aware of what it's like for other people to want to kiss the unboobened population," says Zeus. "Xanthe, any of your miscellaneous playmates, random traveling-pack-people, whatever. When I'm sorted out in my head I know it's not mine, though." He taps his chin again. "At least insofar as I've bothered to think about it, which, I'm not completely un-self-aware, but also am not Her Majesty, you know? Maybe kissing is boobs-only and, I dunno, blowjobs aren't." He contemplates this. "I just made that up but now I think it might be true."

"Which way around?" he says curiously.

"I think you'd probably have to bribe, threaten, or magic me to get me to figure out how to give one."

"I'll pass," laughs Harley. "I'd give you one, though."

Zeus considers this. "If you were anyone else I'd be saying 'just like that?' 'what kind of alien are you?' 'what's the catch?', but I already know that the answers to that are 'yes', 'a Harley kind of alien' and 'I poisoned your omelet, duh'."

Harley beams up at him.

"Of the activities I am willing that Jake or Her Highness walk in on unexpectedly, though, that is not on the list, so if you mean anything resembling now a change of room is necessary. Like, Jake'll know about it eventually if it's remotely memorable, because, pack telepathy, but that is not the same thing."

"Sure thing," says Zeus, and he rolls up out of his chair onto his feet, bounces once, smiles, and offers the floorsitting Harley his hand.

Harley grabs Zeus's hand, hauls himself up, hugs him, and then scampers to his room.

"Glffngh," says Zeus eloquently.

"Dmmglflgl."

He giggles.

"Hflrgl," objects Zeus.

"You're adorable. I adore you." Giggly hug!

Zeus can, at least, hug back without suffering critical vowel failure.

"I aaaaam," beams Harley. "And you are very welcome."

Zeus grins at him. "I am," he says, "really glad that there is such a person as you."

Harley giggles. And hugs him again.

Hugs.

A few days later, Harley finds Elsie, hugs her, and announces, "I want a pentagon."

"All right," she says, and she reaches into her coin-sorter for a pentagon in the Joker's colors. "I hope you're being thoughtful about how you're going to use it."

Elspeth laughs. "Aren't you pretty."

[Uuum... what?] asks Zeus, who is very creative but never knows what to do with that question.

[I have booooooobs,] he giggles. [Come look at them!]

[Pff. Sure, incoming.]

Elspeth pats Harley on the head - this requires jumping, now, but she's more than up to it - and says, "I have some work to do; I'll be home in a couple of hours," and she teleports away.

Zeus lets himself into the house a moment later.

Harley blinks. "...About what?"

Zeus sits down heavily on the nearest available chair. "Um," he says, not taking his eyes off Harley's face. "I think I. Um."

"I'm sorry. Should I be sorry? I don't know if I actually am," says Zeus anxiously.

"I'm - pretty sure I don't explode?" says Zeus. "Wolfsplosions are usually just - the furry kind. I don't think this has ever happened before but one or two imprints have had, like - hysterectomies - and their wolves are still imprinted."

Zeus smiles at him, half ordinary fluffy-buddy smile and half new warm imprint-face smile, and pets his hair.

"I love you," sighs Harley, resting his head on Zeus's knee.

"I love you too."

"That sounds awesome," agrees Zeus. "I mean, if we're not treating me as though I'm drunk off my ass on consent-warping magic, or anything."

"You kind of are, but you're not going to not be," says Harley. "So you might as well - not be. You know?"

"Not gonna ask Her Highness to - fix me?" asks Zeus wryly.

"I don't know if that can even happen," he says, "and I don't think you'd want her to, so - no? Unless you do want her to. Or unless we were going to turn into some kind of... big, huge, horrible disaster, like - oh shit." He blinks up at Zeus, realization dawning. "Oh, shit, I can't break my arm again or anything, can I, you'd explode."

"...Not... literally?" says Zeus, wincing. "But - but that sounds really, really bad - like, even though I know how you are about it and I know you're immortal it just -" He bites his lip and shuts his eyes and whines. "And - also Pamela's not gonna be able to hit you anymore."

"Awwwwww, man," says Harley, and he climbs up into Zeus's lap and hugs him. "Can we fix that? I hope we can fix that, I don't want you to be sad like this all the time!"

Zeus hugs him, snuggly-like, tucking his face in against Harley's neck. "The thing with Pam and the thing with me are separate things. I dunno. Not even Jake could get Pam to hit you now, not with all the alpha voice in the world... I don't think anybody's tried the other thing."

"I am mildly sad that Pam can't hit me anymore but it's not a life-changer," says Harley. "The other thing is actually a problem."

"'m sorry," mumbles Zeus. "I know how you are, I just - can't - stand to think about it."

"Then don't think about it," says Harley. "And we'll try to fix it." He winces. "Is it okay if we try to fix it?"

"You need it fixed, right?" says Zeus. This is a complete answer to Harley's question.

Zeus nods, just a little, shifting his head where he's put it on Harley's shoulder.

Harley snuggles him.

Snuggles! Snuggles with imprint: best thing.

[Elsie?] he says.

[Yes?]

[Zeus imprinted on me.]

[...Yeeees. Mostly. I am okay in the short term. In the long term - you know that thing where wolves can't stand their imprints getting hurt? We need to do something about that. I mean, if it's possible, I don't know, but - if it's not possible then I really, really don't know what to do.]

[It... has not been tried,] says Elspeth. [Imprinting isn't like vampire mating in that way. I'll speak to Mama and Jake about a wish design. We'll see what we can do. Is Zeus on board with the change?]

[Quote, "You need it fixed, right?", end quote.]

[Yes, I suppose I should've expected that,] sighs Elspeth. [We'll have something to try soon. Do you or Zeus need anything else?]

[Nah, we're good. Thanks.]

[Okay. If you have questions about how imprinting works that you didn't ask before, you can of course ask me.]

[I love you too, Harley.]

"Okay," says Zeus.

Snuggle.

Snuggle snuggle snuggle. Wolves in general tend to simple desires; imprinted wolves more so.

If Zeus desires snuggles, Harley is so on board with that. He might just curl up right here and take a cuddlenap.

Zeus would be happy to snuggle his sleeping imprint! That sounds like just about the best thing.

Awesome. Cuddlenap!

Harley remains asleep.

Harley, Elspeth sends.

Jake thinks it will be best to make the wish while Zeus is asleep. Do you want to hear how we've designed it up or shall I just go ahead?

[Yeah, I wanna hear.]

She lobs a summary of the entire conversation leading up to the design. Jake advocated for the minimal change - an exception made for deliberate masochistic experiments only, not random mayhem. Elspeth, armed with the judgesighted histories of eleven Jokers, suggested that this would still leave tension between imprint instincts and Harley's interests - Zeus has never been a restraining influence on Harley's risk-taking behavior and starting now wouldn't really help anyone. Bella's general discomfort with mental editing led her to suggest simply selectively reverting Zeus's opinions about Harley's safety to whatever he had before, since apparently that was working so well, and Jake grudgingly allowed that this would be okay. The hexagon Elspeth holds is intended to do exactly that.

[Sounds good to me,] says Harley.

Zeus sleeps on, still holding Harley.

[You're welcome,] she says. [I wish I'd thought of this before.]

He shrugs.

She smiles an indulgent smile, pats him on the head as she walks by, and heads up to her home office.

"Elsie fixed the thing!" says Harley.

"She did?" Zeus makes a puzzled, searching face, and then he smiles. "Hey, she did. Neat."

Harley beams and kisses him.

Kisses! Zeus is so on board with kisses, you have no idea.

Kisses. Best thing. Best best best thing.

[I totally have a face! It's very important. For kissing you. Also breathing and eating and seeing and stuff.]

[You should continue breathing and eating and seeing! And kissing me!] says Harley.

[I will do all those things.]

Making out en route is a fantastic idea.

Zeus is appropriately fascinated.

Zeus is nothing if not responsive to encouragement.

Zeus is awesome. Harley is awesome. Boobs are awesome. Everything is awesome.

Zeus is in firm agreement with all of these evaluations.

Zeus play-bites at the nearest Harley body part. (It is a shoulder.) "Uh, what's gonna happen to me when you do that?"

"According to the Imperial Seer, nothing exciting," he shrugs.

"Okay. I suppose excitement'll have to come from other sources then." He kisses the bitten shoulder.

Here is Elsie! She is illustrating a pamphlet.

"Hi, Elsie! I want a pentagon," he says cheerfully. "Ooh, what's the pamphlet?"

"It's about offworld magic," says Elspeth, producing a pentagon and handing it over.

The answer is a slightly confused yes!

How confused? Should they have a conversation about it, or is Zeus just going to make some funny faces before resuming makeouts?

Looks like it's the second thing, unless Harley really wants to discuss it!

"Am I making funny faces?"

"You are, it's adorable." Harley kisses Zeus's nose.

Zeus grins. "I dunno, it's just, this isn't the first time imprinting decided to take some wolf's sexuality out back and shoot it? But it's the first time it's happened this way."

"I'm full of surprises," Harley says brightly, and he pounces on Zeus.

Mmmm pouncing! Highly appreciated pouncing.

Hooray for highly appreciated things! Harley decides to do some more things that he expects will be highly appreciated.

Pretty much anything Harley-related is highly appreciated.

Awesome, because giving Zeus blowjobs is lots of fun and he would be sad if Zeus stopped appreciating them.

There has been no cessation of appreciation there! It has if anything increased.

Awesome, perfect, excellent, he's so pleased.

It is very important that Harley be pleased. That is the point. (Of Zeus's existence, if you ask Zeus.)

It's so convenient! If Zeus had had to pick an imprint he would've picked Harley if he'd known Harley was an option.

That is good. Harley would be glad to know that, if he did.

Eventually - during a lull in the proceedings - Zeus tells him so.

"Awwwwwwwwwww," says Harley, hugging him tight. "I'm glad. I love you."

"I love you too," says Zeus, "so, so much."

Snuggle snuggle. Ferocious snugglings.

That is delightful and Harley is delightful and Zeus is delighted!

Harley is delighted too. They are just a big cuddly pile of delight.

Good, good.

"You should've done something anyway!" cries Zeus.

"Done what? I couldn't predict where he was going to go, or how, let alone stop him. But," she says, "I think he will be back, eventually." She sighs. "When I was gone and no one knew how long I'd be gone -"

"Yeah," breathes Zeus, "yeah, I remember hearing about that, please - just - I'll sleep. Can - it doesn't matter but -"

"You can stay here," agrees Elspeth quietly.

Elspeth watches him for a moment, then goes next door to tell Bartholomew and Demeter, and then to Jaipur to tell the Golden Coven.