Chapter 218: Extras #2 – All-In With Chaos

=::= Kaylee's PoV =::=

"What happened to all the other decorations?" I heard my grandma ask as they all stopped in the front hall just outside the doorway to the den. "You always used to have a lovely little nativity scene there on the hall table."

Mom replied, "Out of respect for Cassandra, Raymond and I agreed not to put out any religious iconography this year, apart from the Chaos star tree topper."

My smile only got wider when I heard that. And from the way I felt my girlfriend cringe I knew she heard it as well.

"What?" my grandma asked in confusion. "Who in the world is Cassandra?"

"Come on into the den and you can meet her yourself," mom replied. "She's Kaylee's girlfriend."

Uncle Rod demanded, "She's Kaylee's what?!"

A moment later my grandparents and uncle followed mom into the room with the rest of us, and just like Bea's family the latest arrivals all froze and stared at me in shock.

"Hi grandma, grampa!" I greeted them both while my tails twitched against the back of the sofa behind me. "And hi uncle Rod! Time for more introductions. This is my girlfriend Cassandra, also known as Cass. Before you got here we were explaining how she's actually a goddess. And before you ask, I've become a demon. A three-tailed fox demon to be precise."

I continued with the introductions without giving them a chance to respond, "This is Cassandra's sister Nina, and those are her moms Tanya and Julie. And this is my uncle Rodney, he's mom and Bea's big brother. And my grandparents, Steven and Mary Hayes."

My uncle and grandparents were all still staring at me in shock, while mom returned to her seat next to dad. Bea Jeff Ned and Nancy were staring again too. In fact it seemed like the entire extended family were either quietly freaking out or completely lost for words.

Then again the Underwoods were all quiet too. Tanya and Julie just looked awkward, Nina looked shy as well as awkward, and Cass seemed to be stuck in a permanent cringe.

I was almost surprised when my grandma was the one to break the silence. I was less surprised though when her shock gave way to anger and confusion, as she looked from me to my mom and dad.

"What in God's name has been going on here?" she demanded as she glared at my parents. Grandma gestured at me and continued, "How could you possibly allow your child to become...this?! And what's this nonsense about a so-called 'goddess'? If this is supposed to be some sort of joke it's in extremely poor taste!"

There was about a second of silence, before the den erupted into chaos. Unfortunately it was the shouty kind, not the fun kind. Grandma was yelling at mom about religious stuff while uncle Rod started spouting his homomisic nonsense at me, then mom and dad both began shouting back in defence of me and Cass and Cass's family.

Beatrice joined in next, telling mom she needed to show grandma and grampa more respect, while Jeff was trying to get Bea to calm down. Ned was scowling at me like it was my fault everyone was yelling, while Nancy seemed worried that grandma was about to have a fit or something. Grampa was actually quiet, he was sort of staring at me like he was trying to figure out if I was really his youngest grandaughter or not. Or maybe he was just curious about my ears and tails. And finally Tanya Julie and Nina all looked like they were seriously considering teleporting straight home.

Rather than join in all the yelling I sighed quietly as I hugged my girlfriend a little tighter. Up until that point it was kind of fun with all the shocking reveals, but I had a feeling it wasn't going to take long before the shouting got louder and nastier. Even worse, I started to worry one of my relatives would try and drag Julie and Tanya into it. I could easily imagine Rod blaming everything on the lesbian neighbours or something like that.

And as much as I disliked the religious intolerance from aunt Bea and grandma, or the homomisic bigotry from uncle Rod, I didn't actually want to see any of mom's extended family get themselves smote by angry angels.

So I was preparing to intervene myself, when Cassandra suddenly decided to make her divine power move. I had about a half-second warning, as I felt my girlfriend's body relax from full-on cringe mode into something a lot more calm and confident.

A moment later everyone in the house went completely silent and still. Every single one of them was staring at my girlfriend, who'd just allowed her pure divine power to shine through.

"Hello everybody," the Goddess of Chaos greeted my extended family in a calm confident voice. Her unfiltered divinity was still radiating out, and the others were all completely silent as they stared at her in awe.

"My name is Cassandra," she continued calmly, "And yes, I am a goddess. Specifically I'm the Goddess of Chaos, hence my other name, Kid Chaos. I know the evening's got off to a bit of a bumpy start, but for the sake of my girlfriend and her parents, not to mention my own parents and my sister, I hope that we'll all be able to get along?"

Nobody responded or spoke up, but then again my girlfriend still had her divine aura going strong. So it's possible everyone was still too overwhelmed to react.

It was another couple seconds before Tanya broke the silence, "Cassandra hon? I think that's enough, ok? You've made your point, the mortals are sufficiently awed."

"Sorry mum," the goddess apologized, as she finally turned off the divine power.

We were all able to relax a little after that, and a few of my extended family members even let out sighs of relief. To my surprise it was my grampa who spoke up next. He'd been quiet through all the arguing and everything, but now he addressed my girlfriend's parents.

"You referred to us as 'mortals'. Does that mean you're not human either?" grampa asked.

Tanya seemed a little reluctant as she answered, "My wife and I are angels."

"Former angels," Julie clarified. "We both quit working for our respective gods so we could elope, and we've lived among mortals ever since."

Then my cousin Ned asked Nina, "What about you? Are you an angel too?"

My girlfriend's shy sister cringed a little as everyone's attention focused on her. She shook her head and mumbled, "I'm a demon. Like Kaylee."

I still had an arm around Cassandra, but I reached over and slipped my other arm around Nina so I could give her a hug too.

Then I told my extended family, "Before any of you start to panic, demons aren't evil or vicious or nasty. Nina here is kind and gentle, she loves animals and even volunteers at the local shelter. And I'm still the same Kaylee you knew before, I'm attending university and getting good grades. The main difference is I'm a little smaller and a lot floofier than I was last year."

The others were all quiet again after that, as they processed these newest revelations. Meanwhile I was still hugging both my girlfriend and her sister.

After a second or two I spoke up again, "So to summarize? Magic is real. I was a witch all through high school. I'm gay. Now I'm a small three-tailed fox demon. And I'm dating the Goddess of Chaos. My girlfriend's sister is also a demon. And their parents are a couple angels."

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That led to another awkward pause, which Nancy broke after a second or two. "So um, if magic is real and you folks are all powerful supernatural beings, can we see some kind of demonstration? Can we see some magic?"

"Sure," Cassandra replied with a shrug. Then she made a little wave-like gesture with her hand as she added, "How about we start with something simple?"

There were little swirls of golden light all around the room, and when the light faded everyone's drinks had been refilled. In addition, three more had appeared. Grampa and uncle Rod were both suddenly holding glasses of beer, while a cup of tea was next to grandma.

That led to some surprised oohs and aahs, along with a few distrustful looks from Beatrice Rod and grandma. Meanwhile grampa had a gulp of his beer then smiled, "It's perfect."

After hearing that, Nancy and uncle Jeff both tried their magically-refilled drinks too. And they both agreed that Cassandra's magic was good.

Then my dad surprised everyone when he suggested, "You folks should try petting Kaylee's tails."

"They're really soft," he added when half the family all gave him confused and questioning looks. "It's kind of relaxing to be honest."

I couldn't help grinning as I realized what he was trying to do. If I sucked the stress out of the in-laws then they'd probably be a lot less annoying to deal with. We wouldn't have to worry about any more arguments this evening either, if everyone was chill. The only problem was I doubted the worst of them would want to give it a try.

Still, it was worth a shot. So I jumped to my feet again and turned while swishing my tails around at everyone as I offered, "Who wants to experience the floof?"

Grampa surprised me yet again when he stepped forward and reached out to run a hand along the fur of my favourite tail. He was still holding his conjured beer in his other hand but he almost dropped it when he pet me. His eyes widened and his shoulders sagged slightly as some tension left him.

"Wow," he gasped as he stepped back. He almost slumped into one of the folding chairs then smiled, "That is really relaxing. I haven't felt this calm since..."

His voice trailed off and he had another gulp of his beer, then just sat there smiling.

I was less surprised when Nancy was the second one to give it a try. I was near enough that she could lean forward and run her fingers through one of my tails' floof, and just like with grampa my cousin's eyes widened as she sat back on her chair.

"That's the softest nicest thing I've ever felt," she half-mumbled.

Uncle Jeff tried as well, and like both grampa and Nancy he ended up looking very relaxed and calm afterwards. He smiled and sipped his beer as he said, "I feel amazing. Bea you need to pet your niece's tail."

Unfortunately neither my aunt or my grandma were the least bit interested in doing that. Same with uncle Rod. Ned seemed suspicious as well, and I was positive he'd realized that touching my tail did something to people. And from the expression on his face I could guess he assumed I was doing something evil to people, despite all three of them saying it was good.

"Kaylee?" mom said as she got to her feet. "Can you give me a hand in the kitchen? It's time to bring out the rest of the food."

She glanced at dad and added, "Raymond if my mother and Rod don't want the drinks Cassandra provided, can you get them something else? And make sure everyone's comfortable."

That seemed to defuse the last of the angry tension for the moment, like mom was obviously trying to get the family get-together back under control or at least into familiar territory. So I excused myself and followed mom into the kitchen, while dad took care of grandma and Rod.

As mom and I got the hot food out of the oven and the sandwich platter out of the fridge she suggested, "When we bring these into the den let's carry them around and offer them out before we set them down on the tables, ok?"

"Actually can you take those little plates and napkins out first?" she added. "That way our guests will have somewhere to put their snacks. I'll follow with the next two platters, then we can come back for the rest."

"Sure mom," I nodded as I picked up the little stack of plates.

Just before the two of us left the kitchen my mom stepped closer and whispered, "Maybe you can make sure to brush your tails up against your aunt Bea when you give her a plate? And your grandmother."

I smiled and my tails twitched in excitement as I whispered back, "Wow mom, you and dad really are going all-in with chaos! Want me to get uncle Rod with my tails too?"

Mom smield back as she nodded and made a 'shh' gesture, then the two of us headed back to the den together. My tails swished about mischievously while I moved around handing out plates and napkins to everyone. And needless to say, my long floofy tails managed to get just about everyone in the room by the time mom and I were done.

I was careful not to be too obvious about it, I knew if my aunt or grandma suddenly felt relaxed the moment I passed by they'd know what I'd done. So I made sure my tails only made the briefest contact. But I also made sure to do it several times over the course of the next fifteen minutes or so, while mom and I were fussing over the food and moving around making sure everyone had whatever they needed and that they were all comfortable and everything.

Cassandra definitely noticed what I was up to, and I was positive my dad did too. For that matter Julie and Tanya seemed to know as well. In fact I had a feeling even my grampa noticed, but he didn't say a word.

After all that, our big family get-together was a bit quieter, but a lot more fun. I even said as much, "I'm glad we got past all the arguing. This has turned into a really nice xmas family gathering."

"Oh um, actually Kaylee?" My mom looked and sounded awkward as she told me, "Your dad and I agreed not to call it that anymore, since that feels like a celebration of the wrong god? We don't want to offend Cassandra, after all. So we were thinking, maybe we could refer to it as Cassmas instead?"

She looked at my girlfriend and added, "If that's ok with you, I mean?"

I could tell Cassandra thought that was funny, while Cass was probably completely mortified by the idea. My goddess girlfriend was still in control though, while her shy demon side remained hidden.

In a slightly-amused voice Cassandra replied, "I appreciate the sentiment Mrs. Holt, but I'm not sure 'Cass-mas' is the best term? How about we call it Chaos-mas instead?"

"Sounds good to me," I grinned. "Happy Chaosmas everyone!"