Hoshidan Artemis

Gray raises an eyebrow and snorts out a laugh. “At least you have confidence going for you.” He looked around at the park, “And the light seems good today? Honestly, I know nothing about photography.” His let his shoulders sag dramatically, but had an apologetic grin on his face. “I take phone photos sometimes, but they’re usually fuzzy.” And mostly sneaky photos of Tobin but no one needed to know his shame.

He turned and took in the surrounding area. “Anything interesting you were focusing on, or just taking photos for photos sake?” Gray honestly didn’t see anything worth photographing in the area, but he was no artist. There was probably something he was missing. He winced as Setsuna described her fall. “That still sounds uncomfortable. I’d love to help you get down, but… uh… how tight are those ropes? I don’t want to make it worse.”

Setsuna let out a snort. “You don’t sound like somebody who knows anything about photography.” She replied. That was fine though. Not everyone needed to be good at it. If everyone was good, then she would have a much harder time doing anything with her photography. It was only because people were bad that it worked.

“I like wandering. Finding stuff. It’s fun. But then sometimes I do end up in places like this.”

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Setsuna’s description of Hinoka brought forth a quiet chuckle. A capable lady, from the sound of things. “She sounds quite different from my own boss… He’s still new to people’s expectations, I think, but he’s doing his best.” Toeing the ground absently, hands in his pockets, he wondered how Hector and Ostia were doing without him. Just fine, probably. Oswin and the council would be there to keep him in line.

Surely the place wouldn’t burn to the ground while he happened to be away just a day or two. He suppressed the grimace that thought brought to mind, and nodded instead. Yes, really. Despite himself. His work awaited… but work could wait a bit longer. Even so, he was sorely tempted to take her at her word. She had shown she could handle herself just fine (minus the whole falling into pitfalls thing - but there, they were no different).

He opened his mouth to speak, but she beat him to the punch, and his mind was with that made up. With a small smile, he seated himself. “In that case, think I’ll stick around. At least for a little bit.” Maybe he’d even get to meet the Lady Hinoka Setsuna seemed to hold in such high esteem…

“What do you usually do while you’re waiting for her to find ya though? D'you like, nap or?”

“Nothing very exciting.” She admitted. She tapped a mindless rhythm against the ground with her toes. She was kind of surprised Matthew had agreed to stay. He seemed important. She would have thought he would have had to rush home right away. But she was glad he’d decided to stay. She’d decided he was nice. A nice Saizo. Pleasant to be around.

Underground things… That left much to the imagination, but given he was in no hurry to return, Matthew was content leaving it at that. She wasn’t wrong, after all. Whatever they had been doing back then, however long ago that had been, it had indeed been underground. He smiled in quiet appreciation and nodded. “Probably.”

Taking in another breath of the blissfully fresh outside air, he took a few steps after her but gave pause at the archer’s question. “Hmm… Yeah, I should be fine.” He was certain he could find where he’d left off and retrace his steps if need be. He did need to be getting back to work sooner rather than later… But…

“She’s really reliable that way huh, your Lady Hinoka? That sounds… nice.” Glancing away, he took to nudging a rock with his shoe. “Are you… What about you, Setsuna? Is it safe for you to wait on your own? I could-” Could he? “-I can wait for her with you, if you want.”

Who said chivalry was dead? Perish the thought.

“Oh, of course!” Setsuna brightened immediately, smiling fondly at  the thought of her liege. “Lady Hinoka is wonderful and so smart. She always has the best ideas. That’s probably why she’s so good at finding me. She always just knows. It’s very useful! Especially when I get stuck in traps and can’t go home. Because then it’s like a game too.”

Oh, but that wasn’t really the question, was it? Setsuna blinked and tilted her head curiously at his offer. “Oh, really?” She didn’t think he would’ve waited with her. She wasn’t sure why he would either. She thought he was busy with places to go. Wouldn’t staying with her waste his time?

Gray squinted up at the figure, taking in how the ropes were tangled about her ankles. “You need some help then? That can’t be super comfortable?” He scooted around to the side and looked at the mess from a different angle. He might be able to get up in the ropes without increasing pressure on her poor ankle? Gray wasn’t sure though.

Instead of climbing up, he tilted his head and watched her mess with something for a minute. Was… was that a camera? “You can’t be getting any good shots from that angle.” He called up. “How did you end up like this anyway?” 

“I always get a good shot.” Setsuna replied. She didn’t bother to pause and look at the boy, just continued fiddling with her camera before lifting it and taking another quick shot. The ropes intercrossing and making a pattern against the sky looked interesting. She liked it.

She hummed thoughtfully as she tried to remember what had happened. “Oh I was sitting up at the top trying to get some photos. And then I slipped and I fell. Lucky that I fell this way and the ropes stopped my fall. It would’ve been even worse if they didn’t.”

He climbed up and stood tall to meet the waning daylight, and breathed deeply of the woods with no small appreciation. Sweet, sweet freedom…

“Yeah, we did it!” he agreed with a small chuckle of relief, the tension seeping from his shoulders. But with Setsuna’s next statement, Matthew could but grin and shake his head in wonder. Their definitions of ’easy’ didn’t quite mesh, perhaps, but even so… looking on the brighter side of things was not such a bad idea, especially now that they’d concluded their escape.

Preceded by a soft laugh, he smiled and nodded. “Yeah, I guess we both did make it out in one piece, so that’s something. Gotta wonder what this place was used for though, back in the day. All those runes make me curious.” Not that he was in any hurry to go back and investigate. Scratching at the nape of his neck, he shrugged.

“You heading home from here, then? Or are you as much at the Gates’ mercy as me?”

“Probably underground things.” Setsuna answered. She didn’t really know much about runes. That was more Azama’s realm of knowledge than hers. But if the tunnel was underground they had to want something that was down there, right? It seemed too unused for it to just be a path for people to take whenever they wanted.

“I should get home, but it’s probably best if I wait for Lady Hinoka to come get me. She’d be annoyed if I disappeared and she had to go and find me somewhere else.” She would find her in the end though, Lady Hinoka always did. With that said, she wandered over to a nearby stump and took a seat. She’d make herself comfortable.

A lot of emotions ran over Silas’s face all at once. Setsuna watched curiously. She was starting to wonder if suggesting it had been a bad idea. She couldn’t really tell what he thought about it. It would be a little disappointing, but she wouldn’t mind. There were plenty of other things to do that would be fun, they’d just do those.

She blinked at the sudden burst of questions. He looked just as surprised to be asking them. “Oh, right.” Silly her, she’d almost forgotten. She wandered back where things had been stored and took hold of a bottle she kept among those things. Very important, horrible to forget.

She wandered back and placed the bottle gently on the bed. She didn’t take her place again though. Instead, she gently pushed at Silas’s shoulder to lean back so she could settle herself comfortably in his lap. Her fingers trailed lightly along his skin and slowly down the length of his arm. “Not myself. But I promise to be nice and take good care of you.”

“It was raining when I fell in, yeah. Probably the reason I slipped down there in the first place.” Hah. Yeah. One hundred per cent it was strictly that and not the fact he’d been looking anywhere but straight ahead of himself, whilst trying to make sure he’d left his trailers behind. Mmmyep.

But rain or shine, Matthew looked forward to an exit. He’d had his fill of falling and of rodents of unusual size. The cart ride had been a spot of excitement he did not regret but, nevertheless, he was starting to feel the slightest bit claustrophobic being stuck in these damp tunnels.

When the bats coursed past them, he, too, ducked for cover. But it seemed the creatures had little interest in the duo, more spooked than hostile in this case. In their wake, the thief could but nod in agreement with Setsuna’s assessment. ’Woah,’ indeed.

“Hey. Look.” The bats’ retreat had revealed something of interest: a light at the end of the tunnel. A light that seemed a fair margin more natural than that of the lanterns flickering about them. “Fingers crossed, huh. Shall we?”

With a flourish and a bow, he waited for her before falling into step at her side - albeit not too close, and not too far.

Setsuna hummed. She didn’t mind the rain, but that didn’t mean she was eager to get drenched on the way home. It would be annoying to get sick, and she would never hear the end of it from people who thought they were better at her job than she was. They had enough excuses.

Luckily the bats didn’t seem to want to hurt them, just to leave. Which was fine in Setsuna’s case. She let out a quiet giggle as she watched Matthew bow before continuing their walk. They needed to get out and soon. She was careful to leave him some space as they walked.

It took a bit of time, and some upward climbing, but soon enough they made it to where the light filtered into the tunnel. The forest greeted them once more, damp and smelling of rain, but it thankfully wasn’t coming from the sky.

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I’ll randomly generate a number between 1-29 for one of the following:

A funny text

A sad text

A scared text

A late night text

An excited text

A taunting text

An angry text

A frustrated text

A concerned text

A loving text

A confession via text

An accidental text

A wrong number text

A text that wasn’t sent

A text for help

A helpful text

A comforting text

A drunk text

A bad idea text

A rude text

A long text

A one word text

A text asking for advice

A final text

A flirty text

A hyper text

A weird text

A sarcastic text

Hands stuck deep in his cargo short pockets, Gray wandered towards the local park. He was glad the weather was finally nice enough he could wear his tanktops and denim vests again instead of flannels. Not that there was anything wrong with flannel but… what good were arm muscles if you couldn’t show them off?

On the edge of the park sat a small playground that had been there as long as Gray could remember. As long as his oldest sister could remember too, though she remembered a playground that was more wood and less metal. Gray would take a hot metal slide over splinters any day. 

As he rounded the central tower the spider web came into view and he squinted in confusion. A figure was tangled in the middle of it, they looked relaxed but… they could be dead? Gray wandered a little closer to see if they were breathing and relaxed when they arched their head back to look at him.

“Hey,” he pulled a hand out of his pocket to wave a bit awkwardly. “You, uh… alright there?”

“Oh. Yes. My ankle hurts a lot and I can’t get down, but I’m fine, thank you for asking.”

She didn’t recognize the younger boy who’d found her, but that was fine. There were a lot of people in the world, Setsuna couldn’t be expected to know or remember every single one of them. That just seemed like it would be rude to expect of her.