#rebootwritings

Traipsing through the forest with Hythlodaeus and Athena wasn’t the first thing Hades would have suggested as an activity to do on the day their busy schedules finally aligned for a whole day of leisure. He liked most forests well enough, and he even liked hiking well enough, mostly because it was enjoyable time spent in the company of those most dear to him. And indeed, it was hiking that Athena usually took them out to do when forests were involved.

Usually.

There was always a small chance that their outing was something quite a bit more than a mere hike. It had been quite a while since their last “exciting activity” as she liked to call it, and Hades had almost forgotten that she was overdue for one.

And this lapse in judgement was how Hades now found himself panting in a tree high above the forest floor. 

“Remind me again why we aren’t using our magicks?” he snapped at the people standing on a cliff edge across a dizzying gap who allegedly loved him but left him there on the branch by himself.

“If we disrupt the local aether, you won’t get to see what I want to show you! Come on, you’re almost there, Hades!” Athena called. “This jump is the biggest one but I know you can do it!”

“We’ll not let you fall, Hades!” Hythlodaeus added cheerfully, but Hades wasn’t so sure he liked that tone...

Hades let out a noise of mingled frustration before slowly letting go of the massive tree trunk—whatever it was she wanted to show them had better be worth the trouble. He carefully found his footing on the branch he stood on and steeled himself for the jump: it was just far enough that he would need a running start, and he supposed it was a small comfort that he was not wearing the customary, billowing robes of the city, which would surely catch the wind and send him tumbling down to the forest floor…

He ran as fast as the bough would allow—

And leapt—

And halfway through he realized with horror that he may fall just short—

A pair of hands quickly snatched him from his premature descent—his knee buckled as he was awkwardly pulled forward and he lost his balance, sending him and his rescuers tumbling into a heap—

Athena was, as always, first to let out her effusive, unrestrained laugh as they lay there in the dirt, and next, as always, came Hythlodaeus’s slower laugh that seemed to rumble in his chest, and, as always, his laugh was last, coaxed out of him by the contagious sounds of his companions—

And soon they were on their feet again, ready to continue on to whatever it was Athena dragged them out here to show them.

“We’re nearly there,” said Athena as she began leading them northward. “Both of you can probably see it already.”

Now that she made mention of it, Hades cast his eyes about for what she could be talking about. He quickly found what must be their destination: a gentle, swirling pool of aether not far from where they jumped. Such pools were short-lived and quite rare—existing in a delicate balance for mere days before they were swept up once again by the currents of the Underworld. It explained why Athena had forbidden magicks on their approach; any fluctuations in the local aether could destabilize the pool before they could take a look at it.

“How ever did you find this without destroying it?” asked Hythlodaeus in surprise. “When were you last here?”

“It’s fortunate I decided to climb up here the other day,” she replied. Hades had a passing impulse to ask her just what she was doing climbing up here without magicks, but he resisted—it wasn’t out of the ordinary for her to forgo magicks in favor of more physical challenges.

As they reached the crest of a hill, Athena slowed and turned to them with a smile. “Just over there. I think you’ll like it,” she said.

Hades and Hythlodaeus peered down into the small gully just down the hill, and Hades’ eyes widened in awe at the sight of it. He had only seen one such pool of aether once before, and not in an area as full of life as what he saw now: the life in the area was saturated with aether, with flowers and grasses and trees and even the water and air twinkling brightly along their aetherial lines because of it—so much so that the area would glimmer even without his gift of Sight.

“It’s beautiful,” he said, smiling. Hythlodaeus nodded in agreement.

“It is. Thank you, Athena.”

“I thought you’d like it.”

“You seem troubled. Something the matter?”

Annaiette cracked an eye open, glancing toward the table by the window to find Hades’ eyes on her with what looked like mild amusement on his face. She yawned and rolled onto her back, splaying her limbs across the bed and stretching them as far as they’d go, before sleepily rolling back onto her side and curling up with a pillow in her arms. 

“Did you put him up to it?” she murmured into the pillow as she shut her eyes again.

“Put him up to what, my dear?” he asked lazily as the tinkering sounds resumed—he was busy stripping components out of some salvaged Garlean device.

She furrowed her brow and sighed into the pillow. 

“Nero. Did you ask him to do that?” she asked. “To kiss me.”

There was a chuckle of amusement. “Ah, did he now?” was the only reply she got.

She opened an eye again to give Hades a reproachful stare for his lacking answer, but his attention was on the device in his hands. She stared anyways.

“He shouldn’t feel like he needs to pretend to like me.”

“And what makes you think he is pretending?”

Hades’ words gave her pause. It was true that it had all felt genuine enough, but after the fact she had chalked it up to him being overcome with emotion by technological happenings, as was his wont.

“What in the world would he want with me? I’ve nothing to offer him.”

He looked to her and arched an eyebrow. “Doubtful that his aim is to get something from you, except perhaps the opportunity to enjoy your company.” 

It sounded so ludicrous that she let out a noise of frustration and buried her face in the pillow. 

“I thought you liked Nero quite a bit,” Hades said, a hint of a laugh in his voice. “What’s the problem?”

Annaiette exhaled into the pillow before pulling it down just enough to uncover her eyes. “I don’t want him forcing himself because of some notion that he ought to include me.”

The amused smile on Hades’ face grew slightly wider as he worked. “He likes you more than you realize, my dear. I hardly think he is forcing himself—he is Nero, after all, and if he hadn’t wanted to do it, he wouldn’t have,” he said matter-of-factly. 

She turned this fact over in her mind for a few moments, before finally letting out another sigh and burying her face in the pillow once more.

“I suppose you’re right.”

“When am I not?”

A brief pause.

“I don’t think you want me to answer that,” she chuckled into the pillow.

A laugh.