Every time she took on Anakeion's blue and silver uniform, took on that ancient-old and new-again skin, Amaris always half expected -- there would be some kind of brilliant confluence of things that would make her feel less confused and angry and afraid, the way she did every night and had for the last few years, the way she got around that one park and some rooftops and some alleyways -- she always half-hoped, half-wanted, something would make sense. Something would make sense in her head, something would click, and everything would be worth it. Everything she had suffered through, every inch she'd dug her heels in, every tear she'd cried at night would be for a worthy cause.

Nothing ever happened like that. Not for Anakeion, anyway. Instead she powered up and chaperoned Cepheus through a pale imitation of a patrol, and she thought about messaging Encke, and she didn't message Encke, and she thought about messaging Viatrix, and she didn't message Viatrix either. And she thought about texting Elzo, or Alise, or anyone she had known in both faces before she'd taken her humiliating hiatus and before she'd been dragged back into it all, and she didn't do any of that. If they felt any auras coming their way with any speed, even Lieutenants, Amaris' first order of business had been to teach Zee how to drop Cepheus off her skin in five seconds flat on Amaris' signal and have the two of them become a duo of unassuming auraless civilians.

It might have saved their lives by now. She wasn't sure. Hopefully it hadn't, because that meant she was making a big deal out of nothing, and that meant it was safer these days.

It wasn't safer these days. Anakeion didn't need to do anything but, like, turn on the ******** news to know that. Just as many comas, as many disappearances, as many deaths, as many injuries. But even so -- Zee was trapped in this now, as trapped as Amaris was again, and that meant: seeking out youma. Easy youma, at first, and then moving to more threatening ones. Moving to harder ones who were smarter, or who were fiercer, or who had tricky environments and shadows on their side.

She'd had Zee take them to Cepheus, too. Anakeion suspected it had been beautiful, when it was new, when it was alive; even now it landed them in some deep chamber, the endless twilight roiling of the waves above transmitted through the translucent skylight, leaving elegant shadows playing over their skin. They hadn't ventured too far, not alone; taking two had been so exhausting for Cepheus that Anakeion had panicked a little and had her sister take them back less than thirty minutes later, unprepared for fainting spells, unprepared for anything at all beyond peace and calm and no waves to rock the metaphorical boat.

There hadn't been any skeletons or marks of death on Cepheus, yet, not in those first few rooms. Which was good, because Anakeion really didn't want to have That Talk with Cepheus, the one about 'hey, so, a thousand years ago your past self probably died here, and probably died horribly, and probably died along with the rest of their people, and there are so many bones and graves to find you'll start imagining the gravedirt under your nails even when it's not there'.

Ha. That was funny. Anakeion didn't want to have that talk with Cepheus? She didn't even, like, want to have it with herself.

It had been months, since she'd started being Anakeion again and not just being Amaris full time, and she hadn't been back to her Wonder yet. Every time she thought the phrase that would take her there, she recoiled from it; it almost felt like it would burn her, as if it was dangerous, as if it was some sort of - infohazard, or something like that, something that could hurt her without ever being actually put into action, like, all the way. But -- it was almost ******** May, and that meant Zee was going to be home fulltime when school let out, and there might be questions from Cepheus to Anakeion that would hurt to answer, when they had to see each other twenty-four hours a day.

And if she wanted to be even remotely responsible, wanted to feel like less of a mess of a sister and a person and a human being in general, she needed to do her goddamn job as Anakeion, which involved cleaning up that Wonder and making it a place she wasn't ashamed of. A place that Amynta would have called her own to steward, thousands of years ago (and, like, that was a whole mess in and of itself, because she was Amynta, and she wasn't, and it was -- it was messy. A few years ago, Castor had almost looked the same as he had all the way back then, if she'd squinted. Maybe he was different now. Hopefully she was different now; Amynta had been sharper-featured than Amaris, pointier-jawed, with heavier-lidded eyes, or that's how she remembered that mirror and the memory).

So.

Three PM was late enough she was fully awake, and early enough the Negaversers hadn't really come out to play yet. That was good. This was about to be ******** embarrassing if it didn't work, but she didn't want to do it at home -- so Amaris walked into a Starbucks that was busy fit to bursting, and she made her way into the bathroom, and she closed herself in a stall and locked it and called Anakeion's armor to cover her.

And then she unlocked the door, and she looked at herself in the mirror and didn't meet her own eyes, and she said what she needed to say. "I pledge my life and loyalty to Castor, and to Anakeion. I -" her voice cracked, embarrassingly hard, but thankfully nobody was there to listen - "I humbly request your aid, so that in return I can give you mine."

And she was gone.

[wc: 1009]
[backdated to ~april 21st!]