Welcome to Gaia! ::

It was the first time that Athene had powered up this year. In fact it was the first time that the dark-haired senshi had powered up since his encounter with the crazy youmafied decorations shortly before Christmas.

The extended break hadn’t really been down to choice – both he and his cousin had been expected for Christmas over at his Uncle’s place and there had been what felt like a mountain of preparation to get through before they could make the drive down (or more like Saffy make the drive down given as his civilian counterpart still didn’t have his driving license).

It had been nice however to have a break (however brief) from the general day to day weirdness that seemed to make up his life as a senshi – youma decorations being a case in point.

But now the dark-haired senshi was back, it was just as easy to fall back into old habits and with his cousin deciding to spend her last weekend before going back to work visiting a friend, it had seemed an opportune time for Athene to hit the patrol beat again. Picking up a hot drink before patrol was something of a quirk for the dark-haired senshi and this time was no different, the hot chocolate he’d picked up earlier carefully cradled in his hands as he found himself walking in the direction of the park.

Athene had spent quite a lot of the latter half of the previous year at the Park while out on patrol, mayhaps, therefore it was ironic that his first patrol of the New Year had once again taking him in a parkwise direction – alternatively mayhaps it was a sign that the dark-haired senshi was finally picking up something of a fixed patrol route.

Either way it had been a pleasant enough day so far, with no random youma encounters – at least not to that particular point in time – and Athene had been content to let himself meander a little – well at least he was until he picked up on the chaotic aura.

A wary look flickered across grey eyes, Athene’s easy mood gone – his last encounter with the Dark Mirror court definitely fell into the unpleasant category and had precipitated the dark-haired senshi’s need for new glasses.

Athene’s thoughts towards the Dark Mirror court were mixed. Although the ones that he’d managed to speak to (a number that was so low that it didn’t even clear a hand) had been on balance pretty much okay. Athene had also witnessed others from the same court going after and killing Pages.

His last encounter with a member from the Dark Mirror court hadn’t gone so well either – had in fact ended up with the dark-haired senshi left on the ground, glasses broken. In fact given how painful the encounter had been on Athene’s part was safe to say that the blond Mirror senshi was probably the last person that the senshi of beads wanted to see.

Despite managing to hold his ground however once he realised just who was heading in his direction, Athene was unable to help the slight flinch as he glanced warily at the blond super senshi.

The cheerful greeting took Athene by surprise – was unexpected given how their last encounter had gone and for a moment, brief though it was, he contemplated not answering however at last politeness won out, his voice slightly flat as he said quietly “I’m doing okay thank you.”

Athene listened to the Dark Mirror Super’s words in a frosty silence. The dark-haired senshi hadn’t forgotten the pain caused by the blows raining down on him or the helpless feeling while he had been curled up in a ball of just wanting it all to stop.

He was contemplating walking away, not really wanting to remember the encounter that had left him having to think up an explanation to try and explain the rather spectacular black eye that the blond senshi had ‘gifted’ him with or the period of having to fall back on contacts until he could get a replacement set of glasses.

In fact he’d half-turned with the intention of walking away, when Virtus said something that had him swinging round to stare at the blond Dark Mirror senshi in surprise. “You want me to what?” Surely he hadn’t just heard the other make an offer for him to take a swing at him.

Athene couldn’t help it – for a moment the dark-haired senshi stared at Virtus until he realised that 1) the other Super Senshi seemed serious and 2) that he was staring at the blond senshi and staring was rude.

“I can’t do that” Athene found it hard to punch people at the best of times and he wasn’t going to start because the other had offered to let him. “And it’s not like punching you would make me feel better or fix my old glasses.” It would just (to his mind) make him as bad as the other had been and yes Athene was still resentful about the glasses – he’d loved the old pair of somewhat battered black-framed glasses.

Athene wasn’t sure what to make of Virtus. He’d thought the other okay when they’d first met – well apart from the energy-stealing thing which was never (as far as the dark-haired senshi was concerned) going to be okay in his book.

Then at their second meeting the other had pretty much beaten him to a pulp which had made Athene have to rethink the whole okay thing because okay people did not beat the crap out of other people.

And now the blond was acting pretty much like their first encounter – sans the energy-stealing and the dark-haired senshi was left feeling confused about which was the real Virtus. “You were here first” he said at last. There didn’t seem to be any civilians around, which meant that Athene didn’t have to feel like he had to try and stop the other senshi from whatever – which was probably just as well given how well the last time had gone.

He sighed “And I don’t think we can all be on the same team.” Maybe there were Dark Mirror senshi out there who were interested in purifying and the dark-haired senshi certainly hoped that there were, but the few that Athene had talked to hadn’t given the impression that they might be interested, although to be fair purification hadn’t been a topic that had come up in his conversation with Navi.

“Mayhaps,” for a moment Athene hesitated, before adding quietly. “If enough of us work at it, then maybe someday none of us will have to fight anymore.”

He bit his lip for a moment before continuing “We’re not friends.” Athene couldn’t promise friendship – not given how their previous encounters had turned out. He hesitated for another brief moment before admitting “But I don’t want to fight you either.”

Turning he paused to add a brief “I’ll leave you to the rest of your day” before walking away from Virtus.

So far Athene’s previous encounters with Virtus (two in all) had left the dark-haired senshi confused about the other – seemed that that third was not the charm, given that once again Athene was left confused by what to make of the blond Senshi of Kindness.