Summary: During one afternoon while training in Henesys, Victoria Island, Aran hears a plea for help coming from a hole in the ground. A male!Aran & female!Evan friendship fic. Post Big Bang–Rated K+
OR IN OTHER WORDS: How Aran and Evan met.
A/N: Holy mother of cows, 5 ½ pages of K-rated fluff! It's a miracle!
The merciless sun blazed over Henesys, sending most of its lively inhabitants scurrying for any sort of cover from the intense heat and even the normally springy bushes of vegetation and wild-grown trees, who although were acclimated to the days of piercing temperature, wilted and drooped while being battered by the sun's rays.
The heat wave had, so far, lasted for several days. The smarter merchants (and citizens) in the usually bustling town closed up their shops for the week and planned impromptu trips to Florina Beach while the rest of the town suffered in the hot spell, slathering on copious amounts of sunscreen whenever exiting the safety of their homes and turning on any possible form air conditioning known to the Maple world up at full blast.
Heck, even Athena Pierce was holed up in her building while sending out daily messages of postponed archery training for the duration of the heat wave.
However, despite the sun's all-mighty brilliance in attempting to scorch poor Henesys from the face of the Maple land, one sole person managed to resist the buckets-of-sweat-inducing heat. The said person was currently training (or more like whacking) several Orange Mushrooms that were not able to find shelter from the warmth into sweet oblivion.
One particularly hard thwack from an old pole-arm sent a poor mushroom flying high through the air; Aran, with a tanned hand shading his strikingly cyan eyes, trailed the squealing monster's path with a bored expression, noting that although it went far, the mushroom didn't go far enough.
'At this rate, I'll be as old as Grendel when I finally get strong enough to defeat the Black Magician!' Aran thought glumly to himself as he dug the tip of his pole-arm into the soft ground, 'I need to train even harder!'
Determined, Aran hefted up his trusty weapon and trudged even deeper into the trembling growths of Henesys's forests, ignoring the pangs of soreness and burning in his arms, which were the direct results from training for several hours non-stop in the heat of one of Henesys's most intense heat waves.
Aran was, naturally, not a person accustomed the sweltering temperatures since he had grown up (once upon a time, in another life years ago) somewhere in the snowy depths of El Nath, which was probably was made even more apparent after being encased inside a block of ice for several decades, so it was quite surprising (in his opinion) that he managed to not pass out the minute he stepped foot out of the Regular Cab. It didn't really help the fact that he still had his furred Simple Warrior Set on, although the fact that he was still here might also have something to do with the incredibly horrifying notion of Lilan eating his head for breakfast if he skipped out on his daily training regimen for as much as even an hour.
Scanning the thick shrubbery for some straggling Pigs or more of those polka-dotted Orange Mushrooms and straining his ears for sounds made by passing monsters, Aran sighed as nothing seemed to pop out from the general population of wildlife, possibly too affected by the heat wave to even attempt to bother travelers and the like.
Turning around and making way to exit the forest, the rustling of bushes near his left sent Aran spinning around to investigate. Peering through the vegetation and batting away some branches, he was faced with…
…a baby dragon?
The baby dragon, looking as if not even more than a year old and some pastel shade of robin-egg-blue with two tiny horns poking out of its egg-shell hat, made squealing noises and breathed out wisps of blue fire from its nostrils as it bounced up and flapped tiny wings in an attempt to try and fly. In all things, it looked quite pitiful, really. Was this really how those every one of those supposedly all-powerful dragons started out?
The dragon wobbly made its way in the air to a quite confused pole-armed Mapler. Floating to around Aran's height, it made a yipping sound and spun in quick circles around his head.
Getting a bit dizzy from the strange creature's playfulness, Aran frowned and grabbed the dragon's small tail with his free hand when it passed by another circle. The dragon yipped again and batted its wings a few more times, the bell on the collar around its neck jingling noisily.
Wait, collar?
Now that it was up closer to his face, Aran could clearly see a simple blue collar around the dragon's neck which said (although upside-down) something around the lines of 'Evan - Utah's House.'
"So…" Aran softly said to the flapping creature, not wanting to startle the rare animal anymore than he already had, "Is your name Evan?" The dragon shook its head furiously, almost breaking his grip on its tail. Aran thought for a moment before asking again,
"Is your owner's name Evan?" This time, the strange monster nodded a few times and licked his face with its long, slobbery tongue. Grimacing slightly and letting go of the dragon to wipe his face, Aran hefted his pole-arm back onto his shoulder. The dragon whistled and breathed some more wisps of magical fire before slowly flapping its way towards some direction, slowing down when it saw that Aran was staring at it with an eyebrow raised.
Whistling and snorting louder, the baby dragon urgently insisted (in its own language) that he follow. Aran, although skeptical about following a tamed monster into some unknown place and possibly getting eaten in the process, followed anyways. A short break couldn't possibly kill him if Lilan didn't find out.
Evan sighed for the umpteenth time as she tossed a pebble mindlessly at the dirt wall in front of her and twisted a loose lock of her chestnut hair around a gloved finger, completely bored out of her mind as she sat awkwardly in the small hole in the ground. Earlier she had sent Mir, her baby dragon, to go and go find anyone that could help her out of the six-feet-deep hole, but she knew the possibility of being rescued for the next couple of hours were slim because of the freak heat wave that had hit her home town for the past few days.
Scrunching her nose in distaste and pain as she shifted her left leg closer to her body, Evan cursed her luck with avoiding holes in the ground while looking for a good target for her dragon to practice on. Apparently she didn't see the ditch and tripped into this tiny pocket of earth, completely dirtying the beautifully red work-out top and skirt her Mama had made especially for training and spraining her ankle in the process. She was too short to reach any ledges and her foot had hurt too much for her to even stand, so she was a sitting duck until Mir returned. It didn't help that the hole was almost concealed under the tall grasses and bushes either, lowering her chances of being found.
After a few more painful minutes of waiting that seemed to feel like eternity, the sounds of the grass covering her hole rustling made Evan look up and lo and behold, Mir was flapping excitedly, making yipping and clicking sounds as it flew in low circles around the circumference of the hole. Evan smiled in relief as her dragon signaled whoever that it had found to come and rescue her–
–only to frown as a crude pole-arm randomly flew over Mir's head, the dragon barely getting out of the way as an out of breath voice shouted from somewhere above,
"Stupid dragon, stop flying so fast! Wait up!"
Evan paled at the thought of her rescuer accidentally falling into the hole and squashing her like a bug so she yelled out, "Hey! Down here! Don't you dare hurt Mir!"
The dragon-master-in-training heard a short curse and thump as whoever was up there tripped over a rock or something and rolled through a bush before they replied cautiously, "Who said that? Come out!"
Evan felt a sweat drop make its way down her face as Mir chirped in its confused way before wobbling over the hole she was stuck in and then flying off. Another thump and curse sounded as Evan sweat dropped again; Mir was probably chewing on the other person's ears in an attempt to get their attention. She tried yelling again, "I'm down here! Mir was flying over the hole a minute ago!"
Some scuffling and thudding noises from above came through the grass before a head popped up at the opening of the hole.
A rather handsome head.
Her rescuer was, from her viewpoint, a young man with tanned skin with strange snow-white hair that was styled like a short mohawk and bright cyan eyes blinked curiously at her from above. His clothes were also as odd as his looks; who was possibly in their sane mind to wear fur and leather during this heat wave? He seemed to pause for a moment at seeing her, but then simply said,
"What are you doing down there?" Evan, who very much wanted to get out of this hole already twisted ankle or not, pouted slightly,
"I fell down. Now, can you help me out of here? I've been stuck in this place for around an hour!" Her rescuer looked around for a moment before saying,
"Sure, uh...wait a moment–I need to get something..." He trailed off before scrambling away, disappearing into the grass as Mir floated down the hole and perched cutely on top of her head. A few seconds later, he reappeared with the pole-arm that Evan remembered having been thrown at Mir some minutes ago. The end of the pole-arm without the blade was lowered down enough so that if she reached with both hands she could grab it.
"Just hold on tightly and I'll pull you up." Evan gripped the pole and felt herself being slowly tugged up and out of the hole, the young man at the top heaving and huffing as he pulled the girl up while carefully avoiding the sharp blade of the pole-arm's head.
It took a while (possibly because of the sun vehemently trying to burn the poor man wearing fur), but Evan was finally out of the ditch. Releasing her death-grip on the wooden handle and flopping on her back onto the tall grass, Evan gulped in a huge breath of fresh air that did not smell like dried mud and dead weeds and briefly enjoyed the sun's rays on her face.
Looking over to her right with her relief-filled green eyes, she saw the young man that dragged her out of the hole on his back as well as being licked furiously by an enthusiastic Mir, hands out and weakly batting away the tongue as her dragon slobbered affectionately all over him. Sitting up with a wince, Evan whistled sharply and Mir stopped his licking and wobbled over to her. The young man (Evan realized that at a closer look, he was more of around her age), sat up and wiped his face with his sleeve before standing up, his back popping slightly from the stretch before turning to face her.
Evan could feel her cheeks heating up as he picked up his pole-arm, walked over to her, and worriedly asked, "Are you hurt anywhere?" Evan shook her head and quickly tried to stand up before collapsing again, her ankle flaring up with sharp pricks. Looking down as she heard a low chuckle, her cheeks flushed even more in embarrassment when her rescuer knelt down and gently grabbed her twisted ankle.
"Hmm... doesn't look too bad, although it's a bit swollen..." Looking up, Evan stared into clear eyes that held no hint of ill-intent before hurriedly tugging her ankle out of his hold and stuttering out,
"I-I can walk on m-my own! T-thank you for helping me out of the hole!" Mir floated behind her and yipped a few times as if chastising her for refusing help from the kind man, but Evan brushed her dragon off and tried to stand again. She was almost successful but a sudden flare of pain got her off balance and she nearly fell when a hand grabbed her elbow and steadied her.
"I don't quite believe you're able to walk just yet." Evan's blush returned, but she only replied coolly as she tugged her elbow out of his hold,
"I can get back home just fine and I don't want to trouble you any further, stranger." The young man behind her gave a short bark of laughter before moving in front of her and crouching down as if offering a piggy-back ride to a child.
"Sure you can, but you probably don't want to agitate your ankle any more than it already has so hop on and I'll carry you to your house. It won't bother me at all." Evan, although skeptical at his childish treatment towards her, wrapped her arms around his neck.
When her arms were adjusted comfortably enough, the man stood up and hooked his arms carefully under her knees before walking towards Henesys at a sedate pace under the blazing sun with Mir flapping happily next to them. Evan noticed something as they began to walk away from the hole.
"Hey, you left your weapon back there!" The man only shrugged slightly before replying,
"I'll get it later. Getting you home is more important." Evan quieted down a little before she realized something else.
"...I don't know your name..." The man turned his head a little before simply saying,
"My name is Aran. What's yours?" Evan smiled.
"My name's Evan, and my dragon's name is Mir!" Aran seemed to stare off into the distance for a moment before asking,
"Are you related to Freed?" Evan blinked owlishly.
"Who's that?" Aran shook his head before saying,
"Never mind. Where's your house?"
"Over there, past the Hill East of Henesys where Utah's Pig Farm is."
"Got it."
As the two future heroes of the Maple world traversed the rolling green hills while comfortably easing into conversation as if they were born to be friends, the sun ceased its angry burning and dropped the temperature back to normal, the remaining townsfolk of Henesys cheering as the dreadful heat wave finally went away.
Somewhere in a dark cavern several thousand miles underground, the Black Magician shrieked in anger as it saw, through its magic crystal ball, the two out of five of his original adversaries finding each other and forming a friendship that would inevitably lead to its downfall in the future yet again.