"Hey Junko! Watcha doing?"
Junko nearly jumped three feet in the air at the sound of Aerrow's voice. He dropped the pencil so that it landed with a clatter on the floor as he spun to face the sky knight. Aerrow was leaning casually in the doorframe, cool as a blizzard crystal, though his eyes widened at Junko's sudden jump. The wallop slapped a hand down on the paper he'd been writing on, his huge palm covering the letters.
"Nothing!" he said, too loudly and redder in the face than Aerrow's hair.
Aerrow raised an eyebrow. His face said it all: 'Yeah, right.'
Junko's grey eyes darted again to the paper.
"Just writing a letter." he finally blurted.
Aerrow was interested.
"Can I see?"
"NO!"
Aerrow jumped back, ears ringing. Junko hesitated.
"I mean, uh."
A bead of sweat was budding at his temple. Now Aerrow knew something was up, but also knew it was only a matter of time before the wallop would crack. Just a few more seconds...
"Well...okay."
Junko handed Aerrow the letter, then ducked his head and hunched his shoulders. Aerrow scanned the page. He blinked.
"Junko," a grin spread over his face. "Is this a love letter?"
The boy could almost feel Junko's embarrassment. He nodded.
"Is it..." he asked tentatively. "...good?"
"Yeah! It's really good!"
And it was. The poetic words were descriptions of beautiful imagery, and painted a very pretty picture. Aerrow had never thought that Junko was dull-witted or not good with words (in fact, this letter seemed to prove he was much better than Aerrow himself), but he'd never pegged the engineer as a poetic kind of guy.
"I mean, this line here: "raindrops on blue skies, such are your eyes", I mean, how did you get this stuff?"
Seeing some obviously promising feedback, Junko shrugged with no small amount of pride.
"I just write down whatever comes to mind."
Aerrow was sure he'd never look at his flight mechanic in quite the same way again.
"So, who's the lucky girl?" he asked.
He expected Junko to be embarrassed again, and he didn't disappoint. Junko's blush reappeared.
"Come on, Junko," Aerrow wheedled, "I promise I won't tell anyone if you don't want me too."
He hesitated, then gave Aerrow a serious look.
"You promise?"
"Promise."
"Swear on your oath as a sky knight."
Aerrow put a hand over his heart.
"I swear as a sky knight of Atmos that I won't tell anyone who that letter's for."
Junko let out his breath.
"Okay," he looked up at Aerrow, then away again, "It's Dove."
Aerrow blinked. Once, then twice. Had he heard right?
"You're writing a love letter to Dove?" he asked. "As in, Terra Gale Dove? As in Wren's granddaughter?"
"Yes, her. I'm writing Dove love letters!" Junko admitted in a rush. "I mean, she's nice and smart and a good fighter and she's really pretty too. Like, a very natural kind of pretty, like she's not even trying, and I like that. And she's tough too. Come to think of it, she kinda reminds me of some of the girls I had a crush on back on Terra Wallop. Except, you know, she's even prettier than them and a whole lot nicer and not as...punch-y."
Aerrow nodded slowly at that last bit. Certainly compared to a female wallop (no offence to female wallops everywhere), he could see why Junko would like Dove. And yet...
"But...doesn't Finn have, like, a huge crush on Dove?"
That thought seemed to have already occurred to Junko as he buried his face in his hands and groaned.
"I know! He'd be so mad if he found out about these letters! He'd definitely not want to be my best bud anymore!"
"Hey, it's okay." Aerrow soothed, but interrupted him with a finger pointing in his face.
"You promise not to ever tell Finn!"
"I promise!" Aerrow assured. "I gave you my word as a sky knight that I'd never tell him, so I won't."
Junko deflated like a balloon, wiping his forehead and sighing loudly with relief.
"Thank Atmos!" he breathed.
Aerrow smiled and left so the wallop could complete his letter in peace. Then he stopped as something Junko had said caught up to him.
"Junko?" he turned to look at the wallop. "What did you mean by "letters"?"