A/N: Tales will be forever told of the morning of December the Second, Two-Thousand-and-Fourteen, when Commander Jorge Gutierrez, vanquisher of the mighty El Tigre and second-in-command to the fierce General Guillermo del Toro, blew the stern of the great ship Gravepainters clean out of the ocean with a single cannon shot. Despite its grievous damages, the unsinkable warship limped its way to safe harbor as best it could. And though the Commander later approached with truce in hand, revealing that the entire battle had been just one mere misunderstanding, there was little he could do to repair the proud vessel's sails and planks which a faithful few patched together with angsty fanfics and apology-themed plot bunnies.

In time, the wounds will heal, and the ship will again venture into open water, blissfully happy and sickeningly fluffy, as though the war had never happened.

But the stitches will always show through the sails and the sides will always be scarred by cracks. Nothing is mine. Soundtrack: "Please Don't Go" – Barcelona.

Prologue

He isn't quite sure how it all started.

His affair with Hel. Keres. Ereshkigal. Izanami. Nephthys. Hecate. Mania.

Her.

If you asked him for specifics, one point in time, one moment upon which he could lay the blame with his long, gloved finger—he wouldn't be able to tell you.

It just happened.

Like drinking. Like getting drunk. Like having one cup of wine, then another, and another, falling slowly into an alcohol-induced oblivion that felt the same as sinking into a warm, welcoming ocean. The sort of drunkenness that stole quickly and quietly into the bloodstream. It happened gently. Seductively. It had crept up on him silently and sinfully, with no fanfare or introduction.

He told himself over and over like a mantra, a prayer, that if he had known what was going to happen, he would have stopped it in one immortal heartbeat. An instant. A second.

But, somewhere in the deepest caverns of his brain, there was a part of him that even that lie wasn't able to reach. He had been perfectly aware of what was happening the entire time, what was bound to happen. He had been conscious of the goblet in his hands, the feeling of his fingers clasped around the cold metal, the swirling depths of the purple poison swimming lazy and carefree inside.

And he had drunk anyway. Another. Another.

And then the fiesta was over, and the Sun was rising over the mountains, casting cruel, accusing light on everything around him, everything he had touched, had whispered, had done.

And, suddenly, she could see it. All of it. The wine on his wings, the look on his face, the guilt splashed across his shaking hands and on his racing heart.

And the way the fire had dimmed in her eyes. The way the water smothered it, overflowing and streaming down her white, sugared face like rain. The way her skin had begun to melt like candy in its merciless path, helpless and frozen, dripping from her chin onto her red satin dress, stabbing a dark crimson stain in her chest.

The way he had pushed her away, horrified, disgusted, sobering instantly and violently, only just now realizing the extent to which he had broken that precious crystal flower that was the relationship with his wife, that beautiful, breathing, beating thing she had placed in his hands willingly, smilingly, that thing he had thrown aside like a piece of garbage.

His voice came, unbidden, desperate, and soft, and his hands floated unconsciously in front of him as though doing their best to telekinetically pull her into his arms. "La Muerte, please, this isn't what it looks like."

But that had been the wrong thing to say, and the words had shattered that ever-so tensile silence that had been the last remaining string joining their hearts together. As soon as he finished his sentence, he felt it snap like frayed rope. Her hands flew to her mouth to keep the scream, the wail, inside, and she closed her eyes and began backing away. Her eyelids were suddenly the dull, gray color of a winter sky, all except the barest hint of midnight blue gone from her skin, and Xibalba's heart stopped beating.

He lunged for her, grasping. "La Muerte, stop, listen to me!"

But she had already vanished in a puff of petals and marigold scent, and his hands clasped on nothing but empty air and the last keening sound of a sharp, high-pitched cry. The French doors leading onto his balcony flew open with a thunderous fury, and hurricane force winds flooded the room, lifting the sheets from his bed, upending his armchair and table, sending jade and amethyst chess pieces raining to the floor like tears. The dunes of ash and dust that were the Land of the Forgotten swelled to violent storms, flying into the sky in vicious tornadoes and crackling lightning, emerging on the horizon like thunderheads.

But the world could have been ending, and Xibalba wouldn't have cared. At this moment, his sole concern was the fact that his wife had left him, his wife was gone, and something inside him was terribly aware that she might very well be gone forever. He tried to transform to follow her, to explain. He tried to flap his wings.

But he felt heavy. So heavy. Like something was chaining him to the obsidian floor. The wind grew to such a force that it began to tear books apart, pages spinning through the air like limp birds, artifacts and objects tumbling after them helplessly. Lightning splintered the sky. Thus buffeted and suddenly incredibly weak, he fell to the stone with a frustrated howl.

Above it all, she was only laughing.

He managed to turn his head, to stare at her, even as darkness closed in on the fringes of his vision. La Muerte. La Muerte, help…

Her long ebony hair was whirling about her face in the wind like some wild untamed medusa, her yellow eyes were flickering with unabashed delight, and her bat wings were stretched into the sky triumphant. She casually wiped her ashen lips free of any remainders of their kiss.

"What can I say, Xibalba?" Eris crouched to his eyelevel, baring her teeth in a sharp, unapologetic grin. "Not even you can win every wager."

A/N: Was anyone else as blown away by JG's Tweet as I was? One moment everything's hunkdory on the SS Gravepainters, and the next everything's on fire. I plan more to this, but this was mostly an outlet for my broken shipper-heart. After all, JG hinted that Xibalba's "affair" was not all that it seemed, and by God, I am snatching hold of that train and hanging on for dear life. Hopefully updates soon.