Theme Two: Love

From what Pride had observed, Lust seemed to have taken it upon herself to be sort of a mother figure for all of the other homunculi, or at least an elder sister, and everyone more or less listened to her. Well, except Envy, but he didn't seem to like listening to anyone. Apparently Lust was the oldest, after the previous Pride.

The more he watched, the more he noticed the little things that signaled her affection towards all of them. She might absentmindedly pat Gluttony on the head as she talked, or jokingly tease Wrath and Envy. More than once she'd caught him staring and given a small smile, a kind look in her eyes, and then direct a question or two at him. He supposed it was to make him feel welcome.

Pride turned to stare at Envy for a while, silently drinking in all his details. He was scowling, as was usual, his chin propped up against his hand. His dark hair fell across pale skin, the contrast making him stand out. The more Pride thought about it, they all had this sort of look. He supposed he must have something relating to it, but his hair and eyes were so different, he must have looked out of place.

He stared down at himself, pondering this. His strange tattoos - Only one of them looked similar to what the others had; it was on his left shoulder - None of the others had these. The more he studied himself, the more he wondered how he fit in around here. He looked up at Lust, and she noticed, smiling at him again.

"Pride, that's quite a nice weapon you have," she directed at him.

Everyone stopped to look as he hefted up his scythe, staring at it silently for nearly a minute before directing his gaze back at Lust.

Wrath struck up another conversation with her, and Pride went back to staring at his tattoos, then at Envy again.

They all referred to each other as siblings. He supposed that made them a family of sorts. The conversation continued around him, and Lust and even Wrath kept trying to include him. At some point Gluttony had left Lust's side and plopped down next to Pride, sucking on his thumb and tracing his tattoos with a fat finger. He eventually became bored and went to poke at Sloth a bit before going back to his place next to Lust.

Pride eventually decided on defining this odd family's interactions as love. Except for Envy, who almost always seemed irritable, they were fairly affectionate with each other.

Then it occurred to him that they kept referring to him as part of their odd family as well. He was rather startled at the prospect of having this familial love given to him, before realizing that's what Lust had been doing all along. It hadn't seemed so bad then, so it couldn't be too terrible now, just because he'd acknowledged it for what it was.

Pride stared at Envy again, contemplating that he was still scowling, even in the face of this love Lust was handing around.

"Big Brother... Why... are you unhappy?"

Wrath's latest sentence trailed off, and everyone turned to look as Envy's scowl deepened.

"Who said I was?"

It was silent another moment before Lust asked Wrath, "What were you saying before?"

Envy looked relieved to have the attention off of him, and Pride continued staring until he came to the conclusion that Envy didn't like love, and this of course opened up a whole new world of questions Envy probably wouldn't answer.

Pride focused his attention on Wrath, who was still speaking, deciding to give Envy a bit of space.