The Honorian Chapter
Tokyo, the world without shrimp 2022
Honora swooped into the bay outside her apartment with a slick gliding across the cobble street. It was nearing dawn as she pulled her helmet off her head and gripped it to her side. Artemis clung to her waist, escaping the vacuum inside her own helmet as she reached around and lay her hands flat against Honora's stomach, breathing in a wisp of coconut shampoo from her hair. A smell she'd nuzzled into the night before as they'd clung together in the sheets, one of the twins between them cuddled under the blankets.
The quiet nights were the ones Artemis cherished, the nights when their family snuggled, when the twins cooed in their cots and she sang them to sleep. The babies spent most of the day awake, and then most of night waking up and talking to each other in a language Artemis assumed only they could understand. She speculated that once upon a time her a Nina would communicate the same way. Nina. Artemis thought of her sister and sighed, they hadn't spoken for a while, and only really communicated through Mr Giles these days. Nina didn't talk to their mother anymore but since reforming the watcher's council, she recieved the occasional letter or email from her sister. Her life was smoothening out and Nina's was still so complicated, still so disrupted. She slayed most of the time these days.
Honora didn't exactly approve. She knew the way of the watcher was to train slayers but Honora believed they were so primitive, she'd never really agreed with the 'charge in with weapons' approach. She - a proper Wyndam-Pryce at heart - believed in solid research. Information before destruction. As they'd pulled up beside the house, Honora's engine revved, the bike steadying itself as she flicked the kickstand down and stood up. She turned around to face her wife, snarling rather than smiling, she lifted her leg lightly and flipped her body over the bike seat like a true acrobat. Artemis smiled with her eyes, brown orbs grinning as she too stepped down from the bike and their leather coated limbs brushed together.
"Honey?" Artemis whispered, turning her attentions towards the towering mountain block in front of them. Honora failed to turn back, her hair wafting around the wind, face like stone staring into the breeze. Honora stuck fast in her movements as she planned what to do next, she'd recieved a letter from the council recalling her back to London. Now was the time if any to tell Artemis that their time left altogether was short lived, that next month she was flying back home, with or without her. Her hard heart wept for the aching of separation. She thought of her cousin Wesley and his rebellion, of his scolding of the council and his fleeing to a new city. She was too much of a good girl for any of that.