I do not own Chaotic nor anything related to it. It belongs to TCDigital.

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The Question of Age

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My daughter, Hera, is forty-seven solans old. I have just learned that Tiaane, her teacher, is a hundred thirty-six. It's not quite the age difference I had thought, but it's still one that bothers me.

We're in the library. Hera sits down slightly hunched over, her elbows on her knees and her hands clasped together in front of her face. Her feet tap nervously, and she keeps glancing at me. Her jaw is tense, and her pupils are thin. Her tail swishes from side to side.

Tiaane is... in pretty much the same pose, actually. Hunched over, elbows on knees, hands clasped... The only real difference is that he avoids looking at me completely.

Isis and I sit opposite them. Isis sits straight, hands in her lap. I can't tell how I'm sitting. Do I look tense?

"Well," Isis says, "ninety-one solans' difference."

"Correct," Tiaane mutters, still resolutely staring at the floor in front of him.

"That large an age difference isn't completely unheard of in Mipedian history." Isis turns to me. "For Humans?"

"Not that it means anything in this situation," I say, "but among Humans it's more than a little bizarre. One more common situation is the younger person marries a wealthy older person in order to inherit the wealth after his or her passing."

"Obviously not the case here," Isis notes.

A small grin flickers across Hera's face for a moment before vanishing.

"I feel there's a more pressing issue." I look at Tiaane. "You've known Hera since she was ten. She's an adult now, but everyone will latch on the fact that she was a child under your tutorship for a long time."

Tiaane is still looking at the floor. "I understand."

I sigh and turn to Hera. "Now, you've had very little experience in having relationships at all. Because of your training, you've spent more time with Tiaane that anyone else." Including me, I add silently. "This may have skewed what you believe is-"

I stop. The words had come out of my mouth, but I don't actually have a way to finish that sentence. Skewed what she believes is what, exactly?

Isis comes to my rescue. "What your father is trying to say is that you should give yourself some frame of reference. Maybe hang out with a few of your classmates, see if you have similar feelings towards any of them."

Hera nods. "Okay..."

Isis looks at Hera, then at Tiaane. "Do you need some time to talk alone?"

Tiaane blinks. "Prince Osiris has forbidden me from speaking with-"

I interrupt, "I'm allowing it for now." I stand up. "We'll be back in...?" I glance at Isis.

"We'll be back shortly," Isis finishes without actually clarifying anything. We leave the library and sit in the hall, on either side of the entrance.

After a minute, I hear Hera's voice. "Tiaane, I... I'm sorry. I shouldn't have..."

"I understand," Tiaane replies. "You had bottled it up for a long time, and you let it out a little."

There's silence for a while. Then Hera speaks again. "So... you also..."

"I also have feeling for you, feelings I'm not entirely sure are appropriate." Tiaane sighs. "I do not have the excuse of naivety, unlike you."

"What if-?" Hera stops, then continues what sounds like a different thought than the first. "What if this is more than just a crush?"

Tiaane speaks, "Would you be able to tell the difference between infatuation and love, Hera?"

Hera is silent for a while. "...No."

"Then we wait," Tiaane says. He sounds like he really doesn't want to say what he's saying. "If another is right for you, then it wouldn't do for you to waste your feelings on me."

There's silence for a long time afterward.

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It's been a week since Hera's birthday. I'm busy preparing Jupiter's birthday celebration. Earth's Ambassadors are busy people, so any requests have to be made at least a month in advance.

I'm just finishing a letter requesting a performance of the Star Wars original trilogy when I hear it. It's a sound of a mugic over at the muge's college. It sounds horribly off-key.

BOOM!

The explosion is strong enough to knock me off my chair and rattle every piece of furniture in the room.

My heart stops for a second, and I dash out of the room. Hera's at the muge's college!

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Up next: The Fire

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