It was a lovely afternoon as Pangaea sat in her cloud kingdom on a (quite lavish) throne her now husband had constructed for her.
Heh, marriage. That was a HUMAN concept, Pangaea thought to herself as she stared down at tiny little creatures. They were so strange with their fire and home building. It was cute, in an odd way. Just then the doors swung open to reveal Ouranos in a deep purple cloak walking towards her.
"Afternoon, dear." He placed a soft kiss on her cheek. She blushed, turning her cheeks a pretty rose color and smiled.
"You treat me so fairly my love." She said. He said nothing as he waved his hand to make a chair for himself. "Something wrong?"
"It's the humans. They're getting too powerful." His soft facial expression turned cold, mean. "They think they can just abuse the land like they do. It's terrible what they're doing to the great land you've given them." Pangaea stared at her husband.
"My mother gave them."
"Whatever. I say we just wipe them out all together." Ouranos said looking out the adjacent window, scowling.
"No! If mother created them for a reason then they must stay." No response. She huffed.
"They're worthless."
"They have a purpose!"
"Animals, the lot of them."
"Animals use the lands too!"
"At least animals are kind enough to bow to you when you descend upon the Earth." Ouranos said.
"I'm going for a walk."Pangaea stood and brushed the cloud off of her robes and began to walk away. Ouranos watched her with an angry expression on his face.
"I'm telling you, they're horrible creatures! They're going to destroy the Earth one day!" He yelled. Slam. She was gone.
Pangaea stepped down from the cloud and thought for a moment. Maybe Ouranos was right, maybe these creatures were bad. If they did destroy the Earth, she would cease to exist. But that wouldn't happen for a long, long time. So wiping the thought from her mind, she ran into the forest and sat in her normal spot. There, tucked deep into the trunk of the tree, laid her Ocarina. She glanced around, making sure no human was around, and she began to play the sweet and soft melody she had played so many times for her mother.
From a high cloud, Ouranos watched his wife. What was she doing? She could attract a wild beast! Or even worse: a human. Those nasty creatures would kill her! Terrible, terrible! In a fit of rage, he threw his fist into the wall of the cloud and pulled out a bow and a set of lightning arrows. Angrily, he loaded the bow and shot an arrow down at a village of humans. It sparked, and started a fire among the houses. He cackled as the humans scrambled to put out the fire like rabid monkeys fighting for a banana. Suddenly, he heard a shriek form the forest.
Pangaea screamed as the shock hit her so fast and painfully. She fell to her knees in front of the stump: she had never felt this kind of pain before. What happened? Quickly she stashed the ocarina in the tree trunk and ran to the ocean where he was brought up on a cloud. The pain was getting worse and worse as she was escorted to her home. Ouranos was there to pick her up like a doll and bring her inside and create a bed for her out of the softest of cirrus clouds.
"What happened?" She asked him as she lay panting on the bed. The pain had lessened.
"It was the humans!" Said Ouranos. "They misused the fire and created a great fire. It was big enough to engulf a whole village!"
"Are…they okay?" She asked, curious.
"I'm afraid not my love." He placed his hands on hers and cradled them softly. "The village was wiped out." Tears welled up in her eyes. And there she lay for a moment, weeping for the lost humans.
For the next few weeks, Pangaea began to feel more and more pain. Once while she was cleaning up the dishes from dinner she felt the side splitting pain of the mass killing of humans.
The humans were fighting; they blamed each other for the fire, so they killed those accused. The war escaladed to the point where Pangaea was bedridden for days on end. The pain killed her slowly each day, to know that the humans were fighting and she could do nothing to stop it, not matter how she tried, no matter how she asked her husband to make it rain and put out the fires. Then there was that one peculiar day as she lay in agony, when the final blow hit.
It was terrible, a group of humans had been burned in a fire, which in turned caused a forest fire that killed so many animals and left even more homeless. With a final scream, Pangaea used one of her last breaths to explain to her lover her fate.
"That's it." She said with her husband by her side. "If I can't stop these humans from fighting, I'll move them away from each other." She screeched again.
"Ouranos." She pleaded, tears in her eyes as she turned to face her husband. "You must listen to me carefully: I can only say this once. As I lay dying-"
"NO! You're not killing yourself to save these humans from bloodshed. I'll kill them all before I let you die!" He slammed his fist on the side of the cloud bed, tears falling.
"No! I'll surely die then! Just listen. As I lay dying, you are to take a jar-"(Another moan of pain) "and place my soul in it. Then, split the essence into seven. Then release them all one by one. The spirit should know where to go and in turn will create the world as the humans will remember it."
"But my love-"
"Please, do this for me." She begged. With what little strength left, she leaned up to kiss her husband one last time. "I love you Ouranos. So much…" And in that instant, she raised her hand and plunged it into her chest. She screamed as she pulled the pure white mass from her chest and let it go, her body fading into nothing without a soul.
"Pangaea! NO!" He screamed. But she was already gone. Quickly, and crying at the same time, he swiped her soul up and shut the lid on tight. And then he collapsed on the bed and sobbed. By the time he was able to compose himself enough to fulfill his wife's wishes, the sun began to fade into the milky twilight of the night. He dragged his limbs to the window when he stood and looked over the Earth. The planet was dying with no soul on it to keep it alive. It was then that he split the souls.
He took a piece of his wife's essence, kissed it, and let it go. "Europa." He whispered. For each fragment, he kissed and named it as he let the tiny white mass go with the wind.
"Asya. Amerika. Anta. Maya. Auslia. Afrikana." He let each go, tears falling once again. And it was there that he sobbed. Beneath the feet of the humans, the ground began to split and crack at the great mass continent split and diverged from itself.
And somewhere in the distance, seven beautiful little girls were born from the earth.
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The next night the boys were sitting on Alfred's back porch drinking cool glasses of lemonade. The silence between them was peaceful as the wind ruffled the tree leaves. Occasionally the silence would be broken by Alfred trying to make a conversation topic, but Matt didn't respond.
"So…how about the Olympics?" Matt didn't respond. Alfred sighed.
"Look, if you're upset over that eclipse thing…"
"I am."
Alfred paused for a second to make eye contact with his brother. He sighed and stood up.
"Don't be. If it makes you feel any better, we'll go and watch the eclipse. Okay?" Alfred walked away from Matt and headed for the back fields. He turned on his heel to face Matt and stuck his arms out to his sides in a wingspan.
"Now come on. Stop sulking. Let's go for a walk." Alfred said. Matt sat there for a second and watched his sibling. Why would he give in so easily? Could it be that he was curious as to what would happen too? Matt shook his head. He stood and ran after Alfred.
They ran through the field together and along the pastures behind Alfred's house. They both lightened up in the cool summer air and began to reminisce about summers past. They talked about how they used to run through the fields as children far, far away from the arguments of the adults. How, when they were teens they would sneak off to the village and try to court some fine young ladies ("And they were pretty damn fine, too.")
Now this, my readers, is how to spend a summer.
It was picture perfect. They made their way back to the house (not before stopping to catch the ice cream man; and that wasn't hard with Alfred screaming "OH MY GOD STOP! I WANT A GOOD HUMOR BAR!" as Matt practically keeled over with laughter at his twin's antics) as the sun set in the west. The stars appeared in the night sky and the moon rose up into the sky to put the stars to shame with its brightness. They lay down in the grass of the yard, head to head, and watched the stars.
"What if something does happen with the eclipse? Like, what if…" Matt asked quietly after awhile.
"The Mayans were right and we all die a terrible death? I don't believe that."
"Neither do I."
They went quiet; the only thing stirring up the night air was the sound of the crickets chirping in the distance. The bushed rustled in the distance as a small animal ran through the grass. Clouds floated in from the east and moved in from time to time to shield the night from the great white disc in the sky. Alfred sat up.
"Well, I'm done out here. I'm going to bed. G'night, Mattie."
"Good night, Alfred."
Matt watched him shut the screen door behind him and turned back to the night sky, getting up to head inside himself. In the distance, a wolf howled up at the moon. Matt turned to face the sound as a breeze moved through the air, and he saw the great yellow eyes of the beast staring him down. The wolf whimpered and bowed and before Matt knew it, there was a small pack of wolves in front of him bowing. Matt Looked around, and not knowing what to do, bowed back. The wolves howled simultaneously and ran away from Matt.
Confused, Matt stood at the back door and looked at the moon. What did the wolves know that he didn't?
The next morning, the plans were all sorted out, the bosses knew what would be going on, they made sure they didn't have a meeting with the other nations, Kumajirou and Tony both had their papers in order so they could fly (because if you bring your "dog" on the plane the terrorists win), and Alfred was all packed. So for now, the boys sat at the kitchen table, drinking tea and coffee and listening to the news.
The window was open and a breeze blew in from the field as Alfred chattered on and on about some random thing he had found that was so cool. Neither noticed the bird fly in the window and land on the windowsill until it chirped. Confused, they both stared at it.
"Hey there!" Alfred said with a small smile at the bird. He extended his hand and let it jump to his finger. He laughed as the bird nipped his finger playfully.
"Alfred! Put that thing outside, it could have diseases!"
"You know, Arthur said the same thing about you when we got you from Francis." Matt frowned.
"Not funny." Matt said. Alfred laughed at his own joke.
"Alright my friend, you belong outside." He placed the bird on the windowsill and waited. The bird didn't move. "Well what are you waiting for? Go outside! It's nice and sunny! And look, there's a pretty girl over there! Go get her, little buddy!" The bird did as commanded and chased after the female.
"Strange." Matt said, sipping his tea.
"What? The bird? No, he comes by once every while to say hi and then he leaves." Matt cocked and eyebrow.
"How long as this been going on?"
Alfred counted on his fingers. "Since March."
"There's something wrong with you."
"Why, because I've got a cool bird friend?"
"Shut up, Alfred."
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Third chapter. And I don't think I've published it here on , but I plan to do an FST for this fic because it's my longest one ever. Thoughts on that?
Reviews are wonderful!