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"Mommy," a young girl with curly black hair and soft, innocent gray eyes tugged on the hem of the skirt of a cold, beautiful woman with brown hair pinned up in a bun and icy brown eyes. "Mommy, I'm bored."

The woman- the girl's mother gave her a cold look, almost like a glare, but the young girl wasn't fazed. She simply gave the woman a pleading look, and the woman sighed, snapping the book she was reading shut.

"Well then, Athena, what do you want to do?"

Athena thought for a moment before shouting, "The Park!"

Her mother sat back down. "Well, if you'd like to go to the park, call Hephaestus and Ares to go with you. Maybe Hebe as well."

Beaming, Athena ran out of the sitting room. But she didn't go call her siblings: she didn't want to. She had been planning on meeting her friend from school there, and didn't want Ares or Hephaestus to scare her away. Hebe could come, but she was too young, and Athena didn't want to drag and babysit a toddler all day while she was supposed to be having fun, however quiet and obedient the toddler may be.

She still ran upstairs, however, but not to call her siblings.

Athena entered a dark room sneakily. She made her way through the room, trying her best to avoid the toys scattering the floor and humming quietly along the soft lullaby that filled the warm, dark room.

Standing on tippy toes, she peeked over the edge of a crib, smiling down at the pair of twins asleep in each other's arms. She blew them a kiss before hurrying out again, ready to burst out the house and charge full speed towards the park.

And that was exactly what she did.

Happily she skipped down the road, humming a little song, enjoying the warm summer breeze. She was free!

But at the same time, she couldn't shake off the feeling that somebody was watching her, but when she turned around, there was no one there.

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It turned out that Nike was unable to come because she had to visit her Grandmother in the hospital.

Sulking slightly, Athena sat on the swing, kicking the ground and watching the dust fly up then slowly float down.

It was getter warmer as the sun climbed higher into the sky, and there were not a lot of kids around. The only ones who were there were all older than her.

Except for one.

It was another girl, and though she was also older, she couldn't be older by much, maybe 7. She was leaning against a tree, staring at the ground, kicking up dust just like Athena.

Athena's eyes seem to light up, and she jumped up from the swing, cautiously and slowly making her way to where the girl rested under the shade. Her wavy brown hair casted dark shadows onto her face, and she was extremely pale.

"Um… excuse me?" Athena called cautiously, slightly nervous.

The girl's head snapped up, watching her with wide, scarily familiar electric blue eyes.

"Who are you?" the girl asked simply, somewhat hostile, glaring at her. Athena wasn't fazed. She was used to all those hostile expressions and glares. She grew up with them.

"Do you want to play with me?" Athena asked, smiling kindly up at the taller girl and holding out a hand. "My name is Athena."

The girl hesitated for quite some time before taking her hand, shaking it slowly. "I'm Eileithyia."

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"So…" Athena trailed off, unsure of what to say. From what she could collect, Eileithyia was very quiet and cold, and doesn't like speaking much. But she was very athletic, as can be seen through the smoothness and fluidness of her movements and how when they had a small monkey bar contest, Eileithyia had swung herself from one side to another in no time at all.

Athena herself wasn't too bad at sports, unlike Hebe or Hephaestus, but she couldn't help being jealous. It's very likely that Eileithyia had learned gymnastics before, being so flexible and light. Athena had wanted to learn, but she had dead-beat parents. Tragic, really.

And now the pair of them sat on the old, creaky swings, enveloped in awkward silence, Athena trying and failing to start a conversation.

"So…" she tried again. "What is your favorite color?"

"Red," Eileithyia answered.

"Oh," Athena was slightly disappointed at another failure to start a conversation. "Mine's gray."

Awkward silence filled the air, so tense you could almost see it.

"…What were you doing there?"

Athena was shocked. Did Eileithyia just ask her a question? But when she turned to look at the older girl incredulously, she gave a cold, hard stare so much like the one Hera gives her.

"I… was waiting," Athena answered slowly. "My friend was supposed to come, but then it turned out she can't. But I didn't want to go home yet, so I stayed here at the park, even though it was boring with no one else to play with. Then I saw you, and I thought you looked, um, lonely, so…" she trailed off, shrugging. Then turning to Eileithyia, she countered, "What about you?"

"Waiting," was the answer, "Just like you."

"For who?"

"Not for a friend, not like you," Eileithyia said, looking up at the sky. "For someone else. Someone who deserves to die."

"Do you hate that person?" Athena frowned at the older girl, who shrugged.

"If you don't know, why does that person deserve to die?"

Another shrug.

"But-,"

"You're asking too much questions!" Eileithyia snapped suddenly, her electric blue eyes filling with static. Athena's mouth clamped shut.

Eileithyia glanced at her watch. "3:28. Should be anytime now…" Then turning to the younger girl, she told her, "I've got to leave. It was nice meeting you." And she leapt out of the swing then stalked away, never looking back, never caring to look back.

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But Athena followed her.

Athena might not be the most mature girl in her class (well, not yet, anyway), but she was the smartest. Very quickly, she had marked Eileithyia as suspicious (she wasn't a very good actress),and decided that whatever the older girl was going to do, it wasn't something nice.

And she was right.

Athena followed her for a very long time, weaving through crowds of people, crossing streets, but she never lost Eileithyia, nor did she lose herself in the maze.

As she was following her down a long road, Eileithyia suddenly swerved and crossed into a small, dark alley, covering her face with a large hoodie at the same time.

Peeking over the edge, she saw Eileithyia talking with a large man in a trenchcoat. They exchanged some quick words, and the man began laughing, saying, "I asked for a helper, but I didn't expect a scrawny seven year old!"

Athena noticed Eileithyia's smile before the man did, and she caught the flash of metal, unlike the chuckling man.

And then there was a spray of blood, so much blood, splattering onto the walls and the ground, onto Eileithyia and the man choked, gasped, then crumbled to the ground.

Athena was frozen for a moment before she turned and ran. Blindly, she ran, gasping, so filled with horror, she couldn't breathe.

And when she entered the house, slamming the door shut behind her, she looked down to the ground.

And she was unclean, impure.

For the man's blood had splattered upon her.

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