Watching and Listening - An Empires SMP AU

New thoughts

           Grian was soaring happily in the clouds. Flying was awesome. He closed his eyes, letting himself relax and just soar. It was relatively safe at this altitude; there was no way he could crash into anything this high up in the sky. But it turned out that even at that height, he could still crash into anyone. 

           Grian opened his eyes just in time to nearly knock Jimena out of the sky. He whirled around, managing to not break his elytra. "Hey, what are you doing?!" He yelled angrily. Jimena wobbled and flew towards him; looking just as annoyed. "You were the one flying with your eyes closed," She accused. Grian didn't like to admit that he was wrong. Especially to her. "I was flying perfectly fine!" He said. "I'm a great flyer!" "You're a better flyer when you watch where you're going, Xelqua," Jimena said, and then frowned. "Wait, what? 

           Grian breathed in sharply and glared at her, hand on his sword. That name. That hated name. The name he wished he would never hear again. "What did you just call me?!" "I don't know..." Jimena answered in a subdued voice. "I know your name is 'Grian', but then I just... said it wrong." She had this very odd expression on her face that Grian couldn't read. His mind was too busy whirling with panicked thoughts. Oh no. She said- she just said- Her memories must be coming back. That's not a good thing. 

           "Don't ever call me that again!" Grian shouted at her, fists clenched. Jimena glanced at his white knuckles and his hateful expression and nodded. "Okay." She said in the smallest voice Grian had ever heard in his life. For a second she sounded like a little girl.

            Grian looked at her and realized that he'd never quite noticed how short she was. She suddenly looked like a teenager to him. And then Grian realized that Jimena wasn't wearing an elytra. Instead she was keeping herself aloft with a pair of pale, feathery wings. And he recognized those wings.

           "Wings-!" Grian sputtered. "You're showing your wings now?!" Jimena tilted her head at him. "What do you mean? They just grew overnight. Sheriff Jimmy says that's a natural thing to happen." Grian blinked. A lot of new thoughts were popping up in his head and he wasn't sure if he wanted to acknowledge them.

           She calls Timmy 'sheriff'? Does she actually respect him? And wait, Timmy said she got amnesia... And Jimena seems to think her wings are new... And her name... Did she run from them like I did? And then hide her wings, like I did? And then lost her memory? Grian shook his head. This is confusing... 

           He looked at Jimena again. If she had truly left them, like he did, then they were in the same boat. And Grian had no excuse to hate her, if what he was beginning to suspect was true. He still didn't trust her. But now he was thinking that maybe he could. Grian brushed those new thoughts away. Whether it was hate, pride, or his uncommon sense of safety, he didn't want to trust Jimena ever. 

           Grian looked at Jimena and realized that she wasn't really paying attention to him; not that he'd been doing anything except float and think. The girl was distracted staring into the distance, but in a way that looked like she was zoning out more than actually seeing. Rather, she looked more like she was... listening to something. But Grian couldn't hear anything. Frowning, he flew off, wondering what he thought about Jimena. He glanced back and saw that she was still zoned out. He shook his head. She's weird... 

---

           Jimena found out that her new pastime was flying everywhere whenever she was bored. She didn't even think of destinations; all she wanted to do was just fly free. So that was how she ended up running into a certain hermit at a million feet above ground and having what she could only describe as a weird interaction.