Heathens

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Why did it seem he always found himself in Philadelphia? It wasn't even his favorite city. He had had the pleasure of watching most of the East Coast cities rise from the ground over the years. From the first lonely settlement of Jamestown to the now sprawling metropolis of New York. He did like New York. It was busy, filled with people and possibilities. There was always something for him to do. Philadelphia, on the other hand, was just lukewarm.

At least it's not Detroit or, Helheim forbid... Anywhere in New Jersey.

The small black cat shivered at the very thought. Fjorlagg, The Lord of Death, the New God who's very name means "Death", padded along a concrete walk way, his small paws barely making a sound as he walked along. His whiskers twitched a bit and he sniffed the air. He was getting hungry. Where was he exactly. He looked around and recognized a few buildings. He couldn't miss the young ones walking all around him with their bags on their backs. Some seemed happy, others depressed, still others simply absorbed in there books.

Ah yes, college. Not quite what the Greeks had in mind, I think, but it does the job.

Continuing to follow his nose, Fjor wandered about the campus. The smell was getting stronger. It smelled like... No... Could it be? He sniffed again. Yes! It was tuna! Wonderful, wonderful tuna! Fjor absolutely hated it when his form's urges overtook him like this, butting could not be helped. He began to sprint towards the intoxicating smell.

He approached a large, square building with many windows, still following his nose, he hopped up on a window ledge and there it was. Sitting inside some young girls bag was a beautiful tuna sandwich. Fjor licked his lips. He stared at the girl as he plotted a way to get his lunch, his black tail swaying slowly back and forth.

"I'm alright, thank you for asking.... but... kid, where're your parents? You shouldn't be wandering a college campus alone..." the woman spoke.

An expected question, people often knelt down and asked her where her parents were every time she approached someone. There was a few that said she would get some candy if she went with them, but those guys were usually left with a bleeding nose and their hands griping their crotch in absolute pain. An expected question gave a swift answer, "My mommy is in class and my daddy is at work."

Usually she would give the 'dead' answer to one of her parents so the people would have less hope for finding her 'parents', but she supposed bringing up death in front of this person might not be such a good idea.

"And my name isn't kid, my name's Rhea.." she corrected the woman in the manner of a child. She always kept a shy attitude when talking to strangers, they were more inclined to trust her that way. She would have to get this person to let her follow for a bit, or at least find a way to stick around long enough to get to know this person more.

She remained silent, standing there awkwardly like a child would. She had no particular place to go and no real reason to rush. If there was a rush for the college student for whatever reason then that would be the least of her worries if Rhea decided to try this human out.

She clutched her backpack straps once more, her mouth and nose being obscured by the scarf. What was this human going to do with a random child with no adult? Some would direct her to the police, some would try to find the parents, and some would just leave her be. Whenever she was brought towards the police, she would usually run. They would probably set her up for one of those orphan programs and it'd be difficult to roam freely and find a proper human.

The child stared, wondering when the woman would pick her backpack up and save the insides from the growing dark spot.

Syrian blinked. "And she didn't leave you in the daycare?" She asked the girl suspiciously, glancing at said day-care building, not ten-feet from them, behind a disgustingly-white picket fence.

Then again, she'd heard that it took months, even years, to get your child enrolled in that daycare because the demand was so high. Still, certainly an adult wouldn't just leave their child to wander the campus alone while they were in class!

"Why would your mom leave you alone without anyone to look after you? That's not very responsible of her..." Syrian continued, disapprovingly. She looked around and sighed. She'd have to watch the kid or something until the mom got out of class. "Did your mom tell you what class she was in, or what room? Is she coming soon?" she asked the girl gently, not wanting to scare her off.

Nomina chuckled a tired chuckle, a small amount of relief washing over her. "Good, you're still talking. That actually makes me feel a little better." She adjusted her position, taking a moment to flex her spine. Hanging over the crack between the couch and the wall in that awkward position was starting to make her back ache a little bit. "And you've still got that analytical mind. It feels like you're sizing me up; it's way too formal. You could, y'know, act less like an employer so we could talk normally. ...Well, I guess you are an employer, in a sense. Still, talking to a cat should not feel this formal." Talking to a cat was already strange enough; Mina could hardly handle a cat observing and scrutinizing all of her habits like she was being considered for a job or a promotion or something. It was weird, even if that's what it technically was. She scoffed when Fjor asked about breakfast.

"I'm a college student and I haven't been shopping in a while. We'll BOTH be lucky if I have any breakfast," Nomina commented with a half-smirk. She climbed off the couch and sauntered over to her tiny kitchen; passing up the pantry in favor of opening up the fridge. She looked in, but paused for a moment without doing anything. Her brow furrowed; she looked confused.

"...oh that's right. I guess I do have some food...." Nomina mused, sounding slightly confused. "I guess... Oh, I bought these ingredients to have a special breakfast after this project ends. 'Cause break starts after this. I can make something with it." She observed. She started stacking stuff on the countertop; butter, eggs, bacon. She also pulled out a half a carton of milk, along with some smaller bottles. "Looks like I have some milk for you, too; although at least one of these is bound to be no good. Also, can cats eat eggs?"

Generic questions again and again, how boring. She had forgotten that humans often offered child care during their educational period, however she already had a back up. She simply had a less than intelligent mother who thought that it would be okay to let her child roam about the campus and wait outside.

"No," she simply said, seeming to get uneased by all these questions. She did not specify which question in particular that she was saying 'no' to, as a child would. She had been performing this child act for centuries, it was impossible for a human to see through her acting. It was really simple actually, just be shy and scared of the world. That's about all there is to it.

The child rocked a bit, as if bored trying to avoid eye contact. Her eyes drifted to the bag before she spoke up, "You going to pick that up?"

Syrian blinked at the simple 'no' answer, only to become concerned when the child seemed to close up, seemingly scared at the questioning.

She turned at the child's next words, realizing that a brown stain was forming in her backpack. "OH CRAP!" she exclaimed, grabbing the bag and unzipping it, pulling out everything that was in it. A crumpled and soggy mess of colored paper was all that was left of her paper mache art project, and her notebooks and college books were all covered in sticky, wet pepsi.

She groaned at the mess. "Great... just great. Exactly what I needed today." she grumbled. Now she had two crises on her hands: a child wandering without an adult, and her soggy backpack and things.

She sighed and looked over at the child. "How about I clean this up and then I'll take you to the Reiver Cafe and get you something to eat while we wait for your mom?" she offered the child.

The normal and intelligent reaction of a child would be to shout "STRANGER DANGER I NEED AN ADULT", but Rhea wasn't here to be a complete child. She nodded, not saying anything at all and instead simply waiting for the human to lead the way. She wished there was something she could do about the human's back pack, but even if she had her abilities...what was she the goddess of cleaning? If it were a severed arm, that'd be a different story.

She waited, doing what she had been doing for most of her life. She wondered if her sons,grandsons, and sister were alright? She had not heard from them for quite a while. They usually did not like to mingle in the human world, save for their beastly desire for affairs. She had to admit that was one part of her sons she had always looked down upon. She likely would have spoken up about it, but women did not exactly have a say as much in her time period, even if they were gods.

Syrian mopped up the mess as best as she could, tossing her stuff into a plastic grocery sack that she'd had, wadded up in one of the pockets of her bag. She'd have to replace most of it, she figured, but she'd deal with that crisis later. Then she tossed out the pepsi can and did her best to wring out the backpack before folding it up the best she could and carrying it with the grocery sack.

Thankfully, her purse had been spared the mess, and her most important things -namely her college ID, Driver's License, and Cash Card, as well as her smartphone, were still intact and pepsi-free. She led the way to the Reiver Cafe -a small canteen in the lowest floor of the nearby building, where people could buy lunch and snacks in between classes.

The cafe got its name from the school's mascot -the Reivers, or 'river pirates.' Syrian wasn't too concerned with sports, so all she could do was roll her eyes at the names and call it a day. She stood in line at the cafe, and looked over at the strange girl following her -Rhea, she'd said her name was.

"What would you like, Rhea? Money's not an issue," she shrugged. It was true. Beyond her several scholarships; her parents were in no way hurting for money, and Syrian and Genevieve had had trust funds in place since before they were born. And now that Genevieve was.... gone.... all that money, was completely Syrian's, to do with as she pleased. The thought of her sister brought another wave of pain and misery through the woman, and she had to bow her head for a second to reclaim her feelings.

While Rhea was tempted to say some exotic dish from the Europeans several centuries ago, she figured that a child in America had no business even knowing what it was. She looked at the menu, thinking for a moment, however she was not thinking of what to get but more what to do.

She supposed she could sit down with the human in a secluded part of the cafe and talk. Grab a snack and then chant about sitting in a specific place, be the brat that doesn't give the adults a chance to react. She needed to keep this quick, maybe if she moved things along faster then the human would have more time to adjust and wont either disbelieve her or run away...or die.

The child pointed at a simple Cheetos package. The marketing on that item was always cute with the cheetah, one of her favorites actually. Once the transaction was paid for she called out, "Let's go sit over here," before wandering off to a part of the cafe that had the least amount of students. To a human it likely would have looked like she was too shy to be around a lot of people.

She took a seat at the chair and ripped open the package to dig in, a messy snack it was, but it wasn't like she was clean in the first place. Some people were probably staring at her state, but she had grown used to the stares even before she came to America. She dug into the snacks, she had managed to snag a breakfast of a doughnut this morning, but food was hard to come by when you didn't have money and had to keep moving.

Syrian smiled indulgently as the girl pointed at a bag of cheetos. She paid for the snack, as well as a new Pepsi for herself -this time from a bottle. Why did she carry cans around anyway? It was asking for a disaster like today to happen...

She followed the kid to a secluded part of the cafe, around the corner from the rest of the noisy students having lunch and doing hasty homework or study before class. They sat down at a table, the farthest away from the other people that they could.

Syrian figured the girl was nervous and shy, unwilling to be around other people. "So... you don't remember your mom telling you anything about where she was? Did she have a place to meet you after class, at a certain time or something?" she asked the kid gently. It worried her that the mother of this child didn't seem too worried about the girl getting kidnapped or something.

"No," Rhea stated simply, not giving eye contact and focusing on her colorful bag of unhealthy goods with a cheetah and sunglasses on the bag. The bag crinkled and made noise as she reached into it, but she did not seem to mind it.

"What's your name?" she finally asked, the other woman still not having introduced herself. Rhea wanted to get this moving. Although it was a relief to sit down and and enjoy a snack, she had bigger fish to fry than her human body's needs.

Her eyes glanced to the woman's face, gauging what this woman must have been thinking. She seemed to show concern, expected. In today's society they often coddled their young, no child was to be left out of sight for even a second in public. Then again it was not like the older days where a man could have any woman he wanted no matter the age so long as the father agreed. Society of the humans seemed to build many more social walls within itself over time, looking down upon large age differences and even same sex relationships at one point. The worry was quite reasonable, but in Rhea's opinion humans needed to just get over themselves.

Now, how to turn the conversation to be about her sister? Perhaps talking about dead parents would have been a good thing-no, she'd just be abusing her emotions. Damn this was difficult to do without being burned in the fire of guilt. As soon as this woman found out, she'd want her sister back. Rhea knew that she was capable of raising the dead long long ago, but ever since the gods of death came about to reap the souls, she could only raise a soulless corpse. Not to mention the corpse must have decomposed quite a bit by now, though she could easily cause the cells to re-grow if she had her full power.

She shivered despite her warm coverings, the idea of toying with a soulless body sending a cold chill down her spine. It would be like those 'Zombies' the humans invented, trudging about and controlled by nothing but their motor functions and animal needs. She hated those movies, just as much as she hated raising a mindless corpse.

Syrian's face crumpled further in concern with the negative answer given by the child. This was really starting to worry her. What kind of parents did this kid have?!

The concern was broken for a moment as her hand rose to her face in a slap as she realized she'd never introduced herself.

"Ah, forgive me; I forget to introduce myself all the time now! Usually Genevieve introduced us and..." She froze, trailing off as Syrian choked up on the subject for a moment. "..and, umm. Yeah, so, my name is Syrian," she finished weakly, stumbling on the answer to the child's question before becoming silent, her thoughts returning to her late sister.

Rhea pitied the girl as she mentioned her sister once more before cutting herself off. Rhea stopped fooling with the bag, the snack still half full. Perhaps it'd be best to get to the point, beating around the bush might just insult her?

"I lied," she stated all of a sudden. Syrian likely was going to ask what she lied about, but if she did Rhea would simply say nothing instead of 'everything'.

"Losing someone can be painful," she admitted, remembering how she had felt when Chronus had slain her children. Of course she was able to simply bring them back to life, but that didn't make the pain of loss and betrayal any less...well, painful.

An idea sparked in her mind to suddenly say something along the lines of "I see dead people" however she knew better than to actually say it. It seemed like being a child for so long and being justified in acting like a child had made her personality a bit more childish. She still had her right and sane mind however.

"Genevieve must be hurting just as much as you," she added on her own thoughts.

At the simply said words, Syrian blinked in confusion. The child was becoming more and more of a mystery the longer Syrian spent with her, and she was beginning to wonder if she was merely having an extremely bizarre dream at this point.

"...About what in particular?" she asked warily, starting to wonder if the kid had said anything true since the moment Syrian had met her.

She froze up, though, at the girl's next words. Her eyes hardened into steel, pain apparent in her gaze. "You're quite perceptive," she said, a bite of ice in her tone. "But what would you know about how Genevieve or I am feeling?"

Syrian reacted harshly to her, bad move. That was a bad move. Her expression changed to express fear a bit more, hoping to soften the human up slightly, that and she kind of was afraid. She was just bouncing into this poor woman's life and about to possibly ruin it. Who wouldn't be angry?

"I've lost some too," the child spoke quietly, "A lot of them."

She wasn't lying around this time, for her siblings, save for Aphrodite, were dead along with her parents. Her children as well, though she had revived them they were close to death once more. She remained silent for a moment, before speaking up and admitting, "I miss my family too."

Syrian immediately felt bad about her harsh words upon seeing the girl's fear. Then her next words caused Syrian's face to fall completely, stressed lines creasing across her forehead and pulling the corners of her mouth down further and further.

Tears welled at the corners of her eyes and this time she couldn't will them away. "I'm... I'm sorry," she whispered finally. "I... I miss my sister, too," she admitted. She looked at Rhea with new eyes. Was the girl an orphan?

"You... you said you lied... you're parents... are they -" she couldn't bring herself to say the words, and she hoped that her suspicions were incorrect.