Hidden Meanings

An Author's Darkness

Examining the book with his eyes, Jaxson Rixen leans forward, clasping his hands to rest on his knees.

The target of his attention is the girl that sits across from him, her own blue-grey eyes trapped by the words on the page.

After Jaxson clears his throat, she snaps a metal bookmark that clips the page tightly into the top of it.

"Sorry," she apologizes, closing the book and revealing the deep melancholy of the blue on the front cover.

Jaxson's face scrunches up. "May I talk to you?"

"Go ahead," she rakes a hand through her hair, frowning as she combs one side to the other.

"It's about my death."

"Oh. That."

Her face hardens, much how you know how it's going to rain when the dark clouds start to roll in.

Rio takes her characters quite seriously- despite how joking she was about them on the outside, they were an extent of her heart, so she took both pride and insecurity with them.

"What about it?"

"Oh, I don't know, maybe the fact one of my crew members, Shinji, he-"

She flies forward, clamping one hand across his mouth.

"Don't spoil it!"

"There's no one listening."

Her face screws up in a scowl, something Rio didn't do much. "You never know who bugs room. Ears are everywhere. The boundary between alternate realities and this one is unbelievably weak. Anyone can listen in if they have the mindset to do so."

"Some people can piece it together based off the clues you give."

"That's the point. Anyways, the topic at hand. What is it?"

Jaxson's hand goes to touch his ear, where a small earring dangles. "Ashita. My family. Shinzo, Kin..."

"Once again," she flicks a hand at the room around her. "Alternate realities are weak here. You could easily slip into one. I'm usually fine with it if you don't screw things over. I let Shikimo escape into a Fairy Tail one- I even followed her into it with a couple others." 

"No, not in another universe," Jaxson says, shaking his head. "Here, where everything is the same, the world I still love. Rio..."

She puffs out her cheeks. "I'm a sap for ships, but..."

Standing abruptly, Jaxson's brittle pieces of glass, his eyes, bear into her. "I see. Thank you for this time."

He turns to leave, but Rio shoots up too, wrenching his shoulder towards her, but her next move is gentle.

Bringing her fingertips to his cheek, Rio smiles. "Another time, Jaxson. Another time, I promise. I'm just a little down and under stormy clouds at the moment."

Her touch is cold, but there was warmth at the tips of her fingertips.

Jaxson blinks, then pulls his hand up to rest over hers. "Best of luck for you, my author. I will wait."

With that, the character turns, leaving Rio in her own weak mind.

After minutes of walking, Jaxson tenses, feeling the presence of someone rest on his shoulders.

"You... You're rather sloppy."

"Perhaps that's my intention," the voice calls, a male one much like his own. "The boundary your author has caused is quite... Unstable. I can only assume that her mind is unstable as well, at the moment."