Chapter Text
Oh yeah... she might... Aether thought, doing a full 180 to swing his head back so he could fully inspect the weird portal-thingy. He would probably need someone like Albedo to tell him if it was safe or not, but that wasn't what he was thinking about at the moment. What was on his mind was a bit more chaotic... but who would care? He would just pop in and pop back out. And if Lumine was in there, and he didn't go...
"Aether! What are you doing?!" Paimon whined, throwing her arms in the air. "You can't go in the pearl-pearl purr-tor!"
"The what-a-what now?" Aether asked, turning to face his tiny, floating companion. He still had the note in his hand from when he picked it up as he was checking out the portal. There wasn't much to check out, and Aether almost immediately spotted the note.
"The purp- purr- the purr- AH! Paimon can't say it, but you know what Paimon means!" Paimon carped, swatting at a chuckling Aether trying to protect himself from Paimon's blows.
"Hmm..." Aether said, stepping away from Paimon.
"What? What is it? Why are you hmm-ing?" Paimon asked, only further hovering over him.
"I don't know... this is a very difficult case..." Aether scratched the back of his head, feigning confusion.
"What's a very difficult case? Wh- HEY! YOU AREN'T TALKING ABOUT WHAT YOU THINK PAIMON MEANS, RIGHT?!" Paimon yelled, pelting him with even more harmless blows. Aether's laughter only further confirmed her theory. "Paimon can talk! Paimon can talk just fine!"
"Bah! You can't even say purple portal! That's so easy!"
"Is not!"
"Is too!"
"Is not!"
"Is too!"
"Is not!" Paimon countered for the third time in a row, then pointed to the note Aether was holding. "Anyways, since we all know Paimon is awesome and can talk like a normal person, should we start asking why this isn't?"
Aether glanced down at the paper. It was a weird jumble of unreadable characters- that was for sure. What the jumble meant, on the other hand, was more of a mystery. Again, Aether should bring this to someone like Albedo, but... "Hey, Paimon... don't you think this kind of looks like me?"
"Huh?" Paimon's confusion slipped out from her lips. She hovered even closer to Aether to get a better look. Aether took her baby hand and placed it on the portrait of two people, next to the jumble of unreadable characters. It sure did look like them... exactly like them. Aether looked at himself then glanced to his sister. Who else could it resemble but her? Every feature of her beautiful face was plastered on the flimsy note, feeding his desire to find her. "Aether?"
"...yeah?" Aether said, looking up from the note after a few seconds of hesitation. Paimon was floating right in front of his face.
"Are you sure you want to do this?" Paimon said, creepily out of character for her usual high-pitched voice. "You know, Aether... she might not even be there."
Aether looked at the note once more before returning Paimon's gaze.
"I have to at least try."
And there it was on Aether's face; a stupid, stupid kind of determination only complete idiots could yield. His stubbornness was easy to see, even to the almost-always oblivious Paimon.
"Alright~! Let's go see what this portal leads to!" Paimon shouted, picking up Aether's attitude. The two fools grinned idiotic, dumb smiles at each other before looking at the portal with a feeling that was not there before. Of course those two morons couldn't identify it, so I guess we'll never know.
...idiots.
Aether suddenly whipped around and drew his sword.
"Aether! What's wrong?" Paimon asked, obviously surprised to see the sword.
Aether swung his head back and forth a few times before hesitantly sheathing it. "I swear I heard something..."
"Well, Paimon didn't! You must be going crazy!" She giggled, poking Aether's cheek.
Aether shook his head and glanced around a few more times before motioning for Paimon to follow him. Paimon nodded, and they entered the purple portal. Not after Aether managed to drop his freaking note though. Gosh... what kind of dummies am I dealing with here?