Work Text:
Hunter was walking through the house, bored and mindlessly stimming as he ventured down the halls.
He bumped into Amity by accident and she looked up at him in surprise.
“Sorry,” Hunter quickly mumbled and she smiled. “Apology accepted. I was looking for you actually.” She informed and he looked down at her.
“Oh? What for?” He asked and Amity motioned to Ghost, who was in staff form at the moment.
“I was wondering if you could teach me some flying tricks? I’d ask Gus but he has an unconventional way of learning, plus I wanted to learn how to stand on mine like you do yours.” Amity said and waved a hand. “Whenever you’re free.”
“Yeah I’ll help!” Hunter said, smiling wide. Amity rarely goes to him for help, normally asking one of the twins or Darius and Hunter hasn’t really had that chance to step up as a big brother to her. “I’m free now if you want to practice and such?”
Amity smiled. “We should go outside, last time Ed flew through here he broke one of dad’s portraits.”
Hunter grimaced and nodded. “Yeah, good idea.”
He ran to his room and grabbed Flapjack, the bird tweeting in surprise at being woken from it’s slumber. Hunter paused and grabbed a few pillows and safety gear he had stashed away as well and paused by the kitchen, grabbing water bottles and a few snacks too for energy.
He met Amity in the yard and she blinked at his full arms.
“Oh, woah, prepared.” She mumbled and Hunter grinned over at her.
“Yeah! Safety gear so you don’t get hurt, Emira is out so we’d have to wait for her to return and I’d prefer you not to get hurt in the first place anyway.” Hunter said and dumped the pillows and such down, holding out knee and elbow pads for her to put on.
She glanced at them with mild disgust. “I’ll be fine.” She insisted and he frowned back at her, simply shaking the gear once more and she sighed before grabbing them from him and clumsily putting the gear on.
“And snacks too! For energy! Flying on an empty stomach isn’t good. And water for hydration.” Hunter added and she smiled teasingly.
“Woah, Darius is rubbing off on you.” She said and Hunter rolled his eyes. “It’s just called safety, has nothing to do with him.”
Except it totally did but Hunter wasn’t about to admit that because the teasing would never end that he was becoming a “Mini-Darius.”
Amity begrudgingly downed some water and snacked some before holding Ghost out.
“Okay, now please teach away.” She instructed and Hunter pulled Flapjack up, the cardinal sighing before turning to staff form as well.
“Have you ever flown before?” Hunter asked. “Cause if not we should go over basics of balancing and such before trying to stand.”
“I’ve flown some, not an expert like Willow is, but that’s why I want to train. Covens don’t exist and I need something to do in my free time. I mean, grugby season is over so… you know.” Amity mumbled.
Hunter didn’t but he was too focused on the excitement of teaching Amity something.
“Do you need your headphones? The wind gets loud.” Hunter stated and Amity was silent for a moment.
“We’ll see.” She responded and Hunter began to run her through the basics, how to balance when sitting and how your centre of gravity changes between sitting and standing, talking her throw speed control and such.
After half an hour of just explaining instructions, Hunter could see amity was getting antsy, wanting to just fly and so he backed off some, helping her stand onto her staff and Ghost hovered over the ground.
“It’s good to try and learn balance first.” Hunter said, holding Amity’s arm so she didn’t fall even though she was only a foot in the air. Amity gripped onto his arm in return though, eyes wide as she tried to gain balance.
“It took me a month to learn how to fly standing, but I didn’t really have free time to practise,” Hunter began explaining. “And you’re a really fast learner, I think by the end of the week you’ll have mastered it.”
Amity just nodded, grip tightening on Hunter as she shook more.
Hunter panicked some, clutching onto his little sister and she paused. “I got this.” She said, suddenly determined and Hunter loosened his grip. “You sure?”
Amity looked up and gave him a sharp look and nodded, prompting Hunter to slowly release her, still close to catch her if she fell but far away enough she had space to try and learn balance for herself.
Her arms were out to the side and she inhaled deeply.
“I got this,” She mumbled to herself and smiled. “I took on Grometheus! I almost won the Bonesbourough Brawl! I can fly standing up.”
Hunter nodded with a smile that matched hers.
“Okay! You seem to have decent balance!” Hunter said. “Flying works the same as sitting, just lean forward some, try and communicate with your palismen where you want to go. If your and Ghost’s bond is strong enough, it should be as easy as walking.”
Amity nodded and leaned forward the slightest, the staff following suit, just really slow.
“That’s good!” Hunter cheered. “Slow and steady, just to try and feel out how it should go. Don’t try and pick up speed too quickly.”
Amity nodded and her staff hovered higher over the ground, moving at hardly a mile per hour but like Hunter said, she seemed to learn it very quickly, making slow circles around Hunter.
The duo stayed outside until it got dark and Darius returned from work, finding them outside.
Amity was going faster now, still nowhere near as fast as Hunter in games, but insanely fast for someone who just learned what she was doing that day . She was making circles around Hunter and idly chatting about plans she had coming up with Luz (Luz was going to take her to a trip to the Human Realm and show her some mall Luz really enjoyed because they had super soft pretzels she thinks Amity would enjoy).
Hunter was listening intently as she talked, cheering every now and then when Amity picked up speed some or managed to do a quick circle without wobbling too much.
Darius leaned against the back door, arms crossed and a soft smile on his lips as he watched the two talk.
Hunter had been worried a lot recently, about taking the older brother role to Amity. He told Darius he knew she had Edric, but what if Amity didn’t want another older brother? What if Amity didn’t want him as her older brother? He had been asking Darius about advice on how to get closer to Amity, try and show that he was there for her.
Darius smiled at Hunter seemingly have figured it out by himself.
There was a scary moment where Amity picked up too much speed and went tumbling to the ground, but Hunter had set up enough pillows that she didn’t even get a scratch.
Hunter nervously rubbed his hands together, scared she’d give up but she just sat up and cheered loudly.
“How’d I do?” Amity asked and Hunter smiled.
“Amazing for this being your first time, not perfect of course but you’ll get there.” Hunter said and Amity cheered louder.
“Whoo-Hoo for not being perfect!” Amity said and clumsily stood, summoning Ghost back into cat form, the palismen seemingly just as tired.
“Dinner’s ready you two,” Darius finally made his presence known and Hunter looked up, smile wide on his face.
“Did you see? Did you see how cool Amity was? She hadn’t ever flown like that before! This was her first time!” Hunter bragged and Amity laughed as she began to clean up the pillow mess as Hunter bounded over to his dad.
“You taught her all that?” Darius asked and Hunter nodded as Darius ruffled his hair.
“Congrats, that was some big brother bonding, bud.” Darius said. Hunter’s eyes went wide and he, seemingly impossible, smiled wider.
“Wait really?” He asked and Darius nodded, making Hunter tourn back to Amity.
“Am I a good older brother?” He called to Amity and she looked over with wide eyes and smiled.
“Yeah! Even before today, you’re doing great with the big brother stuff.” Amity complimented and Hunter cheered, rushing inside to clean up for dinner and Darius laughed wholeheartedly and Amity ran to follow in.
Flapjack flew over, angrily tweeting, Darius couldn’t understand it but could tell but the facial expression was mad at being ignored.
“Calm down, be happy Hunter is settling in,” Darius said and Flapjack sighed, resting on his shoulder as Darius followed his kids inside.