Work Text:
FADE IN:
INT. HADES' AND PERSEPHONE'S BEDROOM - NIGHT
The room is dark, but the moonlight and the lights of the city still stream in through the room's wall-sized window.
HADES and PERSEPHONE are sleeping with their backs to the window, with Hades spooning Persephone, an arm around her to keep her safe.
Suddenly his eyes open wide, but he doesn't appear to be seeing the room around him. He gasps in fear, and draws back instinctively, and falls off the bed, nearly taking the blankets with him.
There is a distinct *thud*.
Persephone stirs and opens her eyes blearily. She realizes Hades isn't there, and rolls on her back and sits up.
PERSEPHONE
(sleepy, concerned)
Hades?
Persephone watches as a low, dark shadow streaks past the bed and vanishes before it hits the closed door.
She blinks, and looks around the room, and at the floor on the other side of the bed; no Hades.
PERSEPHONE
Hmm.
She gets up, pulling on a dark robe embroidered with silver leaf edging, shuffles her feet into incongruous but warm fluffy, pink slippers, and heads in the direction of the door; she knows this house so well, these days.
CUT TO:
INT. WINDOW-SIDED HALLWAY - DIMLY LIT
PERSEPHONE walks along silently in the moonlight, pausing at each door to sense for Hades, and moving on when he doesn't seem to be present beyond it.
She stops at the fourth door, and carefully opens it.
CUT TO:
INT. LIBRARY - DIMLY LIT
In front of one wall of bookshelves sits an elegant couch with ornate legs. While the room is dark, somehow the area beneath the couch is far, far darker.
What truly gives the game of hide-and-seek away is faint starlight accompanying the black void.
PERSEPHONE
(gentle)
Hades? I know you're here.
She closes the library door behind her. The darkness and stars shrinks even farther beneath the sofa.
Persephone walks to the sofa and kneels on the floor beside it, though still giving enough room to not intrude on the space around the legs. She does not look underneath the sofa, and keeps her voice gentle and reassuring.
PERSEPHONE
My love, it's going to be okay. You are safe, I am safe, the children are safe, the dogs are safe. Kronos is gone. There are many lifetimes between you and your childhood now.
The darkness and stars beneath the sofa seems to take on a shape, though it remains entirely beneath the sofa.
The shape whines like an ashamed dog.
PERSEPHONE
I'm not angry at you, or ashamed of you, for reacting this way, for running and hiding as you did as a child. Sometimes the past envelopes us, and we can be utterly caught up in it.
Persephone shifts into a more comfortable position, no longer kneeling.
PERSEPHONE
May I look? You don't have to come out if you don't want -- oh.
A hound made of darkness and stars peeks his head out from under the sofa. There are subtle differences between Hades in dog form and Cerberus, apart from lacking three heads, well-known to Persephone by now. Hades' muzzle is a little wider and longer and more square, the ears a little taller and sharper, and the glowing blue eyes more piercing.
There is a very slow *thump thump* of a tail somewhere beneath the sofa.
She carefully reaches her arms out towards him, and after a moment, he scoots the rest of the way from the too-low sofa; a large boi.
He crawls, low to the floor, and carefully settles next to Persephone, lying down. If he were sitting up, he would still be quite taller than her now. Across Hades' void-black coat, lines of stars subtly echo the patterns of his scars when he's a man.
Persephone embraces his thick, muscular neck. They sit there for a while, quiet and taking comfort from their intimacy.
After a while, Hades puts his head in her lap and covers his eyes with his dish-sized paws.
Persephone strokes his head, and continues talking softly.
PERSEPHONE
I know you often don't remember times like these. And you worry that this means you'll never get better. But you do remember some things subconsciously; you do learn. I will always be patient with you, just as you are with me. We have eternity with each other, to love and to heal at our own pace.
One paw uncovers Hades' eyes, and he looks up at her.
PERSEPHONE
(smiling down at him)
You're stuck with me.
His tail *thumps* once, twice.
Persephone settles her head against him, leaning fully, and they lie together, heads drooping and eyes closing, until they fall asleep together.
TIME PASSES.
In the wee hours of the dark Underworld morning, HECATE stops by on her way to work, guided by a finely honed sense about Hades.
She looks down at the two sleeping deities, smiles and shakes her head. Hades has reverted back to a man, and he and Persephone lie embracing one another.
With a wave of her hands, she drapes a warm black blanket around them.
She sighs, and gazes down at the couple.
HECATE
(fondly, without rancor)
You two are hopeless.
FADE OUT