He leaned away from her, a terrifying grin stretched across his face. His sharp teeth made Aionia want to run and hide. The realization that she couldn't get out of this place as easily as she did in the darkness with Styx was starting to sink in, and with it, her heart. Why had she pursued him? Why had she even pursued Styx in the first place? Where did she go?

Aionia thought back to the scene she had witnessed before Styx disappeared. She and this boy had merged. When she thought about the boy, he reminded her of the man who had teleported her to the Underworld and was currently grinning at her like a madman. Nothing in common physically, but his mannerisms kind of seemed similar. What was his name? Did anyone mention it? Aionia tried her hardest to focus on that and not the demon in front of her. Th.. Than-something. Thanos? Thanuto? Thanatos. His name was Thanatos. He had gone missing and had apparently been found.

A new question popped up into her mind. Who were the man and woman who conducted the weird merging ritual? They were both wearing clothes that couldn't really be classified as chitons, more like.. robes? Robes, that was it. They had bedazzled robes on and crowns of silver and gold. They presumably resided in the underworld as well. Only two people were coming into her mind, and she really didn't want it to be them. Anyone but them, please.

Aionia suddenly remembered she was currently being stared down by a demon. She took a moment to collect herself and put on a suitable persona.

"Cute. Get out of my way, please." She instructed him, secretly trying to move to the muscles in her other arm. He stopped grinning and looked at her right in the eyes.

"Out of your way? Where are you going to go? You're thousands of feet underground and I'm not bringing you back up. Besides,-" he took a moment to smack down both of Aionia's arms that were desperately trying to lift her off the ground, "You can't even get up." To emphasize this point, he swiftly stopped crouching down and stood to his full height, which Aionia estimated to be around seven to eight feet tall, just like Styx. Aionia was beginning to realize how similar this man really was to Styx.

"Why did you.. bring me here.." Aionia croaked. The man looked to his right, a blue light shining behind him. Slowly, the figure of her sister came into view. All her colour was gone and replaced with shades of blue corresponding to the darkness and/or lightness of her features. Her eyes had been completely whited out, glowing brighter than the rest of her body. The man outstretched an arm to present her to Aionia.

"Simple. I needed to bring your sister here, and you were in the way. Now, I hope your mother can find some spare drachmas to give to your bodies, wouldn't want you to stay here forever, now. Your sister's memory is already fading." Aionia looked back to her sister. The blues were desaturating slowly, but fast enough for Aionia to notice. She looked back at herself, letting out a silent sigh of relief that her skin was the same peachy colour as usual.

"Wait, what do you mean 'bodies'? This is my body! You teleported it!" She asked, her voice raising in volume and strength as she readjusted back into her persona. The man raised his eyebrows.

"Oh? No, no. Styx and I don't have that power. I teleported your soul. And I brought your sisters over. See, she belongs here, she's with the rest of the dead. You, on the other hand.. your body hasn't died yet. But there's a good chance it will, considering there's nothing in there to control it and give it, oh, I don't know, the basic things it needs to survive." As much as she wanted to keep up her persona, she couldn't stop herself from showing the utter horror she was feeling to the man.

"What a pitiful expression. It's what you deserve, Aionia." Something Aionia was starting to realize was that with her body, she could force it to not show what she was really thinking and easily put on a sort of persona to deal with the situation. But when all she was was what she really thinking, Aionia couldn't put on her personas anymore.

In her mind, she had an array of questions to pick from and ask. They swarmed through her head so much that they were practically coming out of her ears. She blinked a few times, and they seemed to be swirling around her head. Aionia couldn't suppress her lightheadedness or daze any longer. Her head landed face down on the rocky cave floor, and she heard her sister faintly call out to her, like she couldn't quite remember her name.

°0°

Aionia awoke to a bright light staring down at her. She shifted her arm to cover her eyes as best she could and slowly opened them. The luminescence was a light, light blue, almost white. Aionia squinted her eyes and looked directly at the light in front of her. A familiar face was looking back.

"Maia?" Aionia asked, her voice barely a whisper. Her sister blinked.

"Who's that? Anyways, you're finally awake!" She replied in her usual peppy voice. Aionia had to admit it was comforting to finally listen to a familiar voice after being subjected to Styx and whom she assumed was Thanatos' demonic sounding ones.

"You're.. Maia." Aionia told her slowly, her memory rushing back to her. Maia stared at her blankly, before blinking a few times.

"Maia..." She repeated, her eyes closed. She squinted a little before opening them.

"My name is Maia. That's it." She said once more, looking back up at her confused sister.

"Maia, I don't understand. You didn't know your own name? Do you even know mine? Or who I even am?" Aionia inquired, trying to shift into a comfortable sitting position with only one available arm. Maia thought for a few seconds.

"No, not really. To be honest, it feels like I'm forgetting a little more about myself each second that goes by. Can you tell me a little about myself? I want to remember!" Maia asked her sister, her tone getting more excited the more she spoke. Aionia felt safe listening to her voice.

"Well.. you're my sister. You're a year younger than me"-huff-"and you live with me and our mother on the outskirts of Athens." Aionia informed her, currently trying to sit up from laying on her back with little success.

"Athens..? Then, can you tell me what I'm doing here? This place doesn't look like Athens." Maia noted. Aionia was then faced with a hard decision. Maia was only 14, and Thanatos had said she was already dead. Aionia figured that her sister's sick and pale state was a probably the cause of said death. How was she to explain to her that she was dead? How would you explain to anyone that they were dead and stuck in the underworld for possibly forever? Aionia didn't want to think about that.

"No, it's not Athens. We're actually, um, moving to Sparta." Aionia fibbed, hoping Maia had the same attention span as she did when she was alive. Luckily, nothing seemed to have changed other than her fleeting memory.

"Spartaaa? What's a Sparta? It sounds cool! Is it a cave? Are we already there?" Aionia let through sigh of relief out loud, glad that this situation was actually working out in her favour.

"We're.. almost there. This is just a short stop." Aionia took a few slow breaths before focusing all her energy on standing up without tripping.

"Who was that man? Why'd you fall over? Is he your boyfriend? Was I supposed to be sleeping?" Aionia now realized how Styx must've felt while she bombarded her with meaningless questions. She made a mental note to apologize if she ever saw her again.

"How much do you remember right now?" Aionia dodger the barrage of questions.

Maia looked thoughtful. Aionia decided it wasn't a good sign that she saw her sister counting on her fingers.

"The alphabet.. I can count to.. seven? And uh, all the stuff you told me of course!" Aionia felt a twang of sadness. Her sister may have had an attention span shorter than her hair, but she was still very scholarly, and even literate. To see all her knowledge drained into nothingness made Aionia feel like a part of her was lost, too. She had so many memories of her sister attempting to teach her to read and write or excitedly sharing some new story or word she'd learned that day. To think that her sister would never share those memories with her again..

"A little less than the bare basics, got it." Aionia said briefly, finally being able to stand up. She backed up slowly to make sure her balance was okay, and approached her sister soon after. Maia's blue glow was dimming now, the colour white and the brightness slowly lowering.

Aionia thought back to what Maia had once told her about the souls of the dead. They started out as a bright blue, but as their memories faded, they became shades, beings of pure shadow that seemed to glow darkness whenever they went. They had no memories of their past life or lives, and existed for the rest of their days only being about to feel apathy. Aionia realized with horror that her sister was soon to be one of these shades, her light dimming a small bit more every passing second.

"I-We need to get out of here," Aionia murmured. She knew Maia didn't have much time left before she became a shade. Aionia was also acutely aware that her body was slowly dying too, though. And if she didn't get out of the underworld in time, she might have to share the same fate as her sister. Unless there was a way to summon someone who could teleport Aionia and Maia back in the next hour, her sister was a goner. Aionia estimated she had a few days before her body died of starvation or thirst, which gave her an infinitesimal amount of time to navigate the underworld, a place she had never been before and knew next to nothing about.

"Why? I like it here!" Maia twirled around in her ghostly chiton. "It's homey in here! There's this nice little patch of.. um... and this river! Which looks to be full of some.. uh.." She made a weird squiggly motion with her fingers. Aionia's heart rate sped up. Her sister really didn't have that much time.

Aionia's chest felt heavy. She didn't want to have her sisters last memory to be full of panic and worry that she couldn't understand. But did she really want to not take the risk and leave her sister in blissful ignorance? What kind of sister would she be, not even making an effort to save Maia? She felt a tear escaping her eye sockets.

"Hey! Why are you.. doing that?" Maia asked, her tone switching to concerned. She impulsively reached out to wipe the tear from her sister's eye. To only Maia's surprise, her fingers went right through Aionia's face, and ended up on the other side of her head. Maia looked at her sister.

"Is that? Normal?" Every word Maia spoke seemed to be a challenge for her to come up with. Aionia couldn't bare to see her sister like this.

"Yes. I'm going to gather water, alright Maia?" Aionia said briefly, swerving away from her sister's hand. Maia nodded, and Aionia nodded back before heading away from her. Aionia swore she heard her sister asking herself soon after what a "water" was.

Aionia couldn't stop the tears from falling. Her heart ached with the knowledge that she had just most likely left her baby sister forever.

Nonetheless, she trudged onwards towards the river that a hooded man stood dangerously close to, her tears soaking in the ground below. Around her stood the tortured shaded souls of the people who could not board the boat that crossed the river Styx and were forced to stay on the little patch of land that surrounded it and thinly connected to the cave leading to the over world.

Now and then, an unlucky soul would end up falling into the River Styx below them, whether it be on purpose or accident. They dissolved quickly once they entered, becoming just another one of the forgotten memories residing in the river. The fact that an exit back into the land of the living was so close yet unattainable for all the dead stuck on that patch of land seemed almost like Hades himself was mocking them in a way.

Thinking about her sister ending up as just another one of the dissolved souls in the Styx made her want to jump into the River herself. So that's exactly what she did.