It took all of Keisuke’s will power not to react when Niall was suddenly waving a hand in his face. He had been knee deep in recollecting about his parents when Niall had disturbed him. Usually he overreacted in a dramatic manner when someone got too close, as they never realized that they had had a literal brush with death. But, in that moment he hadn’t moved. He listened as the boy backed off, the soft sounds of rustling clothing and the soft thuds of limbs connecting with the ground as the boy moved away. It all went silent and Kei waited a few moments before cracking an eye, the boy was sitting in that straight up position again, his eyes open staring at nothing, and he wondered if Niall actually did sleep like that.
He watched the boy, sitting himself up to observe his strange sleeping habits, and moved in closer to examine his features under the fire. His face was still and blank, but even in the low light of the fire he could still make out the soft lines of the human’s jaw, the curve where his lips dipped, the cloudy eye. He reached up a gloved hand to the dangling earring in his left ear, and he felt himself smile, this boy was cute. He was startled back when the boy suddenly started moving again, he threw his body back and resumed ‘sleeping’ as the boy seemed to awaken. Stranger, the boy proceeded to lay down and go to sleep as an average person would. It felt Keisuke with a feeling of unease in his stomach, what exactly was Niall doing then?
Keisuke was startled awake my a burning sensation on his chest. He hadn’t even realized he had achieved a state of sleep until he had been suddenly awoken by the little phoenix. He had sat up too quickly though, sending the little bird flying as he sat up. Eos appeared unscathed though, running back to his side, excited that he was now able to give her attention. He looked to Niall who had already begun packing his things, confusion still present over what exactly his strange trance state was. “Good morning.”
He stood up fully with Eos in his arms and looked towards the sky. It was still early, the sun was still in the process of breaching the horizon and he couldn’t help but smile. “Look little one, can you see Eos raising the sun for us this morning?” He watched as the dark colors of the night sky began waning to the rosy golden colors of the dawn and wondered if the real Eos was there now, bringing up the new day for the creatures of earth to enjoy.
“I assume we are heading towards the village that is near here, for supplies?” During some of his thinking during the night Kei had prepared himself to face the people of that village. He had to, it hadn’t even been twenty-four hours and he considered Niall his friend and Eos a dear child, and Kei didn’t want Niall deciding he didn’t want Kei sticking around anymore because he was too inconvenient. The village made the most sense as a pit stop, as Niall would need to restock on basic human needs in order to survive their journey. “Let us go, um, it was this way right?”
Kei started off in a random direction that felt kind of right. Whenever visiting the human world he would feel a pull to whom Thantos would be annihilating, and a push towards where the doors to the underworld were, but he had never navigated without that assistance. He was blind without that basic instinct driving him.