Better than Revenge? (Ethan)

[Eowyn Oppedyk]

People claimed that love was better than revenge but Eowyn wasn't too sure on the matter. Love sounded good, of course it did! People wrote love poems and stories and songs and gushed about the concept until the Goth felt like puking her guts out. Had those people never experienced the satisfaction of revenge? The dish best served cold?

So she sat on the doorstep of the Nemesis cabin, glaring at the beautiful monstrosity in the distance that belonged to the fluttery butterflies that were the children of so called Love. It seemed unlikely. Love was supposed to be special right? It seemed her cabin was full enough to be sleeping around more than Zeus and Hermes combined and at least in mythology Zeus got around. Less so these days with the agreement they had with the three bothers. No, not brothers, bothers indeed. She wondered in passing if it still counted, the deal they had made. Since at least 2 of them were known to have broken the deal it only made sense that it was a moot point to uphold it. Even more so since the prophecy they did it for had already come true and made a mess of camp.

Bunch of drama.

But well, she was in a foul mood already and thinking of romantic exploits didn't exactly help. Thinking about all that usually got her confused since it wasn't clean and simple, even though it should be. People always said it was just chemistry and brain stuff and flying sparks. Since the brains ran on electrical signals of the smallest kind and sparks could also be caused because of static charge, it really shouldn't be too complicated. But it was. And it confused her.

She hated that.

So when a kid she recognised as a son of Aphrodite strolled by she did the usual impulsive thing and got up and walked over, resisting the urge to shove him for his mother. She probably looked a bit threatening nonetheless with her black clothes and dark make up and brooding expression. "Hey Loverboy." She said. "I hear you set people up." She narrowed her eyes at him, as if that was some sort of personal insult. "What's that even about? Isn't love supposed to be all natural and sparks fly?" She asked, really going the exact opposite direction that she intended to go. Pretty basic stuff for her around people that she found threatening.

Ethan Jay Macree

[Ethan Jay Macree]

Ethan was on a walk around the camp, he liked to get out and just take a walk at least once a day. He found that his legs started to get very stiff when he didn’t and he didn’t like the feeling of tight muscles. He’d rather go walking than join some of his siblings for yoga in the cabin. Aphrodite yoga seemed to be more about taking selfies or pictures in various poses, and less about actually stretching and meditating. It wasn’t unusual that he was stopped on his walks, he did like to think of himself as fairly well known around camp, but he couldn’t say it wasn’t odd to be stopped by someone from the Nemesis cabin. She walked up to him, calling him loverboy and asking why he tried to set people up when it was supposed to be natural and all that jazz. He laughed a little. “Well childbirth is natural too, doesn’t mean it doesn’t require assistance sometimes.” he shrugged his shoulders. He didn’t know much about childbirth, but he had been considering careers recently and the medical field didn’t seem too bad. He had been researching it a bit. He only had one year left at camp. “Why do you ask?” he questioned.

Eowyn Oppedyk

[Eowyn Oppedyk]

Eowyn didn't really like it when loverboy actually had a good argument in favour of setting people up for dates. It just made it so much harder to be sarcastic and leave that entire thing behind her. She wasn't even fully sure why she had enganged in this conversation. Part of her suspected she was trying to prove a point to herself but she wasn't sure what point that was even supposed to be. That she wasn't in love? That she was fine without company? Neither of those two seemed to make any sense, so there had to be something that she wasn't aware of. Or at least not enough so that she could silence the idea on her own.

She grumbled slightly at his mention of childbirth. "So what? You're just trying to get people to hook up or what? I heard you Aphro kids love breaking hearts. Why should we trust you?" See! Now she was getting somewhere, asking the right questions! If she didn't have a good reason to trust him or his cabin mates, she could let the idea of asking for a pairing go.

But naturally he was clever enough to realise there had to be a reason she asked. She wanted to bite his head off for being insightful but in stead she leaned against the doorpost of her cabin and glared at him slightly. "What's it to you? Maybe I'm just curious. Maybe I have evil masterplans that require me to go on a date." She stepped forward defiantly, sizing him up. "You planning on helping out if my intentions aren't good?"

Ethan Jay Macree

[Ethan Jay Macree]

It wasn’t entirely uncommon for Ethan to get that sort of response from someone the first time they spoke about his skills and hobbies. Matchmaking was an Aphrodite trait for sure, but he didn’t share his siblings desire to break hearts. He fell more on the side of love, rather than lust. Not that he was any good at love himself, but he seemed to have a talent for helping others find love. “Some people choose to focus on other aspects of our mothers domain than others.” he nodded in agreement. “If I was in it for the heartbreak I wouldn’t be very successful.” not to say that everyone he had tried to set up stayed together. As much as he could pinpoint good matches, he wasn’t perfect. Sometimes those matches were just better as friends. He was just good at finding personalities that meshed well and helping to scheme them together.

She stepped up to him, getting defensive about him asking why she wanted to know about his services. He raised an eyebrow. He hadn’t asked in an accusative way, but perhaps she was just a defensive person, he couldn’t say he knew much about her. “If you’re asking for help, I don’t really care why you want it.” he shrugged. What was it to him if she just wanted to hook up, or if he genuinely wanted to try to find someone to love. He got paid, in personal satisfaction, regardless of intent.

Eowyn Oppedyk

[Eowyn Oppedyk]

Well he certainly was a strange kiddo. Eowyn momentarily narrowed her eyes at him. The problem was that his answers were too good and too on the mark for not being a con man or generally horrible person so that she could search excuses not to go through with the madness of the idea of dating anybody at all. She sighed bitterly and crossed her arms in a last ditch attempt to ward of the feeling that this was not actually a bad idea. "You actually like matching people up then? What's the fee anyway? Favours? Safety in capture the flag? Money? What do you get out of it?" She didn't really trust people that did things for free. Nothing in life was every free if it took effort. Friendship was supposed to work dfiferently but even that usually meant exchanging time with somebody you didn't hate. You both got good memories out of it if it was done well.

The fun part was that he gave away the catch in a moment. Even if she was serious about it, he couldn't promise the other half wasn't doing it just for a prank. Then again, it made it easier to claim it was just a prank to her if push came to shove. It was a lot easier to avoid admitting she'd gotten hurt if she could pull of a thing where it was all on the other side of the group getting pranked. She relaxed her stature a little bit and shrugged slightly. "I don't know yet. I might be asking for help, but I want to know what to expect first. Not to threaten you but, you don't want my family as your enemies, just saying." It totally was a threat of course, but she didn't exactly mean it as one. For a daughter of Nemesis, she wasn't as inclined to hold grudges as most of her siblings were.

Ethan Jay Macree