Freyaa knew Orion wasn't all that well in the head most of the time. They were identical down to the brown hair, blue eyes, and mental illness of course. Before they moved to Earth he was just as he was born to be, a perfect mirror of her. Her shadow.

They didn’t stay identical forever.

Orion always seemed to know strange things about the universe, he talked about destiny and the fate of the world with the same energy as he talked about his favorite television shows. With great enthusiasm and a positive attitude toward the future.

After meeting with the ghostly being that lived in their uncle's old house, he seemed to forget a lot of those things. But he was still the same old Orion she'd always known. As happy-go-lucky and excitable as usual.

Freyaa never read the book, but she knew enough. It belonged to Orion, and he was to remember again when he needed it. That's roughly what she was told when it became entrusted to her after his powers were sealed. A book of prophecy so to speak, that held their roles and a path to a future in which they survived.

A big responsibility for a couple of children, but Freyaa never doubted that someone as hopeful as Orion would be able to pull it off. It made her believe in herself too.

That was until they started to go to school with humans, at that point things started to go awry. Things only seemed to get worse for Orion over time. She had no idea what to do about it, she had her own issues to deal with.

During that time, they slowly drifted apart both physically and mentally. She used to be able to tell what Orion was thinking, but now not even Orion seemed to know what Orion was thinking.

She felt like maybe it was her fault for letting them become separated. She also felt responsible for whatever he must have been through as a result of it.

Out of curiosity, she looked into the book. Despite what limited information was offered, it was clear that this wasn’t how things were supposed to be. But S hadn’t returned as they said they would, things hadn’t diverged enough to be a problem. Even if it definitely was a problem otherwise.

“Hey, Orion, what are you doing?” He was very clearly doing something stupid. He was playing around on an elliptical machine their guardians picked up at a yard sale a few months back.

“I’m not feeling Orion, I think I’m a Charlotte.” He said as he continued to remove the pedal and put it back on over and over again. It wasn't all that interesting to Freyaa, but she could see the appeal in a repetitive task.

“Is that your new ‘girl name’? I thought you wanted to go by Simone." She asked.

He seemed pretty adamant about it at the time he’d chosen that to be his other name. It was around the time she'd chosen the name Freyaa for herself.

The name ‘Simone’ and the double ‘a’ in ‘Freyaa’ were both pretty meaningful to them, so she couldn't imagine him changing his mind so suddenly.

"No, it's not that. I just don’t feel like I’m Orion today.” He sighed.

“What do you mean by that?” She asked, it's not as if he’d been doing anything unusual. Not for him at least.

But she realized she’d probably not be the best judge of that. She was so used to his antics it hadn't even occurred to her that there were actual reasons behind them other then it just being how he is as a person.

“Shine said I should give my modes names to keep better track of them. I didn't really want to, since I was worried that would make it worse, but she said it's helping.” He explained.

Shine, as Orion called her, was perhaps the only psychiatrist who specialized in non-human patients on Earth. She had a real name, Freyaa couldn't even remember what it was. But when four-year-old Orion and Freyaa first met her, they couldn't pronounce it correctly and they called her that ever since.

She wasn't a shadow or a Lucidian, but she wasn't human either. Freyaa didn't know what she was, but she'd been good to Orion and her so that's about all that mattered.

“Do you think it's helping?” She asked.

“I haven’t really noticed because I forget so much. But I think my memory has improved a bit.” He said.

“If your memory improved at all then I think it's helping.” Freyaa said.

“I guess, I just don’t like it much.” He added.

That was perhaps one of the most notable things she ever saw happen, he didn't like to talk about it. She'd learn some things from time to time when he felt comfortable enough to say it, but she didn't press him on it.

Charlette never came around again, perhaps just a passing mood. Or perhaps Charlette didn’t feel the need to be ‘a Charlette’ anymore and just stayed ‘an Orion’ as most parts of him seemed to do. There were some other modes that kept a title of sorts, but he didn’t talk about it much.

While worrying about Orion took up a lot of her free time she wasn't overwhelmed by it. She had a decent social life and eventually became acquainted with a boy who would become the love of her life.

She met Richard in middle school and started dating officially in high school. It was a funny story really. He was horsing around with a friend in the hallway and pushed him, accidentally throwing him at Freyaa. She was just finishing up at her locker when the boy nearly knocked her off her feet dropping the book in her hands.

"Really?" She pushed the other boy away. "Is that how it's going to be? Throw people at me?" 

"I didn't mean to throw him." Richard said picking up the book for her with an apologetic smile. "Are you alright?"

"Yeah, yeah." Freyaa dusted off her pants lightly. "I'm going to be late for class." She quickly went on her way unaware that while this was a rather mundane albeit strange happenstance to her, Richard was completely swooned.

Richard had hair on the crayon level of red that highlighted his reddish-brown eyes, and he was slightly taller than her.

He was a bit of a jock, but he didn't play any sports outside gym class. He spent his spare time at clubs instead, he didn't have a particular hobby or anything, he just liked doing a bunch of different things. Almost as if he were trying to avoid going home in the evenings.

They ended up going to a specialized high school geared towards future scientists. Freyaa didn't care for it much at first, but she began to enjoy after the first year. She found that she loved learning a lot more than she did as a child.

While Freyaa was more for the biological and chemical sciences like Orion, Richard was far more interested in engineering and the like. Most of their classes didn't overlap but their lockers were quite close together. After some time, Richard finally decided to take a chance.

"Hey, do you... maybe want to go see a movie or something sometime?" He asked nervously. He wasn't really her type and considering his first impression she wasn't exactly thrilled with the idea.

"As long as you're paying, you owe me for throwing a boy at me." She smiled with an air of cheekiness. 

"I didn't throw him, geez, but I accept those terms. Are you free this weekend?" He asked barely hiding his excitement.

"Yeah, this weekend is good." She replied and that was the start of their relationship.

She later found out that his home life wasn't all that great either.

A glass child as they call it. His brother was severely ill, so he was left alone and almost neglected at times. He was often left to care for him despite still being a child himself. His younger brother ‘took priority’ much like Orion did.

But it wasn't her guardians who made Orion the priority. They always made sure she was cared for and loved. They both held important roles in their destiny after all. If anything, it felt like they paid her more attention because they didn't even know how to deal with him, leaving most of his care to someone else.

So, she couldn't help but get anxious about how he got messed up.

Even so it wasn't hard to relate to Richards struggles.

“Well, yeah, but it's different.” She said, “They never treated me like that, I was always the priority. He was rarely around so it was like I was an only child.”

“That doesn't mean you didn't struggle because of it.” He said.

“I’m not denying that I just… I’m worried about him. And about the future.” She said. “We all have roles to play, I just need to make sure he's capable of playing his.”

“Stressing out about it isn't going to improve his condition it's only making yours worse.” He said with a knowing half smile that only made her more frustrated.

“I know that but… When the Lucidians from the North came to assess his condition.” Freyaa looked down, “They did something to him. I was there and I… I just let it happen.”

She wasn’t sure if her guardians knew it would happen either, but she couldn’t help but feel a bit of resentment towards them.

“How were you supposed to know that?” Richard asked. “You thought they were doing what was best for him.”

“I don't know, I just feel responsible somehow.” Freyaa held Richard's hand tight. “and now… I’m just letting him walk into danger like that. I can't stand it.”

---

Orion was going to go throw himself into danger because of their roles. And things weren't like they should have been. More than anything she was afraid of losing him.

That day, she reluctantly handed over the book. She pretended like it wasn't a big deal. She could sense that something changed when he touched the book. He could probably remember the things that ghost made him forget now.

He said something…

“What was that?” She asked him.

“It's not that important, we can talk about it later.” He said.

She knew full well they wouldn't be talking about it later.

Not long after that he disappeared for a while. She wasn't sure if she was upset with him or herself. But the fact that he said nothing to her at all before leaving made her even more anxious about what was to come.