White box

For science

The closer the time of Bill to leave came, the more koala like Marcus became. It would only be two weeks and perhaps it was even better that Bill would be away during the science awards ceremony time, but by now Bill had become such an essential part of his life, he didn't want to part with him one bit.

Was that something biological? A part of humans being both social and pair-bonding?

"Sheesh, it's only two weeks--" Jerry said, while he and Lydia were bringing bags to the car and the two lovebirds were close to tears.

"Can't we just bring him along?" Lydia asked yet another time.

"We would if he didn't have to go get bucks," Jerry replied.

In the first time Lydia had asked Jerry, he had said it wasn't that good of an idea to drop the news on his parents out of nowhere. (About their grandson being a rainbow child)

By the second time, Lydia had already updated Jerry's parents on the matter (and her own by extension, just in case).

Looked like that had been for naught, though, as Bill filled them in about Marcus solving that maths problem on the TV. Maths teacher had pulled a sneaky on Marcus by informing his parents first - so there were already plans in place and shopping for clothes and whatnot - Burton family would all be going to the ceremony.

"Eh, why didn't you tell us?" Jerry asked, feeling like it might have been a bad idea not to include such an event in their plans.

"Because its embarrassing," Marcus had replied. "They are making such a fuss about such a small deal, and--" the rest of his words were mumbled into Bill's shirt. It was embarrassing both because it was a small deal and because he was not the real author. Xena didn't mind one bit if Marcus took credit, because - that's the thing - it was a small deal.

It wasn't even her father's biggest or most notable achievement, just a small theorem to simplify some calculations among other theorems who could do the same thing. But Urea, this land in hicks when it came to science achievements, didn't have any of those theorems yet. It was now at the stage where all those theorems could be made with the knowledge Ureals had, but no one had put them together.

"I'm pretty sure this won't be the last such event," Bill noted to his parents.

"I won't let them trick me into solving another one--" Marcus mumbled still not looking up to see that all of them had made the same wry smile of 'yep, someone will trick him into solving another one.'

Marcus would much rather go to wherever Bill was going, but-- he knew that he was being selfish and also careless there. The safety zone period had run out. While some Hadeans, like Xena, had quit being Hadeans, thus his brother ought to have problems to contact them, there were still close to fifteen who were ripe for tricking, blackmailing and the like.

Having been made into a murderer by a girl who had been a victim of such trickery, Marcus was aware of the sort of methods brothers would use - as long as any of the Hadeans on this planet had anything or anyone they loved back in Hades it would be used against them.

While Marcus and Romuald both had the same administrator's authority and their status didn't differ in any official matters, it was true that Romuald was backed by all war-related authorities and he had the experience and contacts to make use of those. Sadly, there was nothing Marcus could put up against that; trying to lure the Hadeans to his side had no benefit, only potential losses.

Marcus filled Xena in about his situation at the time when Stephanie was sleeping due to a runestone. Marcus needed to eat, but it felt easier to just run to the temple rather than ordering take-out. Xena was staying over saying she would feel uneasy to leave prince on his own and Marcus did somewhat feel at ease with her as an ally.