AN: Went through three different drafts before finally posting this. Would love any tips on getting betas to preview.
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I could feel the room tense as I slid the papers across the table, most front pages showing grainy black and white pictures of the cruise liner Seaward floating above the coast. Next to the ship floated something described as 'the golden man'.
The occupants of the ship described the thing as 'human-looking, with golden skin and empty white eyes. He felt sad when I looked at him.' It had apparently stopped the ship from running aground on a pillar of rock hidden just under the waves off of Norway's southwestern coast by lifting it into the air through unknown means. The article would have you think the ship would've cracked in two without the things intervention.
I kept watch on the gods whose powers it fit, and the two with the most power available to do this. Hepheastus(Vulcan), Apollo, Poseidon(Neptune), and Hades(Pluto). If they're responsible for this...I'll deal with it. Now if only my Roman echo would shut up.
(We just started our meeting. The others are feeling the displacement.) You just started? (You all started early.) The time was set in advance to deal with this..whatever.
Adrestia and Hermes(Mercury) passed out copies of the article to the gods seated near the walls. I saw a few of them stretch and shudder as they all dealt with the collision of their Roman forms, each of speaking a mix of French, Italian, Latin, and Ancient Greek. Apollo, Hermes, Themis and Atlas were spared. A few of the others were able to spare attention enough to read the article, and their reactions only got worse.
Ares called for us to attack the thing, whatever powers it had be damned. Hephaestus wanted to trap it, which I was all for, once we knew what it could and couldn't do. Athena stated her own position, much in line with my own. Atlas simply grinned and waited while more and more options were thrown out to hear in a mix of Latin, Old English, and ancient Greek.
Give them all a moment to stabilize, and leave me alone. (If only one of us had chosen a different location, then this wouldn't be happening.) This is the emergency meeting location. This, I thought while looking at the paper's headlines, qualifies as an emergency. We don't know who this is, what they want. For all we know, this could be Ouranos, finally recovered after Cronos castrated him.
(He was castrated with adamantine.) I said recovered, not healed. Just stop throwing their Roman names into my head, and we can get through this.
(I can't wait to be one, for this to be over.) There are still more steps before that can happen.
Marie...
I slammed my hands down on the table, and the shock brought silence to the arguments. Once I felt their gazes lock onto me, I began. "Everyone. We have something unprecedented happening here. This," I raised the paper before slamming it onto the table, "happened three days ago. What we don't know is who's responsible for its appearance."
Apollo stood up from his chair, stabbing his arm toward the other wall of the room. "It could've been Poseidon! Garnering for more power before we reveal ourselves." Behind me, Adrestia tensed, her eyes darting between the two of them. I stared at him. At least he voiced the accusation first.
I barely saw the aforementioned sea god draw his weapon. It shot out from the pillar of seawater around his seat, the two-pronged bronze harpoon blades punching into either side of Apollo's neck. Poseidon glared at the god of music, poison, and prophecy before asking, "Do you want to repeat that, Apollo?"
He shook his head as a tendril of water reached out to retrieve the harpoon, pulling the gods main weapon back to its owner.
With my face and half of my eyes focused on the newspaper, I shifted my gaze down the table onto Apollo and Hephaestus as I kept reading. "This wouldn't happen to be you or a powerful child of yours, would it Apollo?" The torrent of languages slowed as attention shifted onto our resident sun god. He jerked in surprise on his chair, shifting from a mass of fire into flesh.
"What?! No!" His eyes widened as he realized it was me he was talking to. "No, Lord Zemyst. I don't have any children with that level of power. Maybe it's Hemera, or Aether?" I wish that you were the god of truth, Apollo. That would make this so much simpler.
Hmm. Interesting possibilities both. Of course, it could also be Hyperion. Even more possibilities came to me the more I thought about it. Anyone with a connection to fire or gold could be a culprit, just looking at the gods on our side or against us. Outside of our council, it could be an avatar of Ra from Egypt, or the Shura from India. I hoped it wasn't a kami or divine spirit breaking away from the East.
I stopped focusing on Apollo and switched eyes to view our resident builder. "Hephaestus, you haven't made any more automatons with flight abilities, have you?"
He looked away from the newspaper to glare at me, straightening his heavy apron. "I only made one, my lord. This is obviously not Strale."
Snorting, I recalled the article about the sighting of it over a field a few years ago. "A better name than 'Mothman', at any rate."
He bristled, standing up and placing his hammer on the table with a clang. "It was only seen because the telekhine was trying to find my workshop. I had to kill it before it got close." He settled back into his chair, shifting his one bronze leg to a more comfortable position before continuing to draw some device in his notepad on the edge of the table.
I looked around the room, making sure to meet the eyes of everyone present. Poseidon and the other gods seated on the sidelines met my eyes, while those at the table straightened up.
"To forestall any further arguments, why don't we swear, as a council, non-involvement with this thing's appearance? Any guilty party will be decided, if they're present, and we can move forward."
The other gods slowly nodded as I released them. No one wanted to at the mercy of Styx, but it was the only way to be sure. No one had ever been known to break a Stygian contract, but the results wouldn't be pleasant.
After a moment, they all accepted, nodding in turn. I stood from my chair and motioned to Themis. She stood, changing to wind and flowing to my side. At her nod, I stated the oath.
"We the council swear on the Styx that there was no planning, foreknowledge, or participation in the appearance of the golden man by anyone present." With the last word, the oath was sealed, and the river flowed into us, searching. Oily green mist filled the room, investigating everyone.
Kratos, standing behind Adrestia's chair unbeknownst to her. Zelus, spread in a thin film over the ceiling. Nike, situated in the far corner, and Bia on the underside of the table. Styx wouldn't spare any of her children if they were involved.
Nothing happened to my side of the table, and the others were spared as well. What I could see of Poseidon seemed relieved, as well as Hades and Demeter.
"Alright." Everyone's attention latched onto me again, invisible but heavy strings attaching themselves. "For now, we leave this thing be."
"What!" "We need to get rid of it!" The Hunt can investigate, right?" "Don't you dare ask to put my girls in danger!"
I slammed my hands onto the table, bringing silence to the room. "We will be investigating," I held up a hand to stop Artemis' protests, "and will be observing, preparing. We have more than enough gods here to act as scouts, and we'll work to increase training the children. They can be moved to the fourth camp location, there's better security there and more shielding. It won't be much trouble to upgrade the turrets currently in place, will it?"
Hephaestus laughed. "My kids would love the work." The others brought out prisms to call their own children, and Apollo lit them up. I could use my Roman form to relay the same instructions in the other council.
"Well, then!" I clapped my hands and moved to the doors. "That concludes the emergency meeting. There's food downstairs. You all can thank Demeter for the vegetables, and Artemis prepared the meat. You can all view the recordings of her skinning and cooking for us on the televisions downstairs." Artemis' head jerked towards me, glaring. I smiled back at her as I opened the door. "Ah! On another note, Persephone will be joining us all again next month after the seasonal council meeting."
I left the room and transformed myself into gas, flowing downstairs through the air of the stairwell, Zelus following behind. Artemis darted after me in the form of a fox, jumping between the handrails and landing softly on the floor. The other gods followed down the stairs behind her in motes of light, a wave of earth, floating fish, and other forms spreading through the doors and throughout the multi-tiered banquet hall beyond.
Hephaestus had tried to outdo himself again with the design. There were at least three floors of oak wood in the hall, energized bronze panels disguised from view with murals of art and statues from many periods throughout the last two millennia. We'd come through a stairway onto the upper third floor, minor gods and some monsters already present. Unfortunate the 'Golden Age' of the Titans had no artwork. I should see if Themis or the Moirai would accept doing a commission..that is, if the three Fates will ever deign to talk to me. I'll ask Themis about contacting the Fates at some point today.
Ares and Aphrodite sat together a floor below, along with many of their children. Dionysus sat with Eros, father and son hooking their arms together and drinking wine from golden goblets. Apollo lounged on his back two floors below in the grotto, the Muses, Iris, and Poseidon floating around him. Hades, the Furies, and Zelus were cutting hunks off the moose displayed on the dining table.
I shifted my attention to Demeter, who was thankfully watching the meat preparation video before turning to face towards Artemis as she slid up from my right, still glaring at me but now in the form of a young woman. "Artemis."
"My Lord." She nodded her head toward the screen. "This video of my work in the kitchens.."
I turned to face her while I leaned on the railing and continued to watch Demeter, who inched closer to the main table after the video ended. "The whole building is under notice that recordings are active. There's a note on the sign-in sheet for the kitchen to that same effect." A parting gift for you, Demeter.
She took a moment to recall it. " The notice said 'Use of these facilities denotes assent to follow proper use and cleaning of tools, food preparation, instruction materials, and video is in place to ensure these rules are followed.'" She looked at me. "That doesn't explain why you advertised and presented this.."
Something in my posture must have given me away, for I saw her glance between the screen and Demeter, still watching her cook and season the deer on video with rapt attention, then glanced back at me. "Why? I tried that centuries ago..she still won't let anyone make her food." Being tricked into eating a child will do that.
I turned my head and tried to raise an eyebrow as Demeter cringed while placing a small piece of meat on her plate. "What did you do?" How do people do that?
Artemis shrugged as she flopped back into a couch. "I took her on a hunting trip. Showed her how to track down and skin a deer. She knew the Kentucky woods, better than I did, of course. Wouldn't impress a Fury how she tries to skin an animal, though. Hacked off chunks of meat or split the skin with every move. She gave up after five times. I say it's been too long. It's been more than two millennia. Anyone who tried that with us now would get the same treatment as Lycaon and Tantalus…………..Hahahaha…"
I raised an eyebrow at her. People don't usually laugh when referring to them. Well, the Furies might.
"Tantalus..'Water, water, everywhere and not a drop to drink!'" She started laughing again, doubling over to clutch her stomach catching the attention of some minor gods.
I took a moment before I remembered the story of his particular punishment. Surrounded by waist-high water and some fruit tree, both of which he could never reach. "Hahahahaha!" Laughing along with her, and drawing even more looks from minor gods and a few satyrs, it took a moment to collect myself. "That is excellent, and you should certainly approach Hades with that." Tantalus hearing that tune….that is funny.
Smiling, she stayed seated and stretched her arms downstairs to grab a plate while a copy of hers split off to find my uncle. "Speaking of Lycaon, why do you want him brought in alive?"
I thought for a moment on how to explain it to her. I knew why I wanted to, needed to do it. I just needed to make sure she understood why she should bother, when he and his pack had killed more than a few of her huntresses, and injured her more than a few times, all the while sacrificing people to us to try and appease his sentence.
I still don't believe he fully realizes why he's being punished.
I shook my head, and leaned back against the wall. "If you found a wild animal that was harming your huntresses, and proved resistant to most weapons, wouldn't you want to know what worked? Wouldn't you want to know why, and how to avoid being attacked again?"
She looked at me, smirking. "I'd first make sure that the monster stopped first, or that I moved my mother and huntresses away."
I waved my hand in her direction and suppressed a sigh. "You know what I mean." All slain monsters grew again to Tartarus, to return through any number of tunnels. Herakles and Atlas guarded most entrances now, but there were always new ones when old ones were closed.
Killing Lycaon now would only free him to kill more people later. "I want to make sure that we know about Lycaon like we know the Hydra, Chimera," I spread my arms wide, gesturing out towards the other levels of the banquet hall. "Once we know him, we never have to worry again, Artemis. We know the challenge. Now we work to know, and defeat the enemy." Keeping him for study would help us, especially Atlas and Herakles, to contain him and the rest of his followers to the prison where they belong. First I needed to understand why it was only silver that injured him and the others. It took years to even find that out, before a man from that disastrous celebration came forward.
I split my body in two, bringing my total count up to seven for today, just a few shy of my limit. My other copy jumped to the ground floor to find Themis. With the body that stayed up top, I bid Artemis a good day and moved off to search the upper level for other gods, and the Titan goddess of law.
Zelus slid up beside me as I walked away. "Hey, boss." He was wearing a suit, black rubbery wings sticking out the sleeves, lower back, and pants legs of his suit. "I'm goin' to go and collect my winnings from Nike."
I stared at him as he sauntered over to the guardrail. "You bet on the outcome of an emergency council meeting?"
The spirit of rivalry gave me a crooked grin as he placed his foot up. "Nah, boss. I bet for Apollo being innocent." With that, he jumped down to the first floor, and I dissolved my body on the third floor.
Of course, Zelus collecting his winnings turned into a wrestling competition, starting against his sister. They put on the mandatory energized bronze cuffs on their ankles, and started in. Themis made the judgments for the first few matches, before being replaced by Lady Styx herself.
Nike won against him and his brother Kratos, before losing to Athena. Ares threw me around the mat before finally ending it with a pin. Apollo ended up winning the whole thing.
Zelus threw a table out the room, and the party wound down from there.
As the rest of the gods departed, I dissolved the body I had here and moved my attention back to my children.
After that, I needed to talk to a goddess of death.
