-Alkaios POV-
The air hung heavy with tension as my peers and I awaited Chiron and Asclepius's return from checking on Jason. I couldn't help but frown; I simply couldn't fathom why Jason was now being affected by the plague. We had been here for hours, yet our group hadn't been infected by the Nosoi once. In fact, the only one who had been was me, but I was immune to the plague.
I glanced at Heracles and winced at his expression. Though his face was unreadable, Heracles was furious—a quiet rage. The very air seemed electrified, smelling of ozone. My eyes met Castor and Pollux, and I deadpanned as they gestured me toward Heracles.
Our eyes seemed to speak. 'Why me, when you two are his younger siblings?' I asked them with my eyes, but the twins shook their heads.
'You are closer to Heracles,' Castor responded silently, with Pollux nodding in agreement. I can't believe this. Since when am I closer to Heracles? I sighed and put my head in my hands, stressed. Of all days, why did these two siblings have to gang up on me today?
As I approached Heracles, the son of Zeus, my footsteps echoed in the chamber. "Heracles, how are you?" I asked, hoping to comfort the gentle giant. "If you're worried about Jason, you needn't be. He'll drive back this plague. It won't be long before Jason is back ordering us around," I added, patting his shoulder.
I hissed as my hand sparked upon contact with Heracles. His shoulders slumped. "I am sorry, Alkaios. I did not intend to injure you; I've been under a lot of stress. The condition of Athens angers me, and with the suddenness of Jason's sickness… I feel rage filling my entire being," Heracles said, looking apologetic.
"It's fine, Heracles. I get that you're stressed. I feel the same way; I hate seeing the Athenians suffer like this," I said. Heracles raised an eyebrow.
"You hate what's happening to the Athenians, Alkaios? I thought you didn't care for them. Considering your shared past, I'd have imagined you didn't care for the people here," Heracles asked. Castor and Pollux perked up at his question. I couldn't help but sigh at Heracles' words; I just knew people would eventually misunderstand my actions.
"It's not that I hate the Athenians, Heracles," I said. "I hated what they were doing to the people of Koutalas. There were innocent people in danger, that's all. If anyone else had threatened Koutalas, I would have done the same." Heracles perked up at my words, as if they resonated with him. Castor and Pollux both eyed me with caution. I could tell they understood that if it were Sparta that threatened Koutalas , I would have done the same.
Heracles gave me a small smile. "It seems I was wrong about you, Alkaios," he said, chuckling softly. "I thought you were difficult to speak to." His words made me frown. Was I hard to approach? I looked to Castor and Pollux, silently wondering if I was also hard to speak to.
Castor and Pollux exchanged an awkward smile, which only made me frown deeper. "Am I unapproachable?" I asked, seeing the confusion on their faces at my question. What was so unapproachable about me?
The flickering torchlight cast long, dancing shadows across the stone walls of the chamber as Heracles, his brow furrowed with a mixture of admiration and perhaps a touch of bewilderment, spoke his mind. "I mean no offense, Alkaios, but sometimes you seem perfect. Like a mountain covered in mist. One that we want to climb, but we do not know how."
Heracles's words hung in the air, each syllable a weight that only deepened my frown. Perfection? The very notion felt like a cruel jest, a distortion of his own self-perception. I was far from perfect, a flawed being whose current standing felt less like earned merit and more like a consequence of circumstances beyond my control. Compared to my peers, men and women forged in the crucible of hardship and relentless training, I felt as though the CYOA choices had carried me. I had never truly earned the strength that others so readily attributed to me.
A faint, almost imperceptible sigh escaped me. Sure, someone could argue that demigods were afforded certain advantages, a heritage that set them apart. Perhaps they were all the same, bound by the divine blood that flowed through their veins. Even so, at times, this strength I possessed felt like a borrowed cloak, ill-fitting and undeserved. It was a burden I carried, a constant reminder of a debt I felt I had yet to truly repay, a summit I had not yet reached through my own arduous ascent. Not yet, at least.
"I'm far from perfect, and every day I train to keep up with everyone in this room. All of you inspire me to work even harder," I said, looking at Heracles, Castor, and Pollux. "You three are the reason I push myself. I want to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with you." I finished; and Castor and Heracles smiled, puffing out their chests with pride. They seemed genuinely pleased that I found them inspirational. Pollux, however, simply smiled warmly at me, a faint blush coloring her cheeks.
Our brief conversation seemed to warm the room. Despite the looming dread of the future, I felt we had grown closer and that things would look up. As the four of us chatted, we heard approaching hooves. We all perked up and stood as Chiron entered the room. I felt a sense of dread when I saw the slight frown on Chiron's face.
"Teacher, how is Jason?" Heracles asked with urgently in his voice. Chiron patted Heracles's shoulder as he calmed him down.
"Jason's doing well, Heracles," Chiron reassured him. "Asclepius has checked on him, and Jason is far more resilient than most people, so he'll be perfectly alright." I let out a sigh of relief, glad that Jason was out of danger. I couldn't have focused if I'd remained worried about him.
"Teacher, what shall we do next?" I asked Chiron, curious about our next move. "How will we get under the giant obsidian stone?" I added, eager to know Chiron's plan.
"That's a brilliant question, Alkaios. Heracles, you'll accompany Alkaios to the giant obsidian where you'll both find a way underneath it. Castor and Pollux, you two will protect everyone within the city. I'll stay here to assist Asclepius in healing the sick and defending the palace," Chiron explained. We all straightened up, ready to follow his orders.
Heracles and I nodded at each other. "Good luck, Castor and Pollux," I said, wishing my peers and allies well as I hopped out the window. "Teacher, I wish you luck too. Heracles, I'll meet you by the obsidian stone." I slid down the side of the palace and launched myself off the walls with the Divine Protection of Swift Running. As I soared through the air, I focused on my connection to Od Lagna for a new Divine Protection.
Divine Protection of Feather Falling.
As my feet touched the ground, my new divine protection shielded me from the impact of the landing. Without wasting another moment, I headed for the obsidian stone. Towards the palace, I heard a loud thud. Heracles was in pursuit, rushing to catch up. I quickly reached the obsidian, which, now that I was closer, loomed as large as a small hill.
As my hand touched the obsidian, I could feel an immense surge of divine energy flowing through the stone, more than I had ever encountered. It even seemed to surpass the power I felt from Zeus when we first met. I couldn't help but wonder how this was possible, but I dismissed the thought, figuring the eagle likely only held a fraction of Zeus's power incarnate.
As I focused more on the obsidian, I sensed an energy hidden beneath the divine energy. Probing deeper into its source, my eyes widened at the sheer amount of hate I could sense. The malice emanating from the stone was staggering. I narrowed my eyes as I realized the obsidian was merely a crystallized version of the mud. It now occurred to me how Jason had gotten sick. He had fallen ill when we were inspecting the obsidian. I might have been safe, but Jason wasn't. The sound of heavy footsteps approached as Heracles reached me.
"Alkaios, have you found anything?" Heracles asked, inspecting the obsidian before us. Nodding, I gestured to the giant obsidian.
"It seems this obsidian is the crystallized version of the plague," I observed, and Heracles's eyes lit up. He quickly caught on, narrowing his gaze.
"The same obsidian Jason inspected," Heracles said, suddenly understanding how Jason had fallen ill. I nodded, watching Heracles' face flush with rage. Without a second thought, I backed away from the obsidian as Heracles' fist collided with it.
BOOM!!
The deafening impact of Heracles' fist against the obsidian reverberated through the chamber, a sound that felt as though it could shatter the very foundations of the earth. My gaze remained fixed, unflinching, as I watched the raw grief contort Heracles' face, his anguished cry escaping him. I couldn't fault his despair, not when we, our supposed friends, had stood by while our companion succumbed to a sickness we could have prevented. The solution, in hindsight, seemed so agonizingly simple: we only needed to have taken the cursed stone from Jason.
A heavy sigh escaped me as I ran my hand through my hair, the weight of our inaction pressing down. My mind raced, desperately trying to devise a way to even understand how we could get beneath such a massive, unyielding stone. As my eyes swept over the colossal obsidian, a chilling thought crept in. I had to wonder, with a growing sense of dread, just how far this insidious plague might have already spread throughout the city.
Recalling the moment Jason first fell ill, I remembered him clutching a small piece of obsidian. It had been a single stone then, innocuous and isolated. But now, staring at this immense monument to our failure, a horrifying possibility dawned: could there have been more of these accursed stones scattered throughout the city, waiting to unleash their silent, deadly influence? The implications were terrifying: a potential contagion far more widespread than we had ever imagined.
I stood there, chin in hand, lost in thought about Jason's earlier pronouncement. "Any noble should be able to recognize jewels," he had stated. But what about the common citizens of Athens? Would they possess such discerning knowledge? Clearly, they would not have known that obsidian was not, in fact, a jewel. My mind then turned to a disturbing possibility: what if someone had approached the merchants intending to sell this obsidian, disguised as precious gems? Slowly but surely, the obsidian would circulate throughout the city, unrecognized for what it truly was.
As these thoughts swirled, I contemplated Pandora. Would it not be a fitting, almost poetic, turn of events if a simple stone, presented as a gift, was in reality something insidious? This seemed like karma of the highest order, a fitting punishment for those who worshipped the gods, the very gods who had inflicted a similar deception upon Pandora herself. They gifted her a box, proclaiming its beauty, when in reality, it was a trap. Now, it appeared Pandora was intent on striking back against the gods who had cursed her. In fact, hadn't she claimed the only reason she unleashed the Nosoi early upon Athens is because she had met me?
A chilling thought then gripped me: what if Pandora had been slowly and meticulously waiting for the crystallized version of her despair, her "mud," to make its way across all of Greece? What about foreign trade routes? All she would have to do is gradually, almost imperceptibly, provide more and more of these deceptive crystals. These obsidian pieces would then travel the land, while Pandora, the architect of this grand scheme, sat upon a throne built not of gold, but of the collective suffering derived from the blood of hundreds, no, perhaps thousands, of unsuspecting victims.
Contemplating this scenario, a wave of nausea washed over me. I couldn't fathom the sheer magnitude of rage one would need to harbor against the world to orchestrate such a devastating plan. What could I possibly say to Pandora to sway her from this path? The vast chasm between our perspectives felt insurmountable; my words, I feared, would simply fall on deaf ears. What could I possibly articulate that could erase hundreds of years of accumulated hate? This was no fantastical tale; this was the brutal reality of human emotion and consequence. People in the real world do not transform their deeply ingrained beliefs and desires simply after a speech, nor after a physical confrontation.
Pandora had years to simmer in her rage, and she seemed beyond reasoning. A proper Greek hero would have simply beheaded her and been done with it. But I wasn't that hero; I was selfish. Selfish because I wanted everyone to have a happy ending. To hold back, to not try to save her, that wasn't me. I wanted everyone to see tomorrow, and that included Pandora.
My ears perked up at the profound silence that descended, a stark contrast to the cacophony of Heracles's previous exertions. I observed him, his chest heaving with deep, measured breaths, his powerful fists no longer striking the unyielding obsidian mountain. A look of apology flickered across Heracles's face as he turned to me. "I am sorry you had to witness that, Alkaios," he admitted, his voice laced with weariness.
I, however, waved his apology away, a sense of shared understanding passing between us. "It's fine, Heracles. I feel the same," I replied, offering a comforting pat on his broad shoulder. "But we need to find a way beneath this obsidian. Perhaps we'll discover something, perhaps not. We won't know until we try," I stated, our gazes simultaneously drawn back to the monolithic obsidian.
My eyes traced the path of Heracles's previous blows, searching for even the slightest imperfection. To my dismay, there wasn't so much as a scratch marring the obsidian's smooth, impenetrable surface. A frown creased my brow; it astounded me that after such a barrage of Herculean strength; the stone remained utterly unscathed. Not a hairline fracture, not a minuscule chip, nothing at all. I surveyed the surrounding area, my gaze sweeping across the landscape in search of any signs of inhabitants or clues.
"Heracles, I have an idea," I announced, turning back to him. "But it will require both of us."
"What is your plan, Alkaios?" Heracles inquired, his voice laced with a mixture of curiosity and exhaustion.
A knowing smirk played on my lips as I drew Reid from its sheath. I positioned myself, my eyes fixed on the base of the obsidian, analyzing the terrain. Heracles's eyes widened in realization as he comprehended my intent. He then unslung Marmyadose from his back, readying himself for whatever was to come.
Taking a deep, centering breath, I drew upon the ambient mana, absorbing its energy into myself. Simultaneously, Heracles's weapon emitted a radiant glow, its power coalescing. Both blades now pulsed with an unearthly light as we prepared to unleash our strongest, most unified assault. I turned my head to meet Heracles's gaze, our eyes locking in a silent pact. With a subtle, almost imperceptible nod, we brought our empowered blades down in unison. The world, for a blinding instant, dissolved into pure, incandescent white.
BOOOOOOOM!!
White. A blinding, all-encompassing white was the only sensation as the combined might of Heracles and I slammed into the earth. The very world seemed to scream under the force of our converging blows; the sheer power of our attacks forcing me to tear my gaze away, my vision scorched by the blinding light and the magical backlash. The potent energy that coursed through Heracles and me, a consequence of our combined assault, sent us hurtling backward.
I grunted, my aura absorbing the brutal impact as I crashed into a building, the force of the collision launching me through its structure. Nearby, I heard the sickening crunch as Heracles met a similar fate, his impact bringing down an entire home. "I do hope ancient Greece has homeowner's insurance," I mused to myself, pushing away the fallen stones with a grunt as I rose. My intention was to survey the damage wrought by our combined attack.
As I approached the scene, Heracles materialized beside me. The closer we got, the more my eyes seemed to drain of life. "Heracles, I truly hope Lady Athena will be understanding," I stated, my voice flat, as I gazed upon the colossal chasm that marked the site of our strike. The destruction was immense, a testament to our overwhelming power. I desperately hoped Athena would look past our methods and understand the circumstances.
"I doubt she will be, Alkaios," Heracles responded, his own voice devoid of emotion. "I believe we should prepare an offering." A sigh escaped me; I knew he was right. Before us lay not just a crater, but a vast canyon that had annihilated the surrounding landscape. The raw, unadulterated ground was gone, revealing something entirely unexpected beneath.
What lay revealed before us made my jaw slacken. It wasn't a single, colossal obsidian crystal as we had assumed. Instead, nestled within the devastation, was a large temple constructed entirely of crystallized mud. The "giant stone" was merely a single component of this strange, unexpected structure. Heracles and I exchanged a look, a silent debate passing between us.
"Well, we completed the mission," I finally said, my gaze sweeping over the destruction we had wrought. "Shall we return to Chiron and report our success?"
Heracles let out a low chuckle. "I do not think our teacher will be pleased with how we achieved it," he retorted. A snort escaped me. Of course Chiron would be displeased; we had, to put it mildly, overshot the mark.
"Well, at least he can't say we failed," I countered, a grin forming despite myself. Heracles gave a small snort in response, and together we began our walk back towards the palace. Brute force, it seemed, was sometimes the only answer.
Chapter 21: What Lies Beneath End
————————————————————————————————————————————
Here's the next chapter! I hope you all enjoy it, let me know what you think of the photos. Thank you for your patience and continued support. I really appreciate all the encouragement you've shown. Your feedback and enthusiasm mean a lot, and I hope you thoroughly enjoyed this latest installment.