by Melody Rose
“Gods, sorry, Vi,” Benji said in a gruff voice as he recovered from the bubble in his throat. “I totally didn’t mean that.”
“Gross!” Violet groaned. “Maybe we're not that happy to have you back.”
“Yeah, yeah, you know you missed me.” Benji grinned at all three of us in turn. We matched him with equal-sized grins.
Suddenly, Benji put his chin in his hand and stared at Violet with wide, glassy eyes. “But I bet you missed me most, didn’t you, Violet? Oh, most fair, most beautiful Violet.”
The awkwardness of his words hung in the air as Darren and I exchanged glances. The sudden shift wasn’t lost on us as well as the unusual verbiage. Suspicion grew at the base of my stomach, like a weed popping up in a garden that just had been sprayed with weed killer.
Violet’s face went pale and then flushed a shocking pink. “Benji, you don’t mean that.”
“Oh, but I do,” Benji cooed at her, his voice growing husky and soft. “You really are the fairest of them all, isn’t that what they say in the storybooks?”
“Benji,” I said as I reached out a hand to touch his shoulder. However, he snapped up his forearm to swat me away, his eyes never leaving Violet.
“I’m talking to my goddess,” Benji said sharply at me.
If I wasn’t sure something was off, there was definitely something wrong now. Benji would never say something like that to Violet, and he would never snap at me like that. The most obvious evidence to all of this was it sounded like Benji was coming on to Violet, and he was gay, which didn’t make a lick of sense, whatsoever.
“Benji,” Darren said, leaning closer to our friend but not daring to touch him, “are you sure you went to the med bay earlier?”
“Yeah, met Eros, did the whole arrow thing,” Benji said casually, his eyes still possessively on Violet, who shrunk back, clearly uncomfortable. “Bada bing, bada boom.”
Darren looked at me, and I was about to voice my concerns aloud, which I was sure were the same as his concerns when a shadow descended over my head. Janet’s lean frame suddenly leaned over me, like I wasn’t even there. She shoved me out of the way, closer to Benji. But after he swatted me away like a fly, I wasn’t sure how close I wanted to get to him. So I tried to make myself as small as I could between the aggressive pair.
“Hi, Darren,” Janet said as she swept her hair over her shoulder. It slapped me in the face, and I fluttered my lips to get it out of my mouth. “How is the fairest and most beautiful demigod doing today?”
“Uh…” Darren swallowed audibly as he watched Janet’s eyelashes flutter. Unconsciously, his eyes flashed down to her chest before reason forced them to bounce back up to her face.
Now I was officially worried. Janet had used the same words as Benji. Again. I took a chance to pull my attention away from the two awkward situations at hand and spared a glance around the cafeteria.
Sure enough, there were lots of groupings looking rather confused while some students aggressively pursued one another. I watched as one Fotia member tried to lean over and hit on an Aeras soldier while she still sat in the arms of her Gi lover. The threatened boyfriend soon stood and shoved the Fotia member.
I whirled around to face my friends, but something else caught my eye just over Darren’s shoulder. Rick had spotted Janet, standing seductively at our table, and he was headed in our direction.
31
“Darren, duck!” I cried out, seeing Rick’s fist as he pulled it back to wallop Darren in the face.
Luckily, Darren followed my instruction without hesitation. He slipped down in his seat right as Rick swung at where his head had once been. Like a snake, Darren slithered down under the table just as another crack of a fist on bone rattled the air.
The cafeteria erupted into chaos.
Fights broke out and spread like wildfires as the soldiers and students alike fought over their supposed loved ones flirting with other students. The aggression seemed to be amplified, though everyone just seemed to be using their fists. No supernatural abilities had come out yet, but it was only a matter of time.
I felt a painful tug at my pants leg from beneath the table. I looked down to see Darren and Violet crouched under the table for cover, while still beckoning me to join them. I shimmied my body down so I could crouch with them as the ruckus continued above us.
“What the hell is going on?” Violet cried out. The table shook over us, and she jumped as someone's body slammed another person into the top of it.
“I think it’s safe to say that we haven’t cured every one of Love Struck,” I answered with a tight throat.
I was in disbelief over everything right then. How could this be happening? Eros said he could fix all of this. A sudden thought struck me, and my throat filled with bile. Could Eros have been lying to me this whole time? What if he was the one who caused this, and instead of healing the students, he made it worse?
That level of betrayal felt like a kick in the stomach. It took all of my concentration not to dash out from under this table and confront that god in the med bay.
“Why does love have to be so violent?” Darren grumbled. He threw up a pair of exasperated hands in the air.
“Well, Eros is the son of Aphrodite and Ares,” I pointed out unhelpfully. “Love and war, two sides of the same coin and all of that.”
“We get it, Shy,” Darren cut me off. “What we don’t know is why. It’s getting crazy. First, the dance, now this.”
“Says the guy who was in the middle of the fray during the dance,” Violet recalled with a pointed tone.
“Yeah, but why not now?” I wondered, my eyes flicking from the chaos outside to my calm friend in front of me. “What’s different?”
“Do you have any violent urges right now?” Violet asked Darren, only half teasing.
Darren shrugged and shook his head. “I feel fine. At the dance, though, that was something completely different.”
Suddenly, one student knocked another one to the ground, the smack echoing over the fighting. Violet let out a scream as it happened right behind her. She curled into a ball, and hugged her knees to her chest as if she could make herself smaller, get herself farther out of the way.
“We need to get out of here,” she chirped, her voice high out of pure nervousness.
“We need to figure out what’s going on,” I added, though I agreed with Violet that the first priority would be getting out of the middle of the cafeteria fight.
“I think we have to just make a run for the front doors,” Darren suggested. His eyes trained on the entrance, analyzing the situation as though he could plot an escape route through all of this chaos.
“I think you’re right,” I agreed. “We just have to steer clear of the ongoing fights. I don't think anyone will come after us.”
“Except Rick,” Violet reminded us wearily.
“I’ll lead the way out,” I suggested, pointing out our positions in midair. “Violet, you take up the rear, and then we can flank Darren with him in the middle.”
Both of my friends nodded sharply, used to taking orders. Their fear disappeared from their faces now that they had a plan to enact. Violet shifted up on her feet, still crouched, while Darren assumed a kneeling position. I shifted one of the benches out of our way, giving us a clear view of the fight.
Food flew over our heads, threatening to stain our uniforms or smack us in the face. An Aeras student created a whirlwind of plates and cutlery, which she sent out like darts. Meanwhile, a Gi soldier manipulated a chair with his mind, making it bend like puddy so he could wrap it around the legs of a Fotia student crawling away from him.
The whole thing was ridiculous. As I watched my fellow soldiers fight one another, I took a deep breath to remind myself that they weren’t in their right minds. All of them were possessed by something deep and primal. Though the fear still stuck with me, knowing that we were powerfully training weapons and this is an example of what could happen when those weapons were let loose.
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nbsp; I held up my hand, with three fingers raised in the air, a signal to my friends. I ticked them down from three to two to one and then a closed fist, and we dashed out from our hiding place.
I never played football or any sport, really. But I felt like a linebacker on the field, darting for the end zone. It was tricky while students surrounded me, tackling one another, while toppled furniture blocked my path. My heart pumped wildly while my legs stretched to hurl me across the room. I never looked back at Darren and Violet, trusting them to make their own way out, but I kept my ears strained for their cries should Rick come out of nowhere or someone should burst through the fray and tackle them.
However, a breath of cold air filled my lungs when the November air hit my face. I raced down the cafeteria steps into the quiet quad and nearly ran straight into The General. I managed to stop my feet just in time before I collided with his solid chest.
“Get in there and stop that nonsense!” he ordered some of the Olympic Officials behind him.
Officer Buck and Min obeyed and rushed into the cafeteria. However, Tené and Fiona stayed behind, standing on either side of the General in a triangular formation. At that moment, Darren and Violet emerged from the cafeteria and fell into place beside me, so that we matched the Olympic Officials one for one. I froze in place as my eyes met the General’s stormy grey ones, my heart pounding even faster than before.
“Cheyenne,” the General growled.
“General,” I replied only with an ounce more respect than his scowl showed me.
“What’s all the commotion?” Tené asked, gesturing to the dulled noise coming from the cafeteria.
“A fight broke out,” Darren announced.
The daughters of Hermes and Aphrodite shared looks behind the General’s back as if they already suspected the reason for the fight. But neither of them chose to say anything, so I stepped in and voiced the mutual opinion.
“It’s Love Struck,” I said urgently. “Eros’s cure isn’t working.”
The General’s bushy eyebrows rose ever so slightly, too slow for him to hide his surprise. “How do you know this?”
“Their language,” I explained.
“Are they acting the same as before?” Tené checked, taking a step forward but not enough to be on the same level at the General. “Talking about connection and all that.”
“Not this time,” Darren answered. “This time, they spoke of beauty or something like that.”
“Most fair and most beautiful,” I corrected, “and these weren’t the same pairings as before. It was much more sudden.”
“And random,” Violet added as she rubbed her shoulders against the chill of the outdoors, or of Benji’s unwanted advances, I wasn’t sure.
The General crossed his arms. “Tell me this, why are you three out here and not in there, infected like the rest of them?”
The emphasis that he put on the word “infected” clearly told me that he didn’t believe a word of what we were saying. I clenched my hands at my sides, trying not to explode on my commanding officer. I held my own temper and frustration at bay as I thought of a reason.
But the honest answer was, we didn’t know. There was no logical reason why the three of us weren’t raging like loons like the rest of them. I knew that I was immune, but as we’d seen from Darren at the dance, he wasn’t. Violet had traces of being Love Struck like Ansel did, but nothing that ever came into full obsession mode. So why hadn’t this strain impacted them?
It also seemed weird that it was only in the cafeteria. As I gazed out on the quad, none of the students were rowdy or fighting out here. Granted, it was cold, so there weren’t that many students out and about in the first place. However, everything seemed normal out here. If anything, it was quiet and peaceful. Quite the contrast to the war raging in the building behind us.
“We don’t know, sir,” Darren replied, answering the General’s million-dollar question.
“That’s convenient, isn’t it?” the General snapped, suspicion rolling over his words.
I didn’t hold back my exasperation. I rolled my eyes. “We didn’t have anything to do with it, okay?”
The General’s head turned in my direction so quickly that I heard his neck crack. “From my understanding, you’re completely immune to the effects of this so-called Love Struck. If I’m not mistaken, it was also your presence at the dance that caused the fight that evening as well. Now, here you are, right as rain, with more wreckage in your wake.”
Unfortunately, the General had a point. It was all rather damning as the various incidents put me at the center of them, painting a large target on my back. I bit the inside of my lip, trying to keep my voice tempered.
“I know it looks bad,” I began, but the son of Zeus cut me off.
“Bad is an understatement.”
“But,” I said sharply, determined to defend myself properly, “I helped Eros build the new bow and arrow. If I was responsible for this Love Struck epidemic, then why would I help him make the cure?”
“It’s obviously not a cure if it’s still infecting people,” the General pointed out.
“Actually,” Darren said as he held up a finger, indicating that he wanted to speak. When the General glanced his way, Darren’s voice shoved back in his throat, and he nearly lost his nerve. But I watched as my friend swallowed his nerves and gathered his resolve to speak against the commanding officer. “The bow and arrow is still an acceptable cure. However, if students continue to get infected, the cure won’t matter. We need to discover the source of Love Struck and get rid of that.”
“Darren makes an excellent point,” Tené said, surprising everyone by jumping to his defense. “We should call Eros from the med bay so he can calm everyone down at the cafeteria, then we need to reconvene and find what is causing all of this.”
“We have been so focused on finding a cure,” Fiona added, “which was a priority. But now, the cure can give us the time we need to find the source.”
There was a tense silence, like a noose wrapped around my neck, as the General considered this point. While he wasn’t known for listening to Darren, despite his brilliance, because my friend was the son of a lesser god, the General would weigh the words of his colleagues. My heart threatened to escape from my chest as I waited for the General to issue his next command.
“Tené, we will go and speak to Eros at the med bay,” the General said though his eyes were locked on me the whole time, even though he wasn’t speaking to me. His tone was like a warning. However, I had no idea what he was warning me about. “Fiona, you will stay and watch these three. I want them here to tell Eros what they saw and heard.”
“Yes sir,” the two women officials said simultaneously.
“Know this,” the General growled as he leaned forward and spoke to my friends and me. “The second we find out who did this, they will be removed from the Military faster than Hermes can send a message. Mark my words, we will not tolerate this kind of invasion of our campus any longer.”
While he issued the warning to all of us, it was obvious that he spoke only to me. Despite what I had said about helping Eros with the bow and arrow, the General still very clearly suspected me. I knew he was biased, given our tense history, but I still didn’t appreciate the accusation when I had clearly done nothing wrong. In fact, I had gone above and beyond to try to find a way to help the Academy.
A sinking suspicion curled at the base of my stomach. While I wanted to belong to this Academy, be a part of this Military, nothing I would do would ever be enough. The General would never be pleased with me or my actions, no matter how spectacular they would be.
For the first time, I truly understood the plight of the demigods born to non-godly parents. That level of disappointment discouraged me so heavily that I almost fell to my knees right there. Instead, I watched the General and Tené walk away while Fiona led the three of us over to a park bench near the cafeteria.
Darren and Violet took a seat, but I was too irritated to foll
ow their lead. Fiona crossed her arms and stood at the corner of the bench, eyeing me as I paced.
“What are you thinking, Cheyenne?” she prompted, her voice kinder, as though she actually wanted to hear my thoughts.
“If I actually told you what I was thinking, I think I would get expelled,” I grumbled, letting a bit of frustration bleed through in my voice.
Fiona’s eyebrows raised, and she frowned slightly. “Fair enough. What are your thoughts on this new bout of Love Struck?”
I spun on my heel and stared at the Olympic Official incredulously. “Why do you want to know? Aren’t I your prime suspect? Even if I did share it with you, it isn’t like you would believe me.”
“Unlike some of my colleagues, I am not so quick to judge,” the daughter of Hermes said as she shifted her weight to center herself, a more open and stronger stance. “You are still the only one who has never been infected by Love Struck on campus.”
While she told me that before, her words took on a new meaning. I cocked my head at her as a thought occurred to me. “The General was affected, wasn’t he?”
“I can’t tell you that,” Fiona answered blandly.
“That means yes,” I concluded. I resumed my pacing with my hands on my hips. “I would have paid good money to see him infatuated with someone.”
“Cheyenne,” Fiona said sharply. “Focus, please. What do you think?”
“Right, right,” I said as I cleared my head of thoughts of the General, making goo-goo eyes at one of the other teachers. I turned to my friends and gripped the armrest of the bench. “What’s different about this time?”
Darren scooted to the edge of the bench, eager to have this conversation. “The first strain put people into pairs. There was obsession and connection at the center of it. But this time, it was more random and incited jealousy.”
“Also, Love Struck spread throughout campus, whereas this seemed localized to the cafeteria,” Violet added, ready to help.
“And the dance was a one-time thing too,” I said, the gears in my mind whirring with possibilities.