The Mythniks Saga

by Paul Neuhaus

  As we walked through broken sticks and ankle-deep water, I said to Hermes, “Hey, I have a question…”

  “Yeah?”

  “You know I had a little Underworld-based adventure recently, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  I adjusted the ram’s horn on my hip. It was rough and chafe-y. “When all the dead got out, they turned living again as soon as they crossed the threshold between worlds. Why didn’t that happen to you? You’re still see-through.”

  Hermes shrugged his shoulders indicating he didn’t think the question was important, but he would answer it anyway. “I dunno. I suspect it’s because there’s someone inside the Underworld minding the store. There wasn’t last time, was there?”

  “No, there wasn’t.”

  “Since Hades is in there, and he’s the O.G. lord of the dead, he still exerts his influence—even out here. He doesn’t want me—or any other dead person—to be able to pass for living.”

  “Mmm. That makes sense. What’s this horn for?”

  “You asked me that already,” the messenger god, said, furrowing his brow.

  “I know, but you didn’t answer me.”

  “It’s a horn. You blow into it.”

  “As a party favor? To summon someone or something?”

  “More the second one than the first. Although I do find the sound of a ram’s horn festive.”

  “Have you run into Adrestia? You know… Since you’ve been dead?”

  His furrows became even deeper. “No, she’s not allowed into Elysium.”

  “Where’d they put her?”

  “I don’t know, and I don’t wanna know.”

  “Am I asking too many questions?”

  “Kind of.”

  “Can I ask one more question?”

  “‘What’re we gonna do when we catch up with the Titans?’”

  “No, but that’s probably a better question than the one I was gonna ask…”

  Hermes sighed. “What question were you gonna ask?”

  I thought for a moment, not sure how to phrase the thing I was wondering. “You… always stood up for me. You always took care of me. Like when you got me out of jail in Long Beach.”

  He raised a finger. “That wasn’t me, remember? That was Medea pretending to be me. Because she wanted you to go after the pithos and funnel you into Hades and set you off like a bomb.”

  He was right. Even I was at the point where I couldn’t keep the players straight without a scorecard. “Okay, sure. But I get the feeling that, if Medea hadn’t trapped you in a fake Nevada whorehouse, you probably would’ve gotten me out of jail in Long Beach.”

  “Probably,” he said, without much enthusiasm.

  “I was just wondering why.”

  He sighed. “I thought we went over this. Adrestia was the only daughter I ever had,” he said.

  “That you know of…”

  “That I know of. Adrestia was the only daughter I ever had, and she was a bad seed. A real nut-burger. But… Sometimes, daughters aren’t where you make them but rather where you find them.”

  I nodded. “So, I was the daughter you found?”

  “Yes, for Pete’s sake, what is wrong with you? You’re talking a mile a minute. You’re barely coherent…”

  “I think I’m in shock. I may be responsible for the forthcoming death and subjugation of the entire human race.”

  “That does seem like a possibility…”

  We walked for a really long time. My ankles were sore, and the ram’s horn was rubbing me raw. Finally, we came to a drop-off overlooking the town of Parga, the modern replacement for Toryne. At some point in the not-too-distant future—provided Mankind survived—there’d need to be a replacement for Parga. The Titans had stopped at the coastal city—partly because they couldn’t go any further marching in that direction, and partly because it was ripe for razing. When we arrived at the overlook, their work was mostly done. “Fuck,” I said. “That’s on my head.”

  Hermes grimaced. I could tell he was annoyed by what I’d said. “Why don’t have time for self-recriminations. Blow the horn.”

  I looked briefly into his eyes and then lifted the horn to my lips. I took a deep breath and blew. The sound was, despite what the messenger god had said, not at all festive. In fact, I wouldn’t hesitate to use the word, “majestic”. The way war horns sound in movies as opposed to the way they sound in real life which, if memory serves, is more like a sustained fart. The response was immediate. A luminescent wave of ectoplasm flowed around Hermes and I from behind. Not like a wisp of fog; more like a torrent of incorporeal water that broke around us at waist-height. It went over the promontory upon which we stood. It moved inexorably toward Parga and broke apart as it neared the ruined town. Its constituent elements were, I could see, men and women on horseback and on foot. Most of them carried dory, Greek spears. They wore Corinthian helmets and hoplite armor.

  They were an army of the dead.

  “Gods…” I muttered, awestruck.

  “No,” Hermes said next to me. “Heroes. The Heroes of Elysium. Achilles, Hercules, Jason, Odysseus, Perseus, and a thousand, thousand more.”

  We both fell silent as the army, unbound by the laws of physics, swarmed around the Titans and, both on foot and from the air, stung them again and again. The Titans reacted as humans might. They covered their heads ineffectually and swatted at the air. But their hands found nothing solid to connect with. They were faced with an enemy they could not counterattack, and their only choice was to flee. They began to run down the coast. Half of the Heroes pursued them while the other half out-paced and presented a bulwark against further progress.

  The elder gods were, for a time at least, contained.

  “That’s incredible,” I whispered.

  “It’s more than incredible,” Hermes said beside me. “It’s useful.” He put his backpack down on the ground and, from it, he withdrew two objects. One was his winged helmet, a badge of office he’d long ago stopped wearing. He placed it on his head. The other object was a short tube which he held in his right hand. He gave it a firm shake. The tube extended itself in both directions to become a dory. Once it was at full length, the god rose from the ground and turned to face me. “I’m going to join them,” he said. “Shall I relay an order?”

  “I’m in charge?”

  He smiled. “You’re in charge.”

  “Meet me at the Parthenon restaurant between L.A. and Vegas.”

  “I had a feeling you’d say that. Partway up the Eastern face of Olympus, there’s a huge door. Go to that door and sound the horn again. We’ll come to you.” Without further comment, my surrogate father flew over the land separating us from the Titans. Under his direction, the Heroes of Elysium drove the Titans into the sea.

  I turned and headed inland.

  When I got back to Malibu, it was the dead of night and I was pleased none of my friends were around. They were probably all in Westwood, waiting anxiously for me to return. Unfortunately, I was going to have to let them down. What I had to do next would be bloody and brutal and there was no way I was going to involve them.

  I went into the trailer and made a bee-line for the bedroom. In my closet, buried under a bunch of junk, was an old set of hoplite armor. I’d worn it back in the day when Hope and I were in full Evil hunter mode. I pulled it out, dropped it on the bed and got undressed. Leaving on only my panties, I slipped into the armor and took one last look around the place. The only thing that captured my attention as having any kind of sentimental value was the set of Walking Dead commemorative plates. I picked up the one with Michonne and looked at it briefly before setting it down again. I picked up Pan’s copy of The Great Gatsby and exited.

  When I got outside, I set the trailer on fire, and got into my Pontiac.

  9

  Reckoning

  Since it was the middle of the night, driving out to the Parthenon was easy. Only a few other cars shared the road. Of course, I could see Olympus long before I reached
it. It was a dark blot against the sky. Silhouetted as it was, it reminded me of Devil’s Tower from Close Encounters of the Third Kind. But of course, the difference was I wasn’t going there to meet a bunch of happy-go-lucky aliens. I was, more likely, going there to fight and die. But I didn’t focus on that morbid factoid. In fact, I didn’t focus on much of anything. My mind was surprisingly clear. Zen even. For a while, I’d wanted to die. Then I’d wanted to be “Power Dora”; in charge of my own destiny. It looked like I might just achieve a happy medium. I’d die, but it’d be more or less on my terms.

  When I reached the Parthenon Restaurant it was deserted, just as it had been when I’d seen it from Pan’s pup tent. I pulled in and parked next to the fake Olympus—which was considerably less impressive now that the real Olympus was nearby. Since I was in the lot, I noticed a detail I hadn’t seen before, a dark shape hanging from one of the drive-in roofs. I got out of the car and went over to it. It was a badly decayed body. Pinned to it was a wanted posted depicting Theora Livas, the owner of the restaurant. I looked back and forth between the black and white representation on the paper and the ruined face of the murder victim. She’d been offed by Prometheus’ goons. Good times.

  As I walked back to the Firebird, I noticed something out of the corner of my eye. The field between the diner and Olympus appeared to be alive. Dark shapes huddled close together. A sea of bobbing heads. I knew what it was right away—it was a welcoming committee for yours truly. A mass of soldiers (or cannon fodder) meant to keep me from reaching the base of the mountain. I nodded when I saw them. I already knew how I was going to deal with the problem.

  I went around to the back of my car and opened the trunk. From it, I withdrew a gladius in a scabbard with a belt (this I fastened around my waist), and a dory. I slammed the trunk and reentered the Firebird for what I figured would be the last time. I sat down, slid the spear over the backseat so I could grab it at a moment’s notice, and I revved the engine. I put the vehicle into gear and plowed into the field of lurking shapes.

  Getting to the mountain and up its slope was my one and only priority. If I couldn’t get to Hermes’ door and sound the horn, this whole trip into the desert would be a waste.

  At first, I cut through the creatures blocking my path with ease. In time, they tightened their ranks and made the going more difficult. None of them feared dying; it was their purpose. They existed only to do Prometheus’s bidding and they did it with gibbering enthusiasm.

  Once they were inside my headlight beams (and splattered on my windshield), I could tell what the monsters were. They were animated corpses. George Romero would’ve been pleased—particularly whenever I ran over one and sent its insides splattering to the four winds.

  Even as I leaned all my weight onto the accelerator and steered toward Olympus, I knew I wasn’t going to make it. There were too many of them, and my axles were choked with their gelatinous remains. My wheels started smoking. The evil dead closed in tighter and tighter in front of me. Since I’d have to get out at some point and fight hand to hand, I wanted to make sure I was as close to the mountainside as I could get. I hunched down so I could see over the heads of the zombies. Hermes had said the eastern face of Olympus, but I had no idea which direction was east. I also had no way of knowing what orientation the peak had chosen for itself in its journey from Greece to America. Of course, it was too dark to see. The mountain was little more than a blot of darkness in front of me. I felt a twinge of panic. Not because of the zombies, but because of my uncertainty. It wouldn’t do me much good to reach Olympus and be on the wrong side. I could probably keep a fair number of undead at bay, but not if I also had to circumnavigate the mountain on foot.

  Then a miracle happened.

  Two giant brasiers suddenly lit up the mountainside, not too far from the ground. Lit by these massive metal bowls was a door inset into the slope. How had this happened? Didn’t matter. I pushed even harder on the gas pedal so that it was flat against the floor of the car. My wheels were smoking and now so was my engine. Great plumes of white leaked from under the hood, obscuring my view. I could still see the yellow glow ahead of me even through the fog and I pushed and pushed the car. “Come on, baby,” I said, urging the Firebird on. “One last time. One last time.”

  Flames from under the hood. More and more zombies pressing in from the sides, determined to act as an unliving shield for Olympus.

  A flat, muffled “Boom” from under me. The fire was spreading. The car was a missile. A burning bullet. Even though the flames were probably moments from consuming me, they were also aiding me in my quest. All around me, zombies burned and fell.

  “Flumph”, “flumph”, “flumph”. Three of my tires blew in rapid succession. I cut huge ruts through the dry soil behind me. My speed was decreasing. The fire from under the hood grew larger.

  I came to a sudden, lurching stop. I bit down on my own tongue. I grabbed the dory just below the head and yanked it out of the backset. I’d start with the spear and move to the gladius if I had to.

  I got out of the car and spared myself a quick, tactical look-see. I’d come to rest against the base of Olympus. Diagonally, to my right and above me, was the door.

  Zombies were pooling around the Pontiac toward me. I put my back to my destination. I’d fight and back up, fight and back up.

  My hands were quick. I made poking gestures with my long spear, going for zombie faces and heads. I knew if I went for bodies and limbs, the monsters would keep coming. If I wanted to put them down, I’d need to puncture their brains.

  As I fought, I took shuffling steps to my rear. The undead followed, of course, but I was doing a good job of keeping them back. They had to step over their recently-fallen comrades to get to me. Some of them tripped and fell. Stabbing the downed ones through the head was easy.

  Then, the worst happened.

  I heard groaning behind me. Some of the zombies were flowing around my car going in the opposite direction. They were climbing to the door on the mountain’s face and pressing in behind me. I gave a frustrated scream and tried to hold off zombies coming from both directions.

  Even when my car finally exploded and lit all the undead clustered around it on fire, the zombies were undeterred. If they could’ve spoken, they would’ve said, “Plenty more where that came from”.

  But I wasn’t about to give up. Not when I was this close. Was I close enough to the door to sound the horn? I doubted it. Knowing how these things work, I guessed I needed to be standing right in front of it. And I had a good ways yet to go.

  The zombies were clustering close enough that I dropped the spear and drew the gladius. For a moment, I exulted in the sheer joy of chopping off heads. Head after head. But there were so many of them, and I had no idea how I was going to survive the encounter.

  Then I saw something. A strange glow. Pressing in from the parking lot of the Parthenon. Not a sustained glow, but rather intermittent bursts of orange.

  Then a new kind of glow, this one just above the sea of undead and moving toward me. I wasn’t able to identify this second source of illumination until it was right on top of me.

  It was M.C. Pliny the Elder. He was riding on Pegasus, and he was carrying a flamethrower. As he flew, he set zombies alight. He set zombies alight, and he whooped as if it was the best thing that ever happened to him. In my reptile brain, I did the math: Flying on a winged horse while roasting the undead? Easily the best thing that could ever happen to anyone.

  Petey concentrated on the zombies behind me so that I could resume my backward momentum. I focused on the ones in front of me, so they couldn’t lurch out and end my journey prematurely. Finally, there were enough bodies clogging the path, I was able to run in the direction of the doorway and the two brasiers. When I reached the top, Petey continued to hover in circles around the earthen platform. He roasted any zombies that got too close. “More help’s on the way!” he said. “Do what you gotta do!”

  I looked briefly toward the first glow I
’d seen. I could make it out now. It was a group of men on foot, searing their way through the zombies with flamethrowers of their own.

  I put the ram’s horn to my lips and blew.

  An ear-shattering crack drew everyone’s attention to the Parthenon. Zombies included. A sinkhole appeared and swallowed the restaurant in its entirety. For a while, nothing happened. Smoke poured from the new opening and debris continued to pour in. Then an enormous hand appeared at the lip of the hole. Cronus’ hand. Soon the Titans climbed out, singly and in pairs. They were still under the watchful eye of the Heroes of Elysium.

  As I stood taking in this wondrous sight, the bronies, liquifying zombies as they came, mounted the outcropping I stood on. Elijah led them. Behind him were his brother Jack, Tiresias, Sebastian Squire, Pan and Chad Kroeger. Chad held a banner aloft. A banner depicting an angry purple pony surrounded by lightning bolts. El came over to me and said, “Okay. Now what?”

  Given the fact I’d been close to death just a moment before, I was very glad to see them. I nodded to each in turn. “I guess we go inside,” I replied. “I was waiting for Hermes to get— “

  I was cut off by the sound of the enormous door opening. Standing in the portal was a tiny figure, silhouetted at first, but visible when he walked into the light of the two brasiers. “Hey, everybody,” he said.

  It was Calesius. My jaw went slack. “Cal!” I said. “Where’ve you been?”

  He nodded to me. “I got my old job back. In the Olympian stables.”

  I scrunched my face at him. “Why would you wanna do that?”

  “I’m a double agent,” he replied. “I’ve been up there biding my time ever since Prometheus brought the mountain here and took over.”