by David Welch
“I am the weapon of Your will. Since this is Your desire, I shall obey.”
“No!” she squealed as he pulled the trigger again. A third click, but no bullet.
“Please!” she begged. “Please! I’ll tell you whatever you want to know, don’t—”
“In death may the stain on her be lifted by Your love!”
A fourth click. Duscha wrenched at the chair, but the cuffs on her hands and the duct tape around her feet held firm.
“Stop! Stop! You’re crazy! What do you fucking want to know?!”
“I commend this fallen one to Your care.”
He moved his left hand, pointing the loaded gun at the water pooling around his ankles. He squeezed the trigger.
A loud roar filled the room as the revolver fired. Duscha wailed and frantically jerked forward, so hard that both she and the chair tumbled forward. She smacked hard against the side of the tub, the impact opening a gash on her forehead, just below the hairline. The bullet, however, struck the water and the ceramic floor of the tub. It lodged there harmlessly.
Duscha screamed, flailing. Tears streamed from her eyes, and she shrieked like a frightened girl. As Ares stepped from the tub he realized that, despite all her masochism, she was just that. Maybe she’d done some bad things in her time, and maybe she liked pain. But the crying young woman on the floor was not the toughened psychopath her father was. Despite being captured after the attack on his house and the fight in his kitchen, this was a woman who’d never felt truly helpless or vulnerable. Until now, she’d never really thought she was going to die. He didn’t have to probe to know this. He could see it in her panicked face, hear it in her hyperventilation.
Forgive me, God, he prayed glumly, for this. For using You to make her fear. Do with me as You see fit.
But it had been necessary. Pain was different from fear. A person not responding to pain was not necessarily immune to fear. And he’d put the greatest fear he could think of into her heart.
He crouched before her fallen form. The smell of urine surrounded her.
“Now tell me,” he said, righting her and the chair. “Where exactly does your father live?”
“From what his daughter said, Lenka probably has fallen back to Russia to regroup. He lost a lot of men in his attack,” explained Ares.
They sat in the living room of the beach house, spread around on the chairs and couches. Outside, a moonlit ocean shined through the sliding glass door, the surf strong and washing up high on the sand. They were all there except for Aphrodite, who’d volunteered to watch the kids.
“Not enough,” Zeus remarked.
“Sadly true, but that’s where we are,” said Ares. “And from what the ‘lovely’ Duscha told me, Lenka will have at least a dozen armed men at his house.”
“Not impossible,” said Artemis.
“Costly,” Zeus added.
“Well, Ares seemed able to take down Lenka’s best fairly easily,” Desmond noted.
“We were defending, and the ones fighting Zeus I caught off guard,” Ares said. “In a fair fight, I’d say I could deal with three-to-one odds. If we were attacking a prepared position, maybe two-to-one. And like it or not, I’m better than the rest of you. Maybe if Athena was with us, we could pull it off, but otherwise . . . too many of us would die.”
“So we don’t attack,” Hera said, then turned to Zeus. “Tell them your idea.”
They all looked expectantly at Zeus. He seemed hesitant, but slowly nodded and began to speak.
“We lure them to Olympus,” he said.
“Olympus?” Artemis said, somewhat shocked. “Our children and families are there!”
Desmond looked from person to person, seeing the same surprise. He turned to Zeus, perplexed.
“Olympus?” he asked. “As in home of the Gods, Mount Olympus? In Greece?
“It’s not in Greece. It’s in a cavern in Macedonia. Unknown to everybody but us,” Zeus said.
“It’s not our ‘home,’” Artemis said bitterly. “It’s a tomb. Most of our children are there. Their ashes or remains. There are memorials there for those buried elsewhere. It’s sacred ground.”
“It’s also a maze of tunnels and chambers,” Ares said. “Dad’s idea isn’t bad. We’d have the advantage. And we have enough guns and supplies stashed there to hold out for months. We’d be the defenders, on our own turf.”
Artemis grumbled, but said nothing.
“It’s disrespectful, I know,” Zeus said. “And we’ve never done anything like this before. But if we go hiring mercenaries, any anonymity we have goes out the window.”
“Does it?” Desmond asked. “I mean, you don’t have to tell anybody you hire that you’re immortal. Just tell them some nut-job with a grudge is hunting you!”
“Tried it once,” Ares said, shaking his head. “Centuries ago. Late Roman Empire, a group of fanatical early Christians decided that as long as we existed, we were an insult to God. We hired people to help us fight, and word spread of the hiring. People started asking questions, and before you knew it, the more moderate Christians started siding with the extremists.”
“Even with you being an apostle and all?” Desmond asked.
“Telling people you’re Judas doesn’t endear them to you,” Ares replied.
“And these days, anything you leak out goes on the net and isn’t forgotten. Word of the hiring would get out, questions would be asked, and we’d end up guinea pigs,” Hera remarked.
“You really think people will lock you up and prod you with needles?”
“Most Americans probably wouldn’t,” said Zeus. “Hell, most people in the world wouldn’t. But you don’t have to be ‘most’ of the population to cause a problem. Some diehard looking for the key to immortality would find a way. Some politician with influence. Some terrorist or tyrant looking to rule forever. Some powerful billionaire who forgot his morals . . . somebody. They’ve tried it before.”
“They have?” Desmond asked curiously. “Who?”
“Small king in what’s now Hungary. Thought he’d gain immortality by drinking Bragi’s blood,” Zeus explained. “Didn’t work out well.”
“Bragi?” asked Desmond.
“The Vikings thought he was the God of Poetry,” Artemis said. “He was pretty good at it.”
“So this king didn’t gain immortality from playing vampire?” Desmond surmised.
“No. After Odin rescued his son, he burned the capital to the ground and nailed the king by his neck to a tree,” Zeus said.
“Yikes,” Desmond replied.
“That was one of the better endings, from our perspective at least,” said Zeus. “Other times, immortals have been killed.”
“So no mercenaries,” said Desmond.
“No,” Zeus said.
“Even though you plan to have Jedrick make you mortal?” Desmond pushed.
“The DNA for immortality would remain in everything but our bone marrow cells,” Hera said. “We could still be ‘valuable’ to those looking to live forever.”
Desmond shrugged and leaned back in the love seat.
“And the kids?” asked Ares.
Zeus frowned, momentarily looking a lot older than the twenty-something he appeared to be.
“We take them to Albert,” he said. “They’ve been put in too much danger already.”
“Albert?” Desmond whispered to Artemis.
“Dionysus’ son. Technically their nephew, but he’s thirty-eight. So they call him Uncle Alby,” she explained.
“We should do this quickly, then,” Ares said. “Keep Lenka as off balance as we can. We offer him a target that seems too good to be true, there’s a small chance he might champ at the bit.”
“He’s not that stupid,” Hera replied.
“I saw him in the fight above my house,” Ares said. “He gu
tted through it well, but there was no hiding it. Just looking at the man, you could tell he doesn’t have many years left.”
“No,” Zeus said. “Not many at all. Probably lung cancer from the way he was wheezing.”
“And if he’s convinced the clock is ticking, he may be taking risks he wouldn’t have in better days. Especially if we let him know that we have his daughter,” Ares said. “So we should move quickly. Force the issue and take the initiative from him.”
“Agreed?” Zeus said.
Artemis nodded. Hera looked unconvinced, but nodded anyway. They turned to Desmond, who was caught by surprise by their attention.
“You want my take?” he asked, flattered.
“Your life is at risk too,” Zeus said. “You okay with this plan?”
“So long as I’m with somebody who knows this cavern we’re going to,” he said, “I’m okay with it.”
Zeus turned to Hera.
“Is the jet available?” he asked.
“You have a jet?” Desmond asked Hera.
“No, but one of my holding companies does,” she said. “It will be available. We just have to get to New York.”
“We leave tomorrow,” Zeus said.
Everybody nodded. Ares slowly got to his feet, a heavy look in his eyes.
“Somewhere you need to be?” Hera asked her son.
“Yeah,” he said heavily, “there’s something I have to do. I’ll be back before morning.”
With that he moved slowly from the room, then out of the building. They watched him go, curious but not willing to push the matter. As he left, Hera patted Zeus on the knee.
“I’ll ask Aphrodite to keep an eye on him,” she said.
“Thanks,” Zeus replied, and watched her leave the room.
Ares didn’t know why he held the rosary. There had been a display full of them at the front of the church, inviting people to take one. It was made of cheap plastic, and he didn’t bother to say the specific prayers in the specific order in the specifically Catholic way. But he clutched it nonetheless, the crucifix dangling just below his fingers.
“There are days I think You are punishing me for betraying You,” he said, gazing up at the cross behind the altar. The church was empty at this late hour, almost midnight. The lights were dim, with barely enough illumination to make the six-feet-tall hanging crucifix visible. His God hung there unmoving, not responding.
“Part of me thinks that what I had to do today was a punishment. You know that I’ve grown to hate such things, and then You make me do it anyway,” he said. “I know that’s nutty. It makes you seem puerile and petty. But sometimes I think it. I can’t help it.”
He paused, listening carefully. He could hear soft footfalls in the back of the church. They were intimately familiar to him. The sound and weight of them, the almost imperceptible sound of air moving against a human form as it pushed forward. It was Aphrodite, no doubt sent to make sure he wasn’t losing it.
He refocused on his task.
“Other times I think it’s just a test to keep me honest,” he replied. “And most times I think that I have no idea what the hell You’re doing.”
Again, Jesus said nothing. The man was maddeningly consistent.
“I don’t know,” he said. “But I’m not here to know. I need Your forgiveness. For doing what I did to that girl . . . for misusing Your name to scare her. I know You know why I did it already. You always do. But I’m here anyway, making no effort to hide it. To save my family, I did a terrible thing. I’m not going to lie and say I wouldn’t do it again, but I can’t pretend the ends justify the means.”
He heard Aphrodite slide into the pew and move up beside him.
“I’m not sure if knowing something was wrong but not ruling out doing it again justifies forgiveness, but I’m asking anyway,” he said.
He felt her arm slip into his.
“I forgive you,” she said. “Though I’m not sure it was all that wrong.”
“Of course it was wrong,” he grumbled. “It was torture.”
“Physically, you did nothing to her,” Aphrodite pointed out. “And she has been trying to kill us. Sure sign of evil in my book.”
“Doesn’t matter,” he replied. “Days like today . . . make me think nothing has changed.”
“In your wild days, you never ran to holy places and begged for forgiveness,” she countered. “In fact, I remember you having your way with the ‘spoils of war’ in quite a few temples. And you know there’s a difference between doing something you have to and doing something for kicks.”
He exhaled heavily, but didn’t reply.
“You gonna tell me what else is eating you?” she asked. “You’ve been ‘off’ since Jedrick told us the news. I thought you’d be happy.”
“I don’t think I can have the procedure done,” he said. She looked at him for a long moment, clearly searching for words.
“Why?” she said.
“Because suicide is a mortal sin,” he replied.
Aphrodite shot to her feet, shaking her head in exasperation.
“It’s not suicide,” she said, far too loudly for being in a church. “It’s normalcy. Human normalcy!”
A hunched-looking older woman appeared from a side room and made an audible “Shush.” Aphrodite turned toward her and shot a fierce glare her way. The woman jerked back, shocked and a little intimidated. Ares realized that for perhaps the first time in her life, Aphrodite had truly scared someone. The older woman scowled and retreated back into the room.
“Perhaps. But I was not made to be normal,” he replied, speaking in Vesclevi. “I was made to live forever. If I have the procedure done, I will die. Maybe it’ll take five or six decades, but it’ll still happen. I will die, as a result of my own choices. Suicide.”
“That’s insane, Ares,” she replied, also switching to Vesclevi. “You can’t be serious about this! In five or six decades we will all be dead. And you’ll be left, alive, with nobody at your side for all the centuries to come. Alone, Ares. Do you understand that?”
“A cross to bear,” he replied. “Centuries of loneliness, compared to burning for eternity—”
“God dammit!” she grumbled, pacing back and forth. “I haven’t challenged your faith for all these years because you seemed better for it. A package deal. You became a good man, and I got a person I could love out of it. But come on. A man you knew for three years two millennia ago is going to tell you what to do with your life?!”
He said nothing, his head swirling. What did she mean, a person she could love? He’d been married to her dozens of times before he’d met Christ, back when he’d been the monster the Greeks had spun stories about. For all that time, had she felt nothing for him?
His thoughts were broken by the sound of her angry steps. She stormed back down the pew, collapsing into the seat beside him.
“Fitting it’s a Catholic church,” she declared, looking around at the decorations. “Since you seem set on self-flagellating for another few eons.”
“What are you talking about?” he said.
“Come on, Ari! You’ve been carrying guilt around since he was crucified! Is that what this really is? Some quest of self-suffering? Your punishment for betraying your God is to live in misery for all time?!”
“I’m not miserable,” he replied. “I stopped being miserable when I met Him. And this isn’t some martyr quest. Much as I’d like to rationalize that having the procedure done wouldn’t be suicide, I can’t. I’d still be killing myself. There’s no way around that!”
“And your ideas on morality are so important that you’re gonna spend another few centuries muddling through this—this sameness?! Another few centuries wondering what day it is because each one you live seems the same as the last thousand? More eons watching children die and seeing things you love come and go like they we
re never anything at all?!”
She crossed her legs, not meeting his eye. He cocked his head, seeing the glower that marred her beautiful face. His fingers grabbed her chin, turning her face back to his.
“Are you not happy with me?” he asked.
“What? Of course I am. I love you,” she replied.
“I admit to feeling some guilt over betraying Jesus,” he said. “But I am not miserable. That does not make me miserable. And if the price of life and life with you is sameness, then so be it.”
He searched her eyes, looking. He saw fatigue. It weighed on her, surrounding the vitality he usually saw when he gazed into their warm, brown depths.
“Is it that hard on you?” he asked.
“I feel it, Ares,” she replied, her voice cracking. “I always do. I was never as strong as you. More and more it seems the good things feel a little less real, and the weight a little more unbearable. There are days . . . I don’t know how I get through them. It all seems too much.”
He swallowed back a wave of fear. This was not the first time he’d heard such talk. Deimos had written pages like this in his good-bye note.
“Don’t talk like that,” he said. “Don’t ever talk like that.”
“Why? Afraid if I kill myself, you won’t be with me in heaven?” she said bitterly.
“That’s not up to me,” he said. “I’m afraid of losing you here.”
“And if you stay, you would lose me, if I get the treatment,” she said. “Maybe your God is enough for you, but what if he isn’t? We’ve spent more time together these last two thousand years than apart. And I worry one day, after I’ve died, you’ll wake up and realize that unresponsive statues and ancient Jews aren’t enough for you. So if you don’t get the treatment, I won’t.”
He sighed, moving to interrupt. She motioned him to stop.
“Don’t try to talk me out of it,” she asserted. “I will stay with you. As long as I can bear it.”
“Dita,” he said, pulling her into a hug. “It doesn’t have to be that way.”
“We don’t all have saviors in our corner, Ari,” she grumbled. “I have to settle for you. So here’s how it’s gonna be. You want to stay immortal, fine. I will too. But you’re going to give me more children. You hear me? As many as I want. I don’t care if they need to get transplants when they’re teenagers or whatever Jedrick’s scheme requires. We’re going to have them. And we’re going to raise them ourselves this time. If there’s no Rot, there is no reason to send them away. You understand?”