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somepsychopomp · 4 days ago

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More Hybrid AU thoughts ft. puppy Ody

Okay so let's just say that Odysseus, having been born from a long line of cunning tricksters from his mother's side, was quite the surprise when he was born w/ his wolf ears, legs, & tail. Laertes looks at Anticlea & her lack of wolf features and asks if this is normal. Well, the child's great-grandfather is Hermes...

Meanwhile Hermes himself catches wind that one his of family lines is up to mischief again and goes to check it out. He finds puppy Ody in his cradle and is ecstatic that one of his distant relatives is such a cute little freak. Come morning, Odysseus' nurse will find him cuddling with a toy tortoise that she's never seen before.

For context: hybrids aren't common in the world of this AU, but Odysseus isn't the only one around

(Ex. As a result of Leda & swan Zeus getting freaky, Helen is also a hybrid with flawless dark skin, piercing eyes, and pure white hair to match her splendid white wings. It's no wonder that she's regarded the most beautiful woman in the world. She doesn't often fly, but uses her wings to captivate audiences as she dances)

Laertes & Anticlea are also aware of the rumors that a king of Crete had his own hybrid son, a cross between a man and a bull. King Minos apparently devised a terrible underground maze to trap the poor hybrid in for the rest of its life.

Personally, they both think that's a terrible idea. How in the world could they condemn their own son, who's never wronged them in any way, to a lifetime of darkness? Or an otherwise equally cruel fate?

So they just... raise Odysseus. As if nothing's unusual or wrong about him. They have to admit though, he's such a cute baby. He's got the softest fur and the cutest little toe beans, and he whines in his sleep as if he's already dreaming of chasing prey.

Interestingly, hybrid Odysseus never had a phase where he leaned to crawl. His parents supposed that made sense. His legs are those of a wolf, and their shape isn't conducive to crawling. That means, to their chagrin, that toddler Odysseus was either wobbling on his two wolf legs or full-on sprinting through the house on all fours.

When his younger sister comes around, the king & queen think they're well prepared for another pup. They have a nice low-set cradle made with a heavy woolen canopy to mimic a wolf den, and had Odysseus roll around and play in the nursery so that it would smell of the new pup's kin. But when Ctimene pops out, Laertes and Anticlea gawk at her in befuddlement because she's completely normal. Where is her tail? Her ears? Her paws and fur? Why does she look like that?

At least Ody gets along well with his new sister. More than once, a nurse or Anticlea went to check on young Ctimene in the middle of the night, only to see a set of amber eyes in the moonlight holding vigil over her cradle.

As time goes on, it's quite difficult to organize safe play time between the siblings. Odysseus' instincts are to roughhouse with fangs and claws (which he's slowly starting to develop) & he indirectly teaches Ctimene to act like a wolf pup. She bites him back and yips like a dog when he treads on her toes. That does make their parents worry that Odysseus might end up as more wolf than man, but they'll have to wait and see. There's still hope for Odysseus, seeing that he's acquiring language at a rate comparable to most other children.

The two parents end up quite relieved as the years go by and Odysseus seems to growing up like any other boy. He speaks fluently without issue, had no difficulties learning to read, and in fact, is quite intelligent and curious. Since Ithaca is on the smaller side in terms of city-states, it'd be nigh impossible to keep his condition a secret from the public. So Ody is dressed in regular clothes and fitted with specially-made sandals to accommodate his wolf feet. The only adjustment needed in his clothing is a slit for his tail, otherwise when it wags or raises, Ody basically pulls up his entire chiton.

There are few wolves on Ithaca or the surrounding islands so Odysseus grows up as quite the novelty (I mean, more so than he already is). Most of his people have never seen a wolf and often mistake him for a dog, thinking he resembles the earth-colored farm dogs that are more common on the island, or perhaps the smaller swift-footed dogs that assist the fishermen. Laertes, having hunted big game before, including wolves from the mainland, is adamant that his child is a wolf. Odysseus' pointed triangular ears, stunning amber eyes, and his tawny-brown hair/coat are more similar to that of a wolf than a dog (I'm taking my inspo from the irl Eurasian Wolf btw)

As I mentioned in my first post here, hybrid Ody does have a ton of energy as a child. He loves to swim, run, and hunt with his father.

Laertes certainly takes Odysseus out hunting with him earlier than most would consider safe for a child. It turns out, not only does Odysseus love it, but he's also an exceptionally gifted tracker. His sharp nose and hearing mean that his father has no need for a hunting dog. And when they catch fresh meat, even though Anticlea insists that Odysseus must learn to eat and behave like a proper person, Laertes can't help but carve out a few strips of meat from the flank and let his son eat them raw. It's their little secret, he says with a wink.

One day, when Odysseus is perhaps seven or eight years old and on a hunting trip with his father + a few other men, he's hot on the trail of a herd of deer when he suddenly stops dead. Laertes is confused and asks Odysseus if there's something wrong. All of a sudden, Odysseus is trembling from head to toe and crying softly about wanting to go home.

"It must be a bear," a friend of Laertes says. It's about the only animal that could possibly spook Odysseus. The only issue is that, while wolves are rare on Ithaca, bears are even more elusive.

Laertes tries to coax his son to keep moving, but Odysseus can only cower with his tail between his legs and his ears flat against his skull. He starts to cry and insist that he wants to go home, even clinging to Laertes' thigh out of fear.

Having no idea what's wrong and never having seen his son like this before, the king decides to call off the hunting party and return home. As soon as they escape the mountainous forest, a sudden storm rolls in from the sea and pounds Ithaca with fierce winds and heavy rain. Laertes thinks that, had they stayed, they surely would've lost a man or two in their attempts to escape the storm.

A year later, Laertes is attempting to teach Odysseus how to tend to the land. A good king doesn't just lead his people, but feeds them as well. As the prince and heir, Odysseus should know useful skills such as farming, animal husbandry, and how to raise olive trees. Odysseus follows along with only a mild interest, finding it not nearly as exciting as hunting, when he sneezes and covers his nose with his hands.

"Papa!" he says, "The ground here smells bad."

Not having forgotten Odysseus' instincts on the mountain, Laertes tries to find out exactly what his son means, but Ody is still too young to fully explain himself. So Laertes conducts a test. He organizes for all the usual farmlands to be tended to as usual, but only puts half as much man power into the patch of land that Odysseus insists "smells bad".

Come harvest time, and that particular patch of ground failed to produce anything useful due to a blight hidden deep underground. It's an unfortunate loss, but it was only a few acre's worth of land. Laertes is glad that he spared the poisoned land his people's efforts.

By the time Odysseus is like 10-11, he's out hunting and exploring the woods on his own. He hears tale of a massive boar terrorizing the mainland, some beast so huge that spears and clubs have no effect on it. He thinks little of the stories, assuming such a huge creature wouldn't be able to swim. That is, until stories from the costal villages reach the palace of an unkillable boar ravaging their farmlands.

The boar might have a great deal of stamina, but so does Odysseus. Without his father or anyone else, he tracks the boar all over the island for days at a time, never losing his way home since he paws at the trees and leaves a scent trail to follow. Odysseus hunts small game like birds and rabbits to keep him sated and sleeps in tree boughs so as to not be caught by surprise.

It's a game of attrition, to see who can outlast who. At last, muddy and disheveled but no less excited by his greatest hunt yet, Odysseus finds the boar. It's been driven mad by the scent of wolves wherever it goes and is looking for a fight. Odysseus had been carrying a bow and quiver with him, but had been saving all his arrows for the boar. He spots a gash in the creature's hide, a few inches deep, from where a spearhead might've pierced it but failed to deliver a lethal blow.

Odysseus narrowly dodges the boar's first few charges until he can get a safe distance away. With the proper footing and stance that his father showed him, he raises his bow and fires just as the boar turns to face him. The arrow hits true and fresh blood spurts from the old wound.

An empty quiver later, and Odysseus is attempting to gnaw off one of the fallen boar's legs with just his teeth. He's so hungry and surely, his mother and father wouldn't reprimand him for enjoying the fruit of his labor even in such a messy fashion. If only he had a long knife to carve out the truly valuable meat like the organs...

Odysseus freezes as he catches a new scent on the wind. It's like nothing he's ever smelled before. It's like an oncoming storm, but hotter? It's electric, kind of like the tang of metal, and makes all his hairs stand on end. What is that?

"Show yourself!" he says, leaping to his feet with blood in his teeth, "I know you're watching me!"

Despite not hearing or seeing anything, he knows that someone else is with him.

"I can smell you!"

And a woman, taller and more grand than any being Odysseus has ever seen before, appears out of thin air. Somehow, Odysseus doesn't yelp in surprise when she appears.

She doesn't necessarily smell hostile, despite her towering presence.

She smells... like a friend.

#epic the musical #hybrid au #epic: odysseus #laertes #anticlea #Ctimene #wolf hybrid Odysseus #well it looks like I'm doing another one of these AUs #here we go #Athena while watching a stray kid eat her boar: oh yeah thats for sure gonna be my new student #also important to note: it took like 5 years before Ody learned to wear clothes all the time #he thought they were optional #which in Ancient Greece they kinda were #as they grew up Polites loved to comb Ody’s fur and Ody loved to play and lick Polites face

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