#i think echo might be to me what dusa was to so many others in hades 1. LET ME ROMANCE HERRRR

[lgbtlunaverse]

So at one point when Mel comes across Echo in the fields of mourning she'll go "Hey, it's melinoë!" just so Echo will have words to greet her... supergiant don't do this to me I WILL cry.

[sellyoursoulforagoodfic]

Fated Epilogue

Epilogue

Ares x reader

Word Count: 2041

Summary: Time skip to Zag running around trying to fix everything; then he gets a weird message from Ares.

The affair known to most of the Underworld’s population as The Confusion of Zagreus started as most things in his life did, on a run through the place as he tested the defenses against an escaping entity for what felt like the thousandth time. He’d had Ares’ vial with him, so naturally he’d gotten a fair few of the war god’s boons. Nothing too unusual, right? That’s what he thought right up until Ares said the most curious thing.

“When next you see Thanatos, tell him that his sister wants him to visit more.”

Sister? Zagreus wondered. Than doesn’t speak to his . . . Wait, Nemesis . . . But why would Lord Ares have messages from her?

When he mentioned it to his lover, Thanatos just chuckled. “I suppose it has been a while since I last saw her,” was all he had to say on the matter.

And that set the trend that continued for a while. He’d get a message from Ares to Than, pass it on, and get some cryptic non-answer in return. It was absolutely maddening. Even when he asked others, all they had to say was that it wasn’t any of his business, which was fair, but that didn’t aid his curiosity.

Finally, all that started changing when he managed to squeeze a drop of information out of Than when he asked, “So why does Ares see your sister more than you?” while they were dining together one evening.

And without really thinking, Death Incarnate reflexively replied, “Because she lives with him in Thrace instead of here.” Of course, immediately after that, Thanatos realized what he’d just admitted and promptly clammed up, but it was something at least.

Then Demeter let slip something else in one of her messages after he’d accepted several of Ares’ boons yet again. “Ares is aiding you when you get injured, is he? I’d be surprised if Nemesis didn’t have a hand in that sort of attack.”

And that set him thinking. Revenge was her area of expertise, after all. And many of Ares’ such boons were noticeably more powerful in dealing direct damage instead of causing various other effects. Could Than’s sister have been indirectly aiding him through Ares all this time?

Then came another piece of knowledge, this one from his mother upon inquiring why Thanatos and Lord Ares seemed to be so close. 

“Well War and Death were always bound to meet frequently just from their natures, I suppose, but it could also have been because of that mess where he saved poor Thanatos from being chained in a box. I’d wager that was a big help to making their friendship grow.” Before he could ask just what that was about, she continued, “Though it could have also started back when Lord Ares almost passed away, too. I remember Thanatos being quite concerned for both him and Nemesis during all that.”

“What do you mean Lord Ares almost died? He’s an Olympian!”

“He is, but the day Hermes found him was a day that stoked fear in the heart of every Olympian,” Persephone said gravely. “They all worried about Ares’ fate despite how they regularly ridicule the man, because if he could die that meant any of them could.”

Zagreus suddenly found his mouth extremely dry and couldn’t form a response.

“Yes, that was definitely the start of their friendship now that I think on it. It was very kind of Thanatos to linger without threatening the poor dears. From what I heard, he was very calm during the whole affair even in the face of such shocking news.”

“Yes, I suppose learning even the great Olympians might die would be quite dramatic,” he murmured, shoulders sagging.

“No, that’s not--ah! You don’t know, do you?”

He perked back up. “Know what, Mother?” he prompted innocently.

She smiled kindly as she patted his forearm. “It’s not my place to tell you if they haven’t already; I’d forgotten how much they value their privacy when they can get it.”

Who is ‘they’? Zagreus wanted to scream while yanking his hair out. Thanatos and his sister? Her and Ares? Thanatos and Ares?? But he didn’t. Instead, he just smiled stiffly and nodded.

It wasn’t until he managed to broker a peace between the Chthonic gods and the Olympians that he finally got answers.

~

There was a party you were supposed to be preparing for, but you were having a hard time working up the gumption to move from your current position. Because of said celebration, you and your husband--how you’d never tire of calling him that--had arranged your schedules so that they aligned, which of course was the reason you found yourself lying in bed perpendicular to the man, using one arm as a pillow under your head on his chest while the other hand played with his hair.

His gleaming red eyes flicked over to the open, brightly illuminated window where sheer white curtains swayed softly in the breeze. “We really should be dressing; I have a feeling your brother-in-law wants to meet us sooner rather than later.”

“Yes, but it’s so rare that we get time like this to ourselves.”

His hand found the one you’d been carding through his hair and brought it to his lips to kiss. “You and I have an eternity full of moments like this ahead of us; we can spare an evening for the boy.”

You huffed dramatically. “Let it never be said that you’re not a man of your word.” A sigh left your lips, but still you pried yourself out of bed without further complaint. “Are we doing full regalia or casual?” When there was no answer, you glanced back to see that he was transfixed by the sight of your naked form heading towards the shared closet. “Ares!” you laughed, snapping his attention back to reality.

“Darling, I take it all back; you must come back to bed at once. There’s a rather pressing matter that needs your attention at once.”

Now, you rolled your eyes. “Well that pressing matter can wait until we return. Are we doing armor or not?”

From there, there were a lot of kisses, gropes, and laughter between that moment and being fully clothed--in light leather greaves and cloth chitons rather than the usual full armor, after all, Ares so hated to be unprotected or unarmed--but neither of you were really complaining.

“Boys!” Ares called down the hallway with you tucked under his arm.

Two heads of wild silver hair just like their father’s appeared from the same doorway. “Yes, Father?” they chorused.

“We’re leaving. I trust you can manage things until our return?”

“Of course, Father.” And then they were gone from sight, their snickering still echoing in their absence.

Ares chuckled as he shook his head. “Little terrors, the both of them.”

Though they weren’t yours, you’d grown to love both of the twins the moment you met them. With Aphrodite being so absent in their lives, you’d taken up the role of ‘mother figure’ quickly, and the two were practically your own by now. “Well, to be fair, one of them is Panic.” 

~

You were unsurprised at the Olympian turnout at the party; most arrived near the time when you did, but none stayed particularly long. As fond as they were of Zagreus in theory, their detest of the Underworld would always be greater. Only Ares and Demeter attended from the mountain and stayed past the pleasantries and feast. Otherwise, it was entirely the subjects of the House of Hades that were present. Fortunately, they seemed to be enjoying themselves nonetheless judging from the way Meg and Dusa had quickly roped you and Ares into conversation.

Zagreus hadn’t seemed to notice your arrival yet--too wrapped up in getting to know his mother and grandmother, you assumed--but you caught sight of Hades glaring at Ares every now and then. Every time you caught him, the harsh threat he’d delivered to Ares rang through your ears once more. 

“Set foot outside this house, boy, and you shall find yourself in a fate worse than death.” Neither of you were surprised by the warning. He was, after all, still angry about the whole ‘bursting into the Underworld without permission to save Thanatos’ fiasco.

Eventually, you and Ares found yourselves alone for a moment once Achilles and Patroclus excused themselves. You tugged the glass from his fingers to steal a sip of his ambrosia, something that’d been quite hard to find the last time you’d visited. You didn’t want a full glass, and Ares never complained about sharing.

He pressed a kiss to your temple, clearly worried about you partaking in a drink you’d never really managed to develop a taste for. “Are you alright?” he asked quietly. The drinking coupled with the knowledge of how much you hated being dragged to these things had likely set him on edge.

“I’m fine,” you assured him with a genuine smile. “These are my family, remember? Much nicer to be around than yours.”

“That’s quite true,” he murmured. No doubt, he was remembering when he and Aphrodite had been paraded around and humiliated as the entertainment at one of his family’s gatherings. His gaze flickered up as he noticed something before you did: Zagreus approaching at last. “And there’s the man of the hour!” he greeted warmly. It was hard to mistake the boy for any other given his attire was his family’s colors and the way he absolutely looked like a mix of his parents.

“Lord Ares!” Zag’s face was alight with happiness. “I’m glad you were able to make it; it’s an honor to meet you properly.” His eyes shifted to you. “You must be Than’s lovely sister I’ve heard very little about.”

You laughed lightly. You like this kid already. “I suppose that’s me, yes.”

“Frankly, I’m amazed I haven’t seen you around the House before now,” he probed curiously.

You decided to indulge him; it was a celebration in his honor after all. “I pop by to visit Mother and Hypnos from time to time, but I see Than enough that lingering isn’t worth it. I’ve gathered that you’re usually gone from the House as much as he is.”

“Yeah, that’s true,” he chuckled. “Makes sense you wouldn’t just lurk around when you put it like that.”

“Have to budget that precious time off somehow.””

“Plus, it’s sort of my fault that she resides in Thrace since I stole her all those years ago,” Ares teased.

“Stole her, sir?” Oh, how the poor boy looked so confused at those words. You were willing to bet his mind was just running back over Persephone’s situation and comparing it to yours.

Your brows furrowed. “Zag, has no one told you about Ares and I?”

“No!” his voice was laughing but had a manic edge to it. “Everyone keeps hinting at there being something going on with you two, but no one wants to clue me in! I’ve tried to respect your privacy by not asking directly, but it’s driving me crazy!”

“Oh, for Father’s sake.” Ares rolled his eyes. “I’m going to have a word with your brother about this,” he announced as he started pulling away from you.

“Wait! You’re not mad at Than are you?” Zagreus fretted. “Because I’d hate to cause strife between you because of my own curiosity, and--”

“Relax, Zag,” you soothed.

“Thanatos is the only being I would ever call my friend outside of her,” he gestured toward you. “I thought it went without saying that he didn’t have to keep secrets from you for my benefit, but apparently that isn’t the case. I’m simply going to tell him that. I’ll be right back, my darling.” With a kiss to your temple, he stalked over to where Than was loitering with his sleeping brother at the edge of the room.

When you looked back at Zagreus, he was staring at you absolutely slack-jawed, probably at Ares’ display of affection. “Blood and darkness, my Lady,” he managed to wheeze, “what is going on?”

You snorted a little, amused slightly by his turmoil. “Zagreus, Ares is my Fated. He’s my husband.”

His eyes went a little crossed as he realized it was just that simple. “Oh, is that all?!”

[hypnoticwinter]

Down the Rabbit Hole part 35

Just looking at Makado makes me realize how incredibly tired I am. “Makado,” I say, trying to put a little bit of that weariness into my voice, “please, I just want to get Elena out of here.”

“I don’t give a fuck,” Makado tells me. “Take your helmet off.”

“Makado,” I start, but she raises the gun and coaxes a threatening-sounding click out of it.

“Jesus Christ,” I mutter, and reach up and pop the helmet open. 

“Now take it off slowly and drop it.”

The helmet thuds to the floor with a dull clunk. I keep my hands open, bent at the elbows, roughly shoulder-height. I guess it’s a testament to how often this has happened to me lately that I’m not particularly panicked or flustered, even though she has a gun on me. I look into her eyes; they’re about as kind as a brick wall, a far cry from the Makado I knew - well, that I thought I knew. I don’t think she’ll shoot me but I don’t want to push her. 

“Makado,” I try again, speaking softly, “I know that you’re upset, but -“

“Upset?” she laughs. “That is a big understatement, Roan.”

“As if you have any right to be upset at me,” I snort. Makado’s eyes flash but I press onwards anyway. “You’re the one who was trying to literally fucking frame me for all the illegal shit you were doing -“

“You got Peter killed,” she says. My mind goes blank for a moment before I nearly laugh. I choke it back down; if I started laughing, either out of terror or nerves or just pure exasperation, I know I’d never stop, and I know Makado would probably shoot me.

“Makado,” I say, stammering a little bit, “I didn’t - there was nothing I could have -“

“Then how come you lived and he died, huh?” she says. I think I hear a crack in her icy demeanor and I look at her - really look at her. She glances away after a moment or two, and when her gaze swings back and hits mine whatever I thought I might have seen, whatever small vulnerability, has already faded away. “How come you lived?” she asks. 

The barrel of the gun trembles gently.

“Mak,” I start. I want terribly to be angry at her but something about the way she’s acting is just making me sad instead.

“Don’t call me that!” she yells. She slips her finger inside the gun’s trigger guard and I feel my breath catch. Maybe she really will shoot me; if she’s mad enough, if she thinks that somehow I caused Pete to get…to get leeched, or whatever the hell…

“Peter was the only one who ever called me that,” she murmurs. I know I’ve called her ‘Mak’ before and she never made a fuss about it but I guess this is special circumstances.

“Pete is - was - a fully trained ranger with dozens of expeditions under his belt, he might have - “ Makado licks her lips and tries again - “he might have gone a little downhill after 2007 but he was still sharp. He would have gotten out of there no problem. But he dies and you live?”

“Was that the plan?” I ask. If I can keep her talking maybe I’ll be able to pull something, but deep down I doubt it. “You send me down there hoping I’d die in an accident or something?”

“Of course not,” she says. “But if I had to choose between you and Peter…”

“That’s cold,” I tell her. She starts to say something, but I continue before she can. “But I get it. You loved him, huh?”

“Of course I loved him,” she says, sounding mildly scandalized. “You wouldn’t understand, I’m sure.”

“Why, because I - ? Oh, whatever,” I grunt. “Whatever, Makado. Just shoot me and get it over with.”

“I don’t want to shoot you.”

“Right, of course,” I snarl, putting as much venom into my words as I can. “You want to hand me over to the feds so I can suffer for your sins, right? That’s the endgame here, right?”

She has the good graces to flinch, at least. “I don’t -“ she starts, but I shake my head.

“Whatever,” I tell her. “What happened to Elena?”

Makado looks round, her eyes resting briefly on the wreckage of the autodoctor unit. “I don’t know,” she says. “When I got down here it was like this, and Elena was gone. I was going to -“

“Kidnap her so you’d have some leverage?”

“Bitch, will you stop fucking assuming the goddam worst of me? I was planning on tracking her down and getting her out of here.”

“I don’t believe you,” I tell her, my voice flat. “How did you even know she was here?”

“Because I heard the two of you sopping all over each other on the radio,” she tells me, her voice hard-edged with disdain. “Soon as I heard she was here in DUSA, I split off from my team and rushed up here. Guess I was too late.”

“Goddam it,” I mutter. My cheeks are burning a little from the knowledge that we’d been overhead; I guess I could have assumed, but it still had felt like it had been something private, something special we had shared. Maybe I wouldn’t have broken down quite so hard if I’d known Makado had been listening in. “It must have been the Leechman,” I mutter, glaring at the gaping hunk of metal torn away from DUSA’s hull. My eyes are stinging and I wipe them hurriedly, not thinking, and when I take my hands down Makado is glaring at me very seriously over the sights of the pistol, and I realize that the quick motion nearly made her shoot me. My stomach does a backflip and I stammer out the beginning of an apology before she mutters a curse and takes a length of rope from her suit pocket.

“Hands together,” she orders me, and with a sigh I slap my wrists together and hold them out to her. She comes to me with the rope and hesitates for a moment; I know it’s because she’s only just realizing that she will have to put the gun away to tie me up. 

“I’ll hold that for you,” I offer, and in spite of herself she laughs.

“Turn around,” she says. “Hands behind your back.”

My heart is thumping heavily in my chest as I do. I am trying very hard not to imagine the Leechman bursting into here like a demon straight out of a horror movie and swallowing Elena up into its swollen leechy body. I can feel my hands trembling as Makado takes my wrists and lashes them tightly together. The rough synthetic fiber cuts into my wrists and I grunt. Makado steps away from me and I flex my hands experimentally but it’s no use, she’s tied me tightly enough that I’d never be able to free myself unless I had a knife. She’s already taken mine from the sheath on my belt and tossed it casually to the dusty, oily floor.

Elena’s dead. I can’t stop the thought from echoing around my skull, increasing in severity with each impact. She’s dead, she’s gone, I was too late. If I had just been a little quicker, if I hadn’t stopped to sleep, if I hadn’t…

“Hey, what are you - oh, Jesus Christ,” Makado grumbles. I sniff and look away from her. I try to keep it down but a quiet sob bubbles out of my throat.

“Goddam it,” I mumble. I can’t even wipe my eyes. My shoulders are shaking with the weight of it, with the weight of knowing that -

Makado sighs behind me. “You didn’t kill her,” she says. “If she’s even dead. We don’t know.”

I let out a terribly mirthless laugh. “You didn’t kill him,” Makado continues, begrudgingly. “I know you didn’t, it’s not like you put a gun to his head and shot him. I just…”

“Don’t want him to be gone,” I suggest, and out of the corner of my eye, through a veil of tears, I can see her nod.

I feel as though I might rip in two the next time someone touches me, but in spite of everything I do want to reach out and touch her, brush my thumb along the knobby edge of her wrist, feel her warmth near to me. Maybe it’s pathetic and stupid, maybe I should be spitting and cursing and swearing revenge but I can’t bring myself to. I want to just curl into a little ball and cry. 

Makado is rustling around behind me, and then I hear the click and crackle of a radio. “Peterson, Rodriguez,” she says, enunciating clearly. “Status check, over.”

A moment passes and then the response comes burbling up through the airwaves. “Peterson, checking in. I’ve got Rodriguez here with me but he’s carrying the crystal so he couldn’t call himself. Everything’s good down here. ETA 20 minutes to DUSA. Over.”

“Thanks. You were able to disable the specimen? Over.”

“Hard to say. It backed off but Emmanuel is hurt pretty bad. One of those leeches, it got into her suit and chewed the hell out of her leg. We’ve got her on a stretcher and we’re bringing her back but I don’t know if she’ll make it. Is the autodoc functional? Over.”

“Negative,” Makado says. Her voice is tight and fraying. “Negative, it’s smashed. It looks like the Leechman got here before we did. Over.”

“Shit. Well, Emmanuel is fucked, then. Do we have support from topside? Over.”

I hear Makado mutter a quiet curse below her breath. “Give me a second,” she says. “Out.”

I sniff hard and duck my head down into my shoulder, try and wipe my eyes against the rubber of the ranger suit. Makado is tapping at the pad in the arm of her ranger suit; she’s put the gun away at this point, tucking it into her holster at her hip. I could make a run for it, I reflect. Instead I fold my legs beneath me and sink into a huddle on the floor a little like a gazelle bedding down for the night. Makado glances over at me and then back at her screen. “Who’s Emmanuel?” I ask. My voice creaks partway through it, and when I clear my throat it comes back thick and congested.

“None of your business,” she tells me, a little absently. “You’d better stop crying,” she adds. 

“Fuck you,” I tell her, but I can’t put much heart into it. “Fuck you for trying to walk all over everything and try to do it your way. You walked all over me, you walked all over the team, you walked all over Peter -“

Makado looms over me, ruddy bolts of fury sparkling behind her eyes. “You have no idea, you have no idea -“ she starts, but I roll my eyes at her.

“Do you have any idea how many people are dead because of you?”

That catches her, and I get a vicious little thrill out of seeing how it impacts, how she absorbs it, how her eyes grow even wearier. She starts to say something but I start listing off names.

“The Sergeant. Peter. Slate. Erica and Marcus. Klaus. Crookshank. Euler. Ellis. Emmanuel, whoever that is. And El - Elena,” I say. I have to swallow hard to get that last name out but I manage it. “They’re all your fault, Makado. If you hadn’t gone off the deep end because of this stupid fucking crystal none of this would ever have happened. Does it really matter? Does it really matter this much? Is it worth it? Tell me. Please. Do you even know?”

“They knew the risks,” Makado tries to say, but she isn’t meeting my gaze. “You wouldn’t understand,” she says, a little bit of strength returning to her voice. “You don’t know what it’s like to -“

“To have an obsession take over your life?” I finish, and she blows a breath out.

“I’m the only one trying!” she yells. “I’m the only one fucking trying to stop all of this! That crystal is the only thing that we have that we know can shut down the Pit if it wakes up again. Getting it back should be our top priority -“

“And the last time one of those crystals was used,” I point out, “it infected - I’m sorry, how many people? - with a fucking personality-destroying disease that spreads when you feel emotions and forces you to crawl into the Pit to die.”

“We know better now,” she says, hands on her hips. “We know what we did wrong. If we don’t shatter the crystals -“

“How do you even know? Aren’t you just guessing?”

“You have no right to tell me how to do my job,” she tells me. I can see her knuckles whiten with rage. “I’m doing what needs to be done. If the Pit woke up and became fully ambulatory, it’d be the end of the world as we know it. If you think that isn’t something worth stopping by any means necessary, then you’re either stupid or insane. Maybe both. If I -“

“Okay, Makado. Whatever,” I tell her. I feel as though if I shut my eyes I’d be able to fall asleep in about a minute. My heart hurts. 

Makado glares at me and for a moment, just a moment, I think she might be about to draw her leg back and slam the hard edge of her boot into my gut, but instead she spins on her heel and walks away, fishing the radio out of its holster on her belt and talking quietly into it.

I think for a while about struggling to my feet and just walking out. I don’t think Makado would shoot me, I really don’t. I think she wouldn’t have the heart for it. Maybe she’d just let me go.

Elena’s dead. You haven’t seen the body, a little voice whispers in the back of my mind, but I don’t need to see the body. If the Leechman got her, I’m not sure I want to see the body. I would want my memory of her to remain clean. I want to remember her in the tent smiling down at me, I want to remember her hands on my body, the way her lips felt when she kissed me, the way my heart felt when she kissed me. 

I spend the next twenty minutes or so agonizing myself before the clunk and hiss of heavy machinery, burbles glutinously up from outside the rent in DUSA’s hull. With a little difficulty I manage to sit up and look outwards, and I see three orange figures in ranger suits marching up out of one of the vents leading to this organelle. Two of them are carrying a fourth on a stretcher, and the third…

My mouth drops open. The third is incredibly bulky, far more so than a normal person in a suit, and as they come closer and step into range of DUSA’s flickering floodlights, I realize that they are wearing something like a white enameled arthropod over their arms and legs, a squat mechanical spider perched on their back like a backpack. Its limbs extend along the ranger’s arms and fill out into armored gauntlets encompassing their hands.

And in their hands, hefted with an assurance and strength borne, I imagine, solely from their armor’s assistance, is the crystal, green and spiky and menacing, with an ugly luminosity flaring somewhere deep inside of it. I think again that I can see something moving within its murky depths.

Makado rushes out to meet them, leaving me forgotten, and again I consider getting up and just walking away. I think I’ve missed my chance, though; if it was just Makado, she might let me go. With everyone else here, all of these other rangers, there’s no way I’d be able to get away with it. And who knows if she’d have any compunctions about letting someone else shoot me.

Makado, to her credit, only paused briefly to tell the ranger with the crystal where to set it down before rushing to the ranger on the stretcher. Even from a distance I can tell that she’s hurt badly; her orange suit is splattered with blood and there is an enormous hole in her side. I think I can see teeth marks. One of the rangers shows something to Makado; it looks a little like a very thick, dark length of rope, and I realize with a horrible twist in my gut that it’s a dead leech. It looks to be about three or four feet long; it’s head has been torn off and it trails a thick, foul-smelling ichor behind it in a long oozing trail. 

The huddled conversation over the wounded ranger continues a while longer before the group breaks apart. The ranger with the exoskeleton carries the crystal into DUSA, moving with almost exaggerated care through the hole in the wall. He looks down at me as he passes, craning his neck around the crystal to make sure he isn’t going to bump into me. “You alright?” he asks. He has a thick Texan accent that makes me smile in spite of myself.

“Yeah,” I tell him. “Do you think you could untie me?”

He pauses. “You’re tied up?” 

“Yes,” I say, rolling halfway over and waggling my fingers at him. “See?”

“Why are you tied up?”

“It’s a long story.”

“You’re Dzilenski, aren’t you?”

“I, uh. No.”

“No? What’s your name, then? I haven’t seen you around before.”

The weight of the crystal doesn’t seem to be troubling him at all. He cocks his head at me.

“Merriweather,” I tell him. “I’m new.”

He waggles a finger at me; the servos of the exoskeleton make little whining noises as he does. “Nice try,” he tells me, but I can tell from the shape of his voice that he’s grinning. I shake my head a little and give him a halfhearted smile.

“Can’t blame a girl for trying,” I suggest, and he laughs as he stomps off towards the stairwell, the crystal glowing malevolently in his arms. 

A few moments later someone is taking me roughly beneath my armpits and hauling me to my feet. I stagger a little but keep my balance. I look over and see Makado glaring at me from a few inches away, but it seems as though her temper has died a little; there isn’t quite as much venom in her gaze as before. Without uttering a word to me she marches me out of DUSA and towards one of the rangers, standing on a small, bulgy lump of flesh with their hands on their hips. I feel a spike of fear in my stomach. “What are you going to do with me?” I ask her.

I can see Makado’s lip curl out of the corner of my eye. “I’m not going to kill you,” she tells me. “Peterson there is just going to take you up to the surface and give you back to the feds, that’s all. Then this whole stupid thing can be over and done with.”

“So that’s it, huh?” I ask, breaking out of her grasp and turning to face her. “You’re just going to throw me to the wolves? You really think that you can get away with this?”

“Roan,” she groans. “Do you think I want to fuck you over? Do you think I want to do this?”

“Well, from the way you’re acting -“

“This thing is bigger than you or me,” she says. “And I’m - I’m sorry,” she tells me. To my immense surprise I actually believe her. “I’m sorry, and I don’t want to ruin your life like I know I’m going to, but I - I have to do this. I’m sorry.”

Before I can say anything Peterson takes me firmly by the arm. Makado swallows hard and nods to him. “Take her up. There should be a contingent of FBI agents somewhere up there, I know it’s a mess but they should still be hanging around, probably yelling at Admin. Let them know she’s Roan Dzilenski, they’ll take it from there.”

“Right,” he says. “Come on, then.”

I stare back at Makado all the way over to the vent leading up to the passage out of here; she refuses to meet my gaze.

“I’m sorry about all this,” Peterson mentions, adjusting his grip on me to push a hanging fold of flesh out of the way.

“If you’re so sorry, let me go,” I tell him. He has a quiet, apologetic tone.

“I’m not that sorry,” he explains, and I can’t help but roll my eyes. “Look on the bright side,” he suggests. “You’ll be out of here soon. I’m sure that will be a relief.”

“Yeah,” I snap, “I’m sure that -“

Something falls onto my shoulder and I let out a shriek. It rolls off and slaps onto the ground with a wet, meaty thump and slithers away.

“Are you okay?” Peterson is asking. “What was that?”

I look up, knowing what I’ll see, but the Leechman actually comes at us from the side, the leeches boiling out of the fleshy wall with a noise like a million hungry mouths gnashing and chewing and slurping simultaneously, leaving the wall pockmarked and collapsing. Peterson blurts out a surprised curse and lets me go, his hands darting to his holster, but the Leechman is faster. It reaches out with a massive, dripping, writhing paw and fixes it around his head, lifting him bodily off the ground. Rodriguez screams and I hear commotion from behind, in the main organ housing DUSA, but his screams quickly become muffled and gurgly and thick. His hands and legs are shuddering and jolting like he were being electrocuted, and then my stupid, shell-shocked nerves finally, finally kick into motion and I stagger backwards. My foot catches on something and I fall; the ground comes slamming upwards to meet me and the breath whooshes out of my lungs just as the Leechman drops Peterson. The helmet of his suit is bent and crushed and although he lands on his feet, his body sways gently back and forth like a wind were catching it. The Leechman stomps past me and I cringe away from it, but it ignores me entirely. Its footsteps resound through the meaty floor and rattle my teeth in my jaws.

I am so scared I think I might throw up. Every fiber in my body is screaming at me to get up and run away, but I can’t force myself to move. “Hey,” I whisper, as the Leechman ducks its broad, wormy head and pushes into the organ. “Hey, uh, Peterson, are you okay?”

Rodriguez turns and looks at me and I scream. His face has been eaten away to nothing and his jaw is hanging from a few stringy tendons on the left-hand side of his skull. He shambles towards me and I scream again, and I hear my screams echoed from back behind me in DUSA’s chamber. It’s only a few moments later that the gunfire begins.

I kick my feet and try and push myself away from Rodriguez’s corpse. As I watch a leech crawls out of his mouth and plunges its snub-nosed head into the wreckage of his eye. The body lurches closer to me and into the light and I get a better look at him; my stomach nearly turns. I scream again and try to kick at him but he just catches my leg and drags me closer. The bone of his skull and the scraps of meat and flesh on his face are stained a dark, inky black with a dripping, noxious ichor. Without any preamble the body straddles me and shoves its fingers into my mouth. I choke and cough and try to kick and bite but it’s simply too strong. My eyes are filling with tears but I can still see the body’s cavernous mouth yawning and yawning and the body of an enormous leech slowly struggling up Rodriguez’s pitted, masticated throat. Though it has no eyes or face I imagine it leering at me, and though I redouble my efforts to get away, my throat convulsing in anticipatory terror, I can do absolutely nothing to stop what is about to happen to me. At the very last my courage fails me and I just squeeze my eyes shut and wait for the leech to barrel down my throat, wait with an anticipatory cringe to feel its needle-sharp teeth dig into my insides.

Instead I feel more than hear a horrific, bone-shuddering crunch from just ahead of me, and when I snap my eyes open it takes me a moment to comprehend what I’m seeing. Jutting from Rodriguez’s chest amid a thorny cluster of broken ribs is a bulky mechanical hand absolutely slick with gore and ichor. With a harsh mechanical whine it makes a fist and withdraws from the grapefruit-sized hole it made in Rodriguez’s chest and then seizes the body and flings it off of me. The body lands against the side wall of the vent with a wet crunch and then flops to the floor and lays still. 

“Joker,” I breathe. The robot’s blocky, flat-panelled head is staring down at me with what I imagine to be a rather odd expression. It’s pitted and stained and rusted and every couple of seconds sparks burst from its torn left arm socket. Its armored torso is battered and dented and it moves with difficulty, but it still leans down over me and with incredible gentleness tucks its blood-drenched hand beneath me and brings me lightly to my feet. A moment later it has untied my hands and I can feel the blood rushing back into them with a clustering ache of pins and needles.

I can scarcely breathe I am so relieved but I still manage to reach up and put my hand on the machine’s metallic chest. “Jesus Christ,” I tell it. “I am so fucking happy to see you.”

But before I get any more out, a tall, blonde-haired blur slams into me and wraps me up in long, strong arms and lifts me off of my feet and nuzzles her face against mine. “Oh god,” Elena says, and before she can say any more my greedy, bruised lips find hers and for a moment, just a moment, amid the gunfire and the screams, I feel completely okay.

* * *

When we finally break apart and Elena sets me down on my wobbly, weak-kneed legs, I reach up and take her face in my hands. I still can’t quite believe that she’s here, that she’s alive, that she’s okay. My heart is beating so quickly that I almost feel nauseous and I don’t trust myself to speak. Elena’s eyes are wide and slatey; they flicker over me, dancing like roulette balls, just as she runs her hands over my arms, my legs, my sides and back. “Are you okay?” she asks. Her voice is shaky. I try to speak a few times but I can’t get any words out so instead I just nod. Elena leans in and kisses me again, briefly this time, and then, with her lips brushing my ear she murmurs, “I was so scared, Roan, I was so scared that I had lost you, I thought -“

“It’s okay,” I tell her. There’s another scream from DUSA and we both jump. I grab onto her desperately as she starts to pull away. “Listen, are you alright? The gunshot -“

“I’m okay,” she tells me. “I promise I’m okay. Jesus Christ I thought I lost you. Let’s get out of here.”

Next to her, Joker shifts on his damaged heels and creaks forward further down the vent, towards DUSA. Elena curses. “Hey, wait. Stop. We have to go.”

Joker ignores her. “Elena,” I ask, “what the hell happened? Why is Joker -“

“Whatever the Leechman did to him down in the barrows jarred something loose or damaged him somehow, he’s operating completely autonomously.”

I stare at Elena. “You’re not controlling him?”

“No,” she says. “He - I think he heard our conversation on the radio, that’s how he knew to come to DUSA to get me. It’s a good thing he did or Makado would have gotten me. He burst right in through the wall, it was fucking terrifying.”

“Joker did that? I thought it was the Leechman, I thought you were dead -“

“No, no, it was Joker! Oh, god, baby you must have been so scared -“

“I’m just glad you’re okay. Where did he take you?”

Joker looks back at us, then returns his gaze to the scene inside the organ ahead. The screams have largely died down now, but I can hear Makado shouting something, and a high-pitched electric whine that sets my teeth on edge.

Elena shakes her head. “He must have been monitoring Makado’s transmissions, I think he has to have a radio receiver in there somewhere. He grabbed me and brought me down to a little organelle maybe a mile away and we just sort of hunkered down there for a while.”

“Did he hurt you? If he -“

“No, no, he didn’t, it’s okay, I’m okay. Joker!” she yells. “We have to go!”

Joker ignores her. There is a curious sense of animation about its pose and its motions, quick and precise and birdlike. As I watch, its fingers flex tightly enough to dig deeply into the fleshy wall it rests against. Again its head swivels and glances back at us and I think I can feel its nonexistent gaze resting on me. “Elena, if you’re not controlling it, then who is?”

“I don’t know,” she says, glancing over at me. “I think nobody.”

“But how could it -“

“Roan, listen, forget about that for a moment.” Her lips are tugging upwards in an irrepressible smile and I can’t help but mirror her. I want to hold her and kiss her and - “there was something I needed to tell you, something I needed to tell you face to face,” she says. My stomach swoops upwards in a surge of delight and I reach out, take her hand in mine. 

“Yes?” I ask, trying to sound innocent and oblivious.

“Roan, I -“ she starts, but before she can get more than a few words out, there is a whipcrack of thunder in DUSA’s chamber, and Joker bolts forward like a sprinter off the starting line, and we both scramble into action and chase after him.

DUSA’s wet, fleshy cavern is in utter disarray. Dead leeches are littered everywhere and there are massive stains of ichor and blood splattered all across the cavern, as though someone upended buckets of paint and flung them. A crushed, distended corpse in a black-stained suit has been driven so deeply into the flesh of the floor that it has nearly been snapped in two. Of the Leechman there is no sign, but as we watch, Makado and three other rangers come storming out of the other vent and take up defensive positions around it, hunkering down and training their weapons on DUSA’s hull. Makado is carrying a long grey brick of a rifle, bulky and supremely un-ergodynamic, with what looks like a lens in place of a barrel. I wonder about it for a moment before a sickly green glow floats into view and the Leechman emerges from DUSA, ducking its titanic head, with the crystal beneath one of its arms, held as casually as one might carry a basketball. It pauses there for a moment, peering out at the four small figures opposing it. 

Makado looks scared; her face has paled to a sickly white and I can see the rifle shuddering in her trembling hands.

I can’t see where Joker’s gone; I catch Elena’s eye and frown, but she nods upwards a little, and I see the robot just above us, clinging to the ceiling like a monkey. It seems content to wait for someone to make the first move.

Behind the Leechman an orange-suited figure takes a juddering, unsteady step into the light, and I can see the limp exoskeleton clinging to its limbs like a length of sodden rope. Another figure follows, and then another, and even in the dim half-light, lit by strobes and flashlights and headlamps, I can see their bodies bulging and throbbing with the gallons and gallons of leeches seething beneath their skin.

My stomach betrays me and I bend double and vomit, trying furiously to wipe the image from my mind, but I can still see the man’s distended belly glistening beneath the orange ranger suit, pregnant with its load of parasitic cargo, and the thought sends a wave of furious revulsion scurrying up my limbs, coaxing rank, cold sweat out of my pores.

The Leechman takes a deliberate step forward and Makado pulls the trigger on her rifle. A  coruscating lance of blinding white light jolts from the barrel with the same deafening whip-crack we’d heard before and spears the Leechman through the core of its body, blowing a meter-wide hole open clean through it and filling the air with the smell of burning leeches. The Leechman staggers back a step or two and reaches out to steady itself, dropping the crystal; it clunks to the floor with a strangely musical tinkle and I can see a few of the spikes shatter and fall to pieces.

Makado rises to her feet, a little color returning to her cheeks, and fires again. This bolt catches the Leechman through the head and forces it down to its knees. It puts one massive hand forward to catch itself and Makado burns it off. She advances on the Leechman, firing again and again until the thing is just a pile of writhing, dying leeches, slowly burrowing into the ground and the walls and the ceiling, trying to escape. The bodies of the parasitized rangers shudder and twitch but they hesitate, standing still as though bereft of any governing intelligence.

Finally Makado pulls the trigger and the gun hisses a loud, screeching complaint and vents an enormous gasp of steam from recessed ports in its side; through them I can see the gun’s innards glowing white-hot, and Makado tosses it aside after glaring down at it in disgust. She draws her pistol from her holster and trains it one-handed on one of the rangers, squeezing one eye shut and glaring down the sights.

I open my mouth to suggest to Elena that it might be time to leave, but before I can get a word out the Leechman charges past us, out of the mouth of our vent, forcing a shriek from my mouth, and bowls into Makado headlong, sending her flying. She slams into the wall on the far side of the organ so hard that I can see a Mak-shaped bruise forming in the Pit’s flesh when she flops to the floor, limp and helpless, either stunned or unconscious or dead. 

The rangers open up on the Leechman but if the laser wasn’t enough to kill it, bullets clearly aren’t going to be enough either. The three parasitized rangers surge forwards as well, wading into the fray, but the Leechman is doing the heavy lifting. I cringe back against Elena as I watch it pick up a hapless, screaming ranger and pull him in half, a spray of gore and guts flooding from the man’s cleft torso and legs. I clutch at Elena, trying desperately to get my legs beneath me, and she pulls me up and steadies me.

“We have to go,” she says. I can hear a note of hysteria in her voice. I take a shaky step backwards into the vent and feel a leech writhe and squirm beneath my cleats. Another one leaps at me and thuds into my back. I can feel its jaws working to pierce the thick latex of the ranger suit, and I hop frantically, trying to reach backwards and dislodge it. Elena brushes it off of me and crushes it beneath her boot just as the Leechman vomits a tidal wave of blunt, wriggling bodies into the pried-open chest of another ranger, struggling weakly in the creature’s squirming grip.

More leeches patter against us, driving us unwillingly out of the vent as we crawl and duck and dodge, trying to avoid them. A nerveless, exoskeletoned paw swipes at me clumsily and I scream and throw myself out of the way. From my vantage point on the ground I see Elena shove the infested ranger back and unload the entire magazine of her pistol into his gut, but the body staggers towards us still. I can see Elena’s teeth bared, a mad glint in her eyes, and I know that she is about to charge the thing and I know that it will kill her, but I haven’t enough breath to tell her not to.

Deeper in the chamber, the Leechman plucks the head off of a ranger’s pinioned, struggling body as easily as separating an apple from a tree and fling the chunk away like a bloody comet. It slaps wetly to the ground only a few feet away from me and I roll back from it, nearly mad with terror. I can see the Leechman slowly turning towards us and I am so afraid I think I might die just from fear alone.

“El - El - El - “ I try, again and again, but I can’t breathe, I can’t speak, I can’t think -

Joker drops from the ceiling directly onto the parasitized ranger, landing with a sickening crunch and a whine of servos. Its head snaps upwards and regards the Leechman with a calculating stare, and the Leechman, impossibly, stops. It seems to cock its head at Joker, and then it takes a step forward, heavy and inevitable and menacing, but before it can go any further Joker launches itself at it with a scream of straining metal and whining pistons. I struggle to my knees and brush the leeches off of Elena, checking her suit for holes or punctures.

Joker is losing. The Leechman has torn its other arm off and tossed it aside, and now it’s yanking at Joker’s leg. Joker is lurching spasmodically back and forth, trying to get free, but the Leechman has too strong a grip on it. The leeches are flowing over the robot’s metal form and in a few more moments it looks as though it’ll be enveloped entirely. I can see Joker’s head turn with what seems like a titanic effort and peer back at us, and then it disappears beneath the surface of the Leechman.

I tug Elena to her feet and take a few faltering steps back towards the vent before there is a colossal wave of sound and light and heat from behind that bowls me over and knocks me face-down in the sopping, bloodstained flesh. Elena falls over me with a scream and for a while all we can do is cling to each other and pray that whatever the hell happened is over quickly.

A moment passes, then another. I roll over and, with more than a little trepidation, sit up. 

It looks as though a bomb has gone off. There is a bloody, charred crater in the floor, and all that remains of Joker are a few metal fragments, embedded like shrapnel in the floor and walls and ceiling. The parasitized rangers have all been cut down, most of them separated into small pieces of flesh, both leech, and human, smeared across DUSA and the organelle like daubs of lumpy paint.

Of the Leechman there is no sign, and when I glance over at it, I realize that the crystal is gone as well.

After another few minutes of utter stillness, Elena and I look at each other. “Are you okay?” she asks, and I glance down at myself.

“Somehow,” I say, “I think I am. Are you?”

She pats at herself cautiously, peers down at her legs, wiggles her foot. “I think so. Did Joker - ?”

I point to the crater. “He must have exploded. Either there was some kind of self-destruct or whatever engine or motor it used was damaged, or…”

“Jesus,” Elena breathes, getting shakily to her feet. She offers me a hand and helps me up and for a little while all we can do is survey the carnage. I feel as though I want to cry and laugh and throw up all at the same time. 

I squeeze Elena’s hand. “What were you going to tell me?” I ask.

“Is now really the time?” she smiles, and I bite my lip to keep myself from grinning back at her.

“At this rate, if you don’t say it now you’re never going to.”

“Roan,” she says, putting a hand on my cheek, “I -“

There is a groan from across the cavern and we both snap around. Over there, on the far side of the wall, Makado is starting to sit up. She looks shaky and shell-shocked and terrified. She sees us and tries to get to her feet, but her leg buckles beneath her and she falls back to the ground. Elena’s eyes narrow and she lets me go, starting towards Makado, her hands curling into fists. I have a knot in my stomach.

“Elena, wait,” I call after her. She spins and stares at me and then shakes her head.

“Don’t look,” she tells me, and for a moment, just a moment, I think of going after her and stopping her from - from doing whatever she’s about to do.

But instead the coward in me wins out and I avert my gaze, squeezing my eyes shut, my insides tensing in anticipation of a gunshot. I hear Makado cry out weakly, and I shudder.

There is a loud, satisfying smack, as of fist on jaw, and then a flopping sound. I look up and see Elena wringing her hand, cursing beneath her breath, before she flips an insensate Makado onto her stomach and, folding the woman’s hands behind her, begins to lash her wrists together with a length of paracord. She looks up and sees me staring, registers the expression on my face and gives me a laugh.

“You thought I was going to kill her?” she asks, and I blow a breath out and try to calm myself before I answer.

“I didn’t know what you were going to do,” I say, truthfully.

“I’m not a killer,” Elena tells me, hefting Makado’s slim frame onto her shoulders in a fireman’s carry. “Jesus Christ,” she adds, adjusting her load a little. “This little shit is heavy.”

I kick at a piece of wreckage, a folded metal panel, bent from the force of the blast, and then reach down and with difficulty pull Joker’s battered torso out of the crater. Elena sets Makado down none too gently and comes over and squats beside me.

There’s something that looks a little like a car battery, jammed into a slot in the torso. I tug at it, using my foot to hold the hunk of metal steady, and it breaks free with a hiss like a seal being broken. “What is that?” Elena asks. I shake my head.

“BCPU - Property of Anodyne Berlin,” I read. “Mind Impulse Unit - B. Walken.”

“Walken?” Elena asks, incredulous. 

“No,” I say, “this can’t - no, that’s ridiculous.”

“What is?”

“Burt Walken was Erica’s husband,” I tell her. “B. Walken, Burt Walken. She told me he died from the psychic illness from 2007, that Anodyne had never returned his body.”

The top of the box is translucent plastic, but it’s too dark to see inside. Elena reaches down and grabs her flashlight and shines it onto the box, and we both squint at it. When I comprehend what I’m seeing I nearly drop it - for there inside the box, soaking in a briny, gelatinous fluid, festooned with wires and covered in metal electrodes and circuits, are the ridges and folds of a clearly human brain.

* * *

“What were you going to tell me?” I ask Elena again once she gets off the radio. She’s spent the last fifteen minutes begging and cajoling and cursing someone on the surface to try and get them to send someone down to get us and finally, finally gotten a begrudging affirmative. I can slowly feel my spirits rising, and Elena even gives me a secret little smile as she comes to sit next to me, sinking down against the wall of the vent with a groan of relief. I lean my head on her shoulder and she kisses me gently on the forehead. A wash of warmth floods down my arms and legs and I have to restrain myself from seizing her and clutching her to me.

“You sure I shouldn’t just leave it a mystery at this point?” she asks, and I elbow her lightly in the ribs.

“Tell me,” I insist.

Elena leans back and takes my chin gently in her hand, inclining my face upwards to her. I can see her studying me, see her pupils dilate as they flick from my eyes to my cheeks to my nose to my lips. “I love you,” she says, and my heart jumps in my chest as though struck by lightning. I can feel myself grinning madly, and then our lips brush and then fit together as though they were made to do so.

And then, when our breath has finally grown short enough to force us to break apart, we slowly rise, Elena’s hand in mine, scarcely daring to tear our eyes from each other, and begin to gather our things for the long journey up.

Continue with the Epilogue

Back to Table of Contents

[thanzag]

someone who’ll set my heart free

the river styx does not wash away the poison that led to zagreus’ most recent failure. thanatos lends a hand.

than/zag sick fic, meg/zag mentioned in passing as something that is happening but otherwise not really relevant for this story.

fic masterlist here

content warning for mention of the concept of vomiting, but no description of it

Normally when Zagreus walks out of the River Styx and back into the House, it’s as if nothing happened. The adrenaline from his escape attempt (failed, again) will have faded, his injuries are healed over, and he’s as good as new. Normally he either walks right past his father to dip into the lounge and say hello to whomever is inside, or he greets Hypnos and Nyx and goes straight to his room. With Achilles being caught up in his own thoughts about Patroclus lately, there’s not a lot of reason to head to the West Hall, most of the time.

Normally, he doesn’t have to drag himself out onto the steps, the tile, as if the pool is trying to suck him back in. Normally his head isn’t pounding, his skin isn’t hot, and the torchlight doesn’t leave terrible auroras burned into his brain. Normally he is able to get his feet beneath him to stand. Normally, standing isn’t even on a list of problems.

The lingering shades, stuck waiting in line, are looking at him. Chattering amongst themselves. He doesn’t have it in him to care. He drags himself a little further out of the pool and groans. Trying to sit up gets him nowhere.

“You don’t look so good down there!” Hypnos enthuses from above him.

Zagreus isn’t sure when he dozed off — it’s been either an hour or an eternity. He drags his heavy eyelids open and tries to speak, though that doesn’t really work out, either. Hypnos looks down at his clipboard before looking at him again. “I mean it, you look terrible. That satyr poison will make you sick, you know!”

“…thanks,” Zagreus eventually drags out. Why does his throat hurt? Hypnos cocks his head to the side, smiling brightly.

“You’re welcome!” He turns to leave, to head back to his post, and —

“Wait!” It hurts to speak. “Can you — help me?” He swallows. “Please?”

Hypnos turns back to him, quilted cloak billowing as he does. He folds his clipboard against his chest. “What do you need help with, Zagreus?”

Surely Hypnos can tell that this isn’t normal for him, right? Zagreus has come out of the river so many times —

“I need help to my room, I think,” he says after a long moment of Hypnos watching him, and the other man brightens again.

“Oh, well why didn’t you say so? I can’t really leave my post, but I’ll get someone!” Maybe Achilles will help him, if he can be drawn from his thoughts.

At least knowing that he’s emotionally invested in someone else will keep his crush from resurfacing. Or maybe Nyx will help him, though her support has always been more from afar.

Hypnos leaves him there, face pressed against the cold tile, and Zagreus tries to keep it together.

“Oh, you are kidding me,” Meg says, drawing him out of his stupor.

“Thank you Miss Megaera!” Hypnos chirps, and then the sound of him walking away echoes in Zagreus’ ears.

“What did you do, Zagreus?” she murmurs, standing high above him. He recognizes the way she’s standing, even though her face is hard to see from down here. The stalwart ‘this is bullshit’ stance she has so often when she’s gatekeeping him from Asphodel. He groans and tries to turn over onto his back to better look at her, and — eugh. That’s a bad idea.

“…dunno. Sick.”

“And you need help getting to your room,” she says flatly, not-asking, and he hopes she’s willing to take pity on him enough to at least help him stand before she ducks out of this one. Hypnos should have asked anyone but her, even Dusa. Or Cerberus. What he and Meg have is great, but it’s not something borne out of care-taking. This is out of her comfort zone. He’s thinking in dizzy circles when the sound of her saying his name draws him back to reality.

“Zagreus.”

“Yeah, sorry.” He mentally shakes his head — if he really does, he might be sick. “Help me up?”

“Don’t be stupid,” she says — not the expected answer, truly — and then she’s kneeling to scoop him up in her arms.

Moving so quickly does make his head throb, and he spends however-long it is that she is carrying him thinking — of course she can carry me. She’s so strong. She always is. I should have known better. But why —?

The darkness of his room settles onto him before he finds a real answer in his mind. She lays him on the bed, on his back, and he can feel her watching him now. He groans without meaning to, but it’s easier to open his eyes in this low light.

She’s standing at the side of the bed, and she’s got her arms crossed like she’s annoyed. If he had the energy to be sardonic with himself, he’d think that of course she is — she’s always annoyed with him. But he doesn’t, and instead he lets his eyes slide off of her and onto the mirror at the other end of the room. It’s easier than looking at her face right now.

“If you’re going to vomit, don’t get it on me,” she bites out, and he shakes his head even though it does, as expected, make it ache more.

“I won’t. Thanks, Meg.”

“Don’t mention it. I’m not your nursemaid. If you need anything, get Dusa. Or anyone else.” Her words are stern but, more briefly than he can comprehend, her cool hand is touching his forehead. And then she’s gone.

Zagreus falls into a fitful sleep sometime after she leaves, feeling hot and cold in turns in a way that has him wrestling the covers on and off of him. He has terrible fever dreams, reliving past escape attempts. Reliving the feeling of being run through with blades and cut down with — whips, and other things.

When he wakes up again, it’s because he can feel someone watching him. He drags his eyes open and turns his head, expecting to see Nyx, maybe, or possibly (very unlikely) Meg back again. But it’s not either of them.  

“Than?” His voice is pitiful, but at least he can bear to speak, unlike before.

“These things would only happen to you,” is what Than says, lingering at his bedside. Zagreus thinks he’s come a little closer, though that might just be his faulty vision.

“I’m special that way,” Zagreus says with a smile, distantly aware that that’s not a normal response, or even what he meant to say. He has very suddenly become hot, all over, and he tosses the blankets off of him. He’s sweat-soaked.

Than does come closer, now, and touches his head. His hand is so cool on his skin.

“You’re burning up, Zag.” Than sounds either unimpressed or worried. Right now, he can’t tell.

“Yeah, sounds right,” he agrees. Than’s hand moves from his forehead to his cheek, and Zagreus turns his head minutely to press a weak kiss against his palm.

“You’re incorrigible. What happened to you?”

“Mmmh. Satyrs in the temple,” he answers. Nuzzles into Than’s hand. “I’m cold.”

“You threw your blankets off. Of course you are,” Than says dryly, but he pulls the covers back over him anyway. Zagreus privately mourns the absence of the hand on his face.

“Missed you.”

“I know, Zag. I missed you too.” Even dizzy and addled, Zagreus is aware that this is not — being brushed off. He knows it’s sincere, even though Than is curt as ever.

“Come cuddle?” He feels so terrible.

Than frowns, minutely, and even from that Zagreus knows it’s going to be a no. “I can’t stay. But I’ll bring you Mort, alright?”

He just groans an affirmative, nestling a little further into his blanket cocoon.

Than does leave for a moment, returning with Mort in both hands. He presses the little mouse against Zagreus’ chest, tucking it under the blanket. “There you go.”

“Thanks,” he murmurs. He’s half asleep already, but he doesn’t miss the soft, tentative press of lips to his hot forehead.

He rests again, still fitful. He can’t get comfortable, still sweaty and aching all over, but he does doze. At some point Nyx and Dusa do come through — he thinks someone turns up with an extra blanket, maybe. But it’s easier and more comfortable to just sleep, so he doesn’t put effort into waking.

The next time he does really wake, it’s against his will. Someone is shaking his shoulder, talking to him instead of around him.

“Come on, Zag, sit up.” It’s Than again, and Zagreus is just aware enough to know that it must have been a long time, if Than’s had time to go do work and come back.

He groans but does try to sit up, manages to get an elbow beneath him.

“Whassat?” Than’s holding a corked bottle of glowing liquid.

“I’ve got the antidote. Drink this,” he insists with little preamble, popping the cork out. Zagreus lets Than tip it into his mouth, swallows it down. Almost instantly, he does feel better.

“Than,” he says, swallowing again, licking his lips. He feels refreshed, too. “Thank you.”

“You’re feeling better?” Zagreus blinks slowly, thinking about it.

His head still feels fuzzy, and he’s a little warm. “Probably should rest some more.”

“You must be feeling poorly still to suggest it yourself,” Than says, but he’s smiling that indulgent smile that Zagreus thinks is just for him. “I can stay for a little while, now, if you wanted company.”

“— really?” If he had the energy, he’d be delighted. As it is, he feels warm all over in a way that has nothing to do with his departing fever.

“Yes, really.” Than discards his scythe and sword, leaning them against the wall. He unbuckles his pauldron and leaves it on the floor. And then he’s climbing onto the bed, underneath the blanket, right next to him. “It was hard enough to leave the last time.”

Zagreus turns over and curls against Than’s side, presses his face against his shoulder in lieu of trying to find the right words to say. Than’s arm wraps itself around his back, stroking his spine, and he nuzzles in a little further.

“Glad you’re here,” he does say, and lets himself sleep again.