WARNING: Slashiness is ahead, or at least implied slashiness of the girly sort. Turn back now, foolish mortals, who care not for such things. If you don't then I'll flay you with angry words and the like. Anyway...

Michelle-Note: Ah...a Xena fic. Haven't done one of these before, but I think it's high time I did. I have great plans for this! Ok, not really. Aphrodite's POV, and a pairing that I have NEVER seen before. This is exciting. Aphrodite/Gabrielle...brace yourself. Oh and the title is a play on Love in the Time of Cholera, which I just finished reading. I wasn't too impressed, and I don't recommend it. I think I pumped it up too much in my head and was just disappointed. Onward into slashy fun!

Love in the Time of Ancient Gods

1. Twas Love Killed the Olympians

Whoever said immortals knew nothing of love because they knew nothing of loss was a fool. It was Eli (and he was certainly a damn fool, preaching his love as a weapon and all of that nonsense); he and his silly One God - the God of Love…blah blah blah. I was the Goddess of Love long before this One God ever showed up in Greece, and it was with the weakening of my powers that humanity became void of love. Not even the supposedly great One God could fix it. With the restoration of my Godhood, love returned, but I took a backseat to this One God though I was clearly necessary. A necessary evil, I guess because I was an old God, and that…apparently…made me evil. I lost my worshippers, and there were no more temples to the beautiful Aphrodite, but that didn't seem to make the One God happy.

We knew of loss, we did! The loss of our immortality, the loss of who we were. We were the Olympians, and we always had been, since the fall of the Titans. We were losing our identity and ultimately, all of us, except Ares and myself, lost their lives entirely. So how could we know nothing of loss?

Where does the soul of a dead God go anyway? In two millennia I haven't managed to run into any of my brother's or sisters of Mount Olympus in my travels. I doubt they went to the Heaven of the One God, who clearly hated us. Ares was around, so I heard, but I never saw him, and I gave up looking.

Our time was over though, and I knew that. Athena and the others brought the Twilight upon themselves. Had they just left Eve alone, they could have lived on forever, so long as they minded their own business. That is if the God of Love would have let us do that. I'll wait for the day that the One God falls. Nothing is permanent…not the Titans, the Olympians, or anyone, but everyone always thinks they are the one that is going to be around forever. One day the One God will die just as everyone else. On some level, I wished to regain my power…my real power…so that people would know my name again, and bring silly little sacrifices and gifts to me.

I'd grown a little bitter, I suppose. Not from regret. I could have killed Eve, and Xena would have lost her power to kill Gods, and I could have fought alongside the others, but I did neither. No point in the latter, at least no point as long as Eve was alive. I turned my back on my fellow immortals when I chose to let her live when she was within my grasp and completely helpless. I couldn't do it. But why couldn't I do it?

Love. I was the Goddess of Love. I suppose Eli's preaching about using love to defeat the Gods was true. Love defeated us in the end. But the Olympians knew nothing of love, so he said. We all did though – the love of power, the love of war, the love of ourselves. I don't suppose that was the right kind of love though. The love that killed us was that obnoxious, meaningful, selfless love.

I didn't know anything about that love. I was more or less the Goddess of Sex and shallow, physical pleasures. I'd never been in love, and I'd never loved anyone except myself. Yet, I was the Goddess of Love. My title was rather non-descriptive, but it did, in fact, encompass all love, I guess. It was love that killed the Olympians. Or rather, Love, as in me…Aphrodite, and my idiotic love. What a lame time for me to realize I did love someone, and I was also in love with that someone. I loved them enough to turn my back on…everything.

But did I regret it?

No.

Here I was now, thousands of years later, the bitter Goddess of Love, who somehow didn't regret the decision she made that caused all of this. It didn't make sense. But - in the name of Zeus - when does love ever make any sense!

I had my immortality though…my endless beauty; no wrinkles, sagging, or any of that nastiness. No gray hair, no arthritis. What good is all that when no one really loves you?