"Kumar, I swear to God, if you don't shut the fuck up right now I'm coming over these seats and breaking your teeth." Antonia snapped.
"Gods, Ms. Neuman. Seems a bit odd to reference the Christian one for those of our ilk." Chen said.
"Kedves, if you don't shut the fuck up, you're next."
"All I'm saying Antonia is that from an objective standpoint, Mars is a more useful incarnation of war than Ares. Mars has objective, organization. Ares simply seeks bloodbath," Aristidis taunted from the front seat.
"This car is gonna be a bloodbath if you keep speaking."
Aristidis grinned. "Inherited some of Father's anger I see. Shame he had to have you as Ares. I would have been proud to call you my sister."
"You fuckin' asked for it, Kumar!" Antonia screeched, clambering into the second row of seats.
The cries of stepped-on demigods filled the minivan as it lurched to a sudden halt. Svetlana Cattaneo, child of Mercury and designated leader-cum-babysitter of the ragtag group behind her, turned around.
"This ends now," she growled out, her Serbian accent bleeding through. "The Senate sent us to accomplish a mission, and I will not fail because you lot couldn't save the rivalries for the war games.
"Greeks," the three Grecian demigods snapped to attention. "This is a Roman-led quest. We follow your traditions when it is your turn, and I expect you to follow ours. That means order, that means discipline, and it especially means following the fucking rules."
Hearing a snicker from the son of Mars next to her, Svetlana whipped her head around.
"Don't think you lot are scot-free either. Need I remind any of you who the centurion here is? Where is the discipline we are so proud of? Do I need to inform the Praetors about this? Or her?"
The Romans of the group went white with fear. Although the Greeks weren't confident on whom she was referring to, they had a general idea. They too paled. Give them Tartarus over the wrath of her any day of the week. Coincidentally, they had. The questing party exited the minivan, stepping into Italian sunlight. It would be the last they would see of it for a while.
"Kedves, for the love of the gods can you walk faster? I'm not getting any younger, and I'm certainly not getting any prettier waiting for your dumb ass to keep up." Antonia grumbled.
"Leave me alone," Chen stuttered out. "You know how children of Athena are with spiders, and this place is crawling with them. Can't one of you do something about this? Aelianus?"
"Not if you want this tunnel below 1500 Celsius." the hulking son of Vulcan said.
"Before you ask, I can't help you. I'm here to help with the Mist. If you wanted a battle mage, you should have picked someone else." Kassandra said, her voice seeming to come from every side of the listener.
"How the fuck does she do that?" Aristidis muttered. "Creepy ass Hecate-spawn."
"I'm sorry Mr. Kumar, I thought I heard you asking for me to remove the mist from your weaponry the next time we're in public. But no one could be crazy enough to ask for that, right? That's almost as dumb as insulting a child of Hecate, and I know nobody in this group is stupid enough to do that."
Aristidis gave a nervous laugh. "Oh come on Kass, you know I was only joking. How could I possibly insult someone as stunning as you?"
Kassandra rolled her eyes. "Shut up and keep moving, dumbass."
"Sorry to interrupt your date, but this doesn't seem to have solved my spider crisis." Chen called from the back of the group.
"Aw, poor Chen. Just stick with me champ, I'll protect you from the big bad spiders." Pero said, flashing a radiant smile that looked like it had been ripped straight off his father.
Despite his disgust, Chen moved closer to Pero.
"If you didn't shine like a fucking lamp, I wouldn't come within 10 feet of you." Chen muttered. "It's only 'cause it'll make it easier to see them approaching, that's all."
Pero laughed. "That's what they all say, and half of them end up swooning in my arms."
Chen recoiled. "Up yours, douchebag."
"Gladly."
"I'm not even going to comment on–"
"You all have three seconds to shut the fuck up," Svetlana said. "Or I swear on every god in existence that I will personally throw the next one who talks into Tartarus."
Chen's upcoming words of retort were quickly silenced by a chorus of shaking heads from the Roman demigods. They all knew too well how horrifying the daughter of Mercury's wrath could be, and they only partially doubted her claim about tossing one of them into Tartarus. None too surprisingly, the next hour of exploration was dead silent save for the yelps of the arachnophobe of the group at the sight of a curious insect. Not even Chen's voice, however, could remain active once the group arrived at their destination.
Although they had all heard stories about it from the members of the Argo II, no words could do the pressure that Tartarus gave off justice. It was a feeling of rejection so extreme, a force so anathema to their very being, that every fibre of their being screamed for them to run away as far and as quickly as they could.
"You sure this is the place?" Chen muttered. "It wasn't the other cave half a mile back? You know, the safe one?"
The gaping maw of Tartarus where the Parthenos had once stood answered his question for him. Trying to stay confident, Pero walked over to Svetlana. "So why are we here again?" he asked.
Svetlana was grim. "A couple days ago, every oracle on the planet started raving about the same thing. Something," her voice quivered at the word. "Is going to come out of that. And whatever it is, the gods want to know. Our job is to report and observe."
"This seems like a suicide mission." Kassandra said.
Svetlana waved her hand in what was supposed to be a reassuring gesture "No, the gods would never send us to just get killed. If whatever it is was truly dangerous, they would have come themselves."
The group wasn't so sure of that. She wasn't so sure of it herself. The subsequent awkward silence was broken by simultaneous grunts from the children of War.
Aristidis turned to Antonia. "You feel it too?" He asked, all traces of his previous mirth gone.
Antonia nodded, her face pale.
"Feel what, exactly?" Chen asked.
Antonia spoke. "As children of the god of war, we have a particular feel for certain emotions, auras almost. Killing intent, bloodlust, rage, hatred, those aren't just words to us. They are very real feelings. Certain people and places, like mass graves or battlefields, give us particular strong feelings."
Aristidis took over. "Let me put it this way. I once visited St. Petersburg on a quest, and we stopped and visited the site of the Siege of Leningrad. I was sick for two weeks after because of the aura coming off of that place. And whatever is coming out of that?" He jerked his thumb towards the gaping maw behind him. "Makes Leningrad feel like a fucking fistfight on a playground."
Chen paled. "Oh."
Aristidis whipped out his spiculum, a scutum materializing on his arm.
"Draw your weapons," he said. "We've got company."
No one could tell if the tremor in his voice was from the shaking of the cave, and no one cared to ask. It was easier to pretend that the difficulty in drawing their weapons was from the environment, that the constant shuffling was just to retain balance in the uncertain terrain.
"Pero, Kassandra, stay behind me. I might not be able to do much, but it's a hell of a lot safer back there." The fear had left his voice, the calming effect of a son of Mars washing over them. At any other point, they might have protested his manipulation of their emotions, but right now it was a welcome relief. "Chen, you work on contacting Olympus ASAP. Alianus and Antonia, I need you two out front with Svetlana. We just have to hold until Olympus is contacted. We can do this."
"The gods have abandoned us," Chen muttered, a mirthless grin taking root on his face.
His only response was the sound of cracking ground as a wall of legionnaires rose to form ranks with Aristidis. He had to admit, it was a comforting answer.
The beats of the ground ripping itself apart was only punctuated by the sounds of chunks of the cavern ceiling slamming into the ground, Poseidon and Hades locked in a desperate struggle for control of the earth. The ground around the mouth of Tartarus started to bulge as if a pustule, anxious to expel whatever was stuck within. And expel it did. With a blinding flash and a sound like the wails of thousands, a single figure was flung out of Tartarus, arcing to the ground below. The group gave a collective shudder. What could possibly be so horrid that not even Tartarus would accept it's existence?
The battle line slowly advanced towards the collapsed figure, praying to every divine existence that the young demigod in the back could make connection to Olympus. To their relief, the figure did not move even as they advanced. It's humanoid figure was the the only thing they could make out, the rest of it's features obscured beneath a mask of ash and grime. Tentatively, Svetlana held up a hand.
"We do not attack until we can make sure it's hostile," she said.
That drew immediate calls of protest from the rest of the group. "Quiet!" she snapped. "I am still in charge here, and we will not attack."
Taking the lead, she slowly approached the side of the figure, the tip of her trembling spatha moving to flip the figure over. To her surprise, she was greeted by the face of a human. Inquisitively, she moved to wipe some of the filth off of his face, before her hand froze as if touched by Khione herself.
"Guys!" An excited shout rang out from behind her. "I made contact! We got through! What should I tell them?"
Antonia crouched down to get a better look at the figure. "Son of a bitch," she breathed. "Isn't that–"