Disclaimer: I don't own PJO/HOO. Sorry I was gone so long, guys. My computer broke at the same as I was admitted to hospital with pneumonia. Crappy way to start the year. Hopefully the rest will be better. Enjoy the chapter and thanks to everyone who's reviewed, kudosed, faved, etc it!
"This is the Propylon," Frank announced as he waved towards a stone path lined with crumbling columns. "One of the main gates into the Olympic valley."
"Rubble!" Leo declared, ignoring how Lena rolled her eyes at him exasperatedly.
Frank continued to read the pamphlet he had picked up without acknowledging the younger boy. "And over there –" He pointed to a square foundation that looked like a patio – "is the Temple of Hera, one of the oldest structures here."
"More rubble!" Leo said.
"And that round bandstand-looking thing – that's the Philipeon, dedicated to Philip of Macedonia."
"Even more rubble! First-rate rubble!"
"Honestly, Leo," Lena sighed. "Haven't you got any respect at all for our history and culture?"
"Of course!" Leo exclaimed. "I have tons of respect for crumbling old rocks."
She rolled her eyes and shook her head in resignation, though a tiny smile played on the edge of her lips for a moment before she turned serious again.
Happily oblivious to them, Frank continued his guided tour. "And over there … oh." He glanced at the others. "Uhm, that semi-circular depression in the hill, with the niches … that's a nymphaeum, built in Roman times."
They all paled, remembering their near-death experience in the nymphaeum back in Rome with Luke and Thalia.
"Here's an idea," Lena said darkly. "Let's not go there."
"I love that idea," Leo agreed.
They kept walking, Frank still giving his miniature tour.
"This is the Pelopion," he explained, pointing to another set of ruins.
"Come on, Zhang," Leo scoffed, fidgeting with his toolbelt absentmindedly. "Pelopion isn't even a real word. What was it – a sacred spot for plopping?"
"Leo!" Lena snapped.
Frank looked offended. "It's the burial site of Pelops. This whole part of Greece, the Peloponnese, was named after him."
"I suppose I should know who Pelops was?"
"He was a prince, won his wife in a chariot race. Supposedly he started the Olympic games in honour of that."
Hazel sniffed. "How romantic. 'What a nice wife you have, Prince Pelops.' 'Thanks. I won her in a chariot race.'"
Eventually, they came to a stop at some wide steps leading to another ruined building – the Temple of Zeus, according to Frank.
"There used to be a huge gold-and-ivory statue of Zeus inside," Frank told them.
Lena nodded in agreement. "It was one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. Made by the same person who created the Athena Parthenos."
"Please tell me we don't have to find it," Leo winced. "I've had enough huge magic statues for one trip."
"Agreed."
"Hey, Lena," he said abruptly a moment later, his eyes widening in worry and making the others tense up. "remember that statue of Nike in the museum? The one that was all in pieces?"
"Yeah?" she frowned. "What about it?"
"Didn't it used to stand here, at the Temple of Zeus?" Leo asked anxiously. "Feel free to tell me I'm wrong. I'd love to be wrong."
Looking grim, Lena began fidgeting with her sword/bracelet. "You're right," she confirmed. "So, if Nike was anywhere … this would definitely be a good spot."
Frank scanned their surroundings. "I don't see anything."
"What if we promoted, like, Adidas shoes?" Leo wondered. "Would that make Nike mad enough to show up?"
Lena gave a sharp, mildly panicked laugh. "Oh, yeah, I bet that would totally be against her sponsorship deal," she sniggered sarcastically. "Those are not the official shoes of the Olympics! Nike wearers are losers, Adidas wearers are winners!"
Hazel rolled her eyes. "You're both impossible."
Behind them, a thunderous voice shook the ruins: "YOU WILL DIE NOW!"
They jumped and spun around, Lena cursing her stupidity under her breath as she did so.
Towering over them in a golden chariot, with a spear aimed at Lena's heart, was the goddess Nike.
Summoning and then raising her sword, Lena scanned Nike, her mind slipping into battle-mode as she automatically began to search for weaknesses.
Like all goddesses, Nike was beautiful, and rather tall. She was wearing a glittering sleeveless dress, with her dark hair in piled-up braids circled with a gilded laurel wreath. Her expression was wide-eyed and a little crazy, like she had just drunk twenty espressos and then proceeded to ride a roller coaster. She was wielding a long spear, tipped with gold that Lena suspected to be Imperial Gold, and she had a set of wings that matched. They glittered so brightly that Leo leaned over to mutter in Lena's ear that "if those things were solar panels, they'd produce enough energy to power Miami."
Lena gave a slight nod, but continued to survey of the goddess of victory. She was riding a golden chariot pulled by two white horses that reared and nickered. War horses.
"Lady," Leo was the first of the group of demigods to speak up. "Could you fold your flappers, please? You're giving me a sunburn."
"What?" Nike's head jerked towards him like a startled chicken. "Oh … my brilliant plumage," she realized. "Very well. I suppose that you can't die in glory if you are blinded and burned."
She tucked in her wings. The temperature dropped to a normal hundred-and-twenty-degree summer afternoon, making Lena sigh in relief. She blinked quickly, getting rid of the spots that had been dancing in front of her eyes.
Frank cleared his throat. "Are you Nike or Victoria?" he asked tentatively. It was a bad idea.
"Argghh!" The goddess clutched the side of her head. Her horses reared again, causing Arion to do the same and forcing Hazel to lean forward and grab hold of his neck to avoid falling off her steed.
The goddess shuddered and then split into two separate images.
On the left was the first version, the one who had threatened to kill them for Lena promoting Adidas shoes over Nikes: a glittery sleeveless dress, dark hair circled with laurels, her golden wings folded neatly behind her.
On the right was a different version, dressed for war in a Roman breastplate made of gleaming Imperial Gold and greaves. In contrast to her other self, she had short auburn hair that peeked out from the rim of a tall helmet. Her wings were white, and made of feathers. Her short toga-styled dress was purple, and the shaft of her spear was fixed with a plate-sized Roman insignia – a golden SPQR in a laurel wreath.
"I am Nike!" cried the image on the left.
"I am Victoria!" cried the one on the right.
Watching her speak gave Lena a headache. The goddess was literally saying two different things at once. She kept shuddering and splitting in two, making Lena feel dizzy and nauseous. Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted Leo patting his toolbelt and eyeing the goddess like she was a broken car and he was contemplating how to fix her engine.
"I am the decider of victory!" Nike screamed. "Once I stood here at the corner of Zeus's temple, venerated by all! I oversaw the games of Olympia. Offerings from every city-state were piled at my feet!"
"Games are irrelevant!" yelled Victoria. "I am the goddess of success in battle! Roman generals worshipped me! Augustus himself erected my altar in the Senate House!"
"Ahhhh!" both voices screamed in agony. "We must decide! We must have victory!"
Arion bucked so violently that Hazel had to slide off his back to avoid getting thrown. Before she could calm him down, the horse disappeared, leaving a vapour trail through the ruins.
The half-bloods exchanged worried looks. Dealing with an unstable goddess was not something that any of them felt good about.
"Nike,' Hazel said in a soothing tone, as she stepped forward slowly. "you're confused. Gaia has poisoned your mind to make your two aspects fight against each other."
"I know that!" The goddess shook her spear, the tip rubber-banding into two points. "I cannot abide unresolved conflict! Who is stronger? Who is the winner?"
"Lady, nobody's the winner," Leo pointed out. "The Greeks and Romans aren't at war with each other. We have an alliance."
"No winner?" Nike looked stunned, as if he had just said that the sky was green, not blue. She ignored the second part of his statement with the expertise of an immortal.
"There is always a winner! One winner. Everyone else is a loser! Otherwise victory is meaningless. I suppose you want me to give certificates to all the contestants? Little plastic trophies to every single athlete or soldier for participation? Should we all line up and shake hands and tell each other, Good game? No! Victory must be real. It must be earned. That means it must be rare and difficult, against steep odds, and defeat must be the other possibility."
The goddess' two horses nipped at each other, as if getting into the spirit.
"That's very true," Lena tried to appease the goddess. "Nothing's worth it if you don't earn it. But the two camps aren't fighting one another, we're fighting Gaia. Why-"
"Until the Parthenos is restored, there is no victor!" Victoria declared. "There must be a victor, Mother Gaia has ordered it!"
"But Nike, you were Zeus's charioteer in the last war with the giants, weren't you?" Hazel argued.
"Of course!"
"Then you know that Gaia is the real enemy. We need your help to defeat her. The war isn't between the Greeks and Romans. We're in alliance against her."
It was no use. The goddess was fixated on either the Greeks or Romans winning, and she would not be gainsaid.
"The Greeks must perish!" Victoria roared.
"Victory or death!" Nike wailed. "One side must prevail! That is the only way for there to be peace!"
They all exchanged helpless looks. Lena had learned from her dreams that the goddess of victory had been suffering from mental assaults by Gaia, making her two aspects war against each other. They had hoped to reason with her, and deliberately balanced their choice of representatives to avoid her aura turning them against each other. Clearly, however, neither Nike nor Victoria was willing to be reasoned with. So what were they going to do instead? Somehow, fighting the goddess of victory seemed like a really bad idea.
The goddess brandished her spear. "You will determine the matter once and for all! Today, now, you will decide the victor! Four of you? Excellent! We will have teams. Perhaps girls versus boys!"
"Uh … no." Hazel gave an uneasy smile, despite the fact that she and Lena would probably be the winners in that scenario. Leo was no fighter, and Frank was more long-range than anything else.
"Shirts versus skins!"
"Definitely not," Hazel refused, eyes widening with the horror that came from being a girl raised in the 40s.
"Greeks versus Romans!" Nike cried. "Yes, of course! Two and two. The last demigod standing wins. The others will die gloriously."
A competitive urge pulsed through Lena's body. It took all of her will power not to grab her sword and attack Hazel and Frank. She could see that the others were being affected the same way. Thankfully, they all managed to hold themselves back. No doubt if any of them were there with people whose parents had feuds, however, it wouldn't have been so successful.
"Look, lady, we're not going to go all Hunger Games on each other," Leo insisted stubbornly. "Isn't going to happen."
"But you will win a fabulous honour!" Nike protested as she reached into a basket at her side and produced a wreath of thick green laurels. "This crown of leaves could be yours! You can wear it on your head! Think of the glory!"
"Leo's right," Frank said, though his eyes were fixed on the wreath. His expression was a little too greedy for the other's tastes. "We don't fight each other. We fight the giants. You should help us."
"Very well!" The goddess raised the laurel wreath in one hand and her spear in the other.
Lena blinked in surprise before she and Leo exchanged looks. "Uh … does that mean you'll join us?" she asked warily. "You'll help us fight the giants?"
"That will be part of the prize," Nike confirmed. "Whoever wins, I will consider you an ally. We will fight the giants together, and I will bestow victory upon you. But there can only be one winner. The others must be defeated, killed, destroyed utterly. So what will it be, demigods? Will you succeed in your quest, or will you cling to your namby-pamby ideas of friendship and everybody wins participation awards?"
"And if we refuse?" Lena lifted her chin defiantly, eyes flashing rebelliously.
"Ha!" Nike's eyes gleamed maniacally. "If you refuse to fight each other, you shall be persuaded!" She spread her golden wings.
Four metal feathers fluttered down, two on either side of the chariot. The feathers twirled like gymnasts, growing larger, sprouting arms and legs, until they touched the ground as four metallic, human-sized replicas of the goddess, each armed with a golden spear and a Celestial bronze laurel wreath that looked suspiciously like a barbed-wire Frisbee.
"To the stadium!" the goddess ordered. You have five minutes to prepare. Then blood shall be spilled!"
Leo opened his mouth to speak, but was cut off before he could begin.
"Run!" Nike bellowed. "To the stadium with you, or my Nikai will kill you where you stand!"
The metal ladies unhinged their jaws and blasted out a sound like a Super Bowl crowd mixed with feedback. They shook their spears and charged the demigods. Self-preservation kicked in, and the group turned and fled, Lena's braid streaming out behind her like a banner.