Apollo: Searching for clues.
In truth, Apollo has no idea where he should start to look for clues for Ares' whereabouts. It has been 13 months since then, and everyone might have already forgotten by then. The only reason he hadn't trying to interrogate others about Ares until today is that he thought that nobody cares about Ares' disappearance. Like there is nothing changed whether he disappears or not. But ever since Hermes came and asked for his help, he finally had a reason to ask around again.
Despite he is not so close to Ares and doesn't care whether he disappeared or not, Apollo is a God of knowledge and he would hate himself if he didn't try to solve his disappearance. But he also doesn't want to solve something that nobody cares about. That is why Hermes is the push he needs to continue to figure out Ares' disappearance.
"Maybe I should ask Zeus and Hera? As his parents they should want to help me, right? ...But then again, they are pretty emotional and might react badly if I remind them of Ares' disappearance. Then maybe I should ask Hebe and or Eileithyia first." And therefore, he starts his search by looking for them.
He finds them playing near the pond in the middle of Olympus. He walks toward them while waving his hand. "Hi, there. What are you guys up to?"
Hebe jumps repeatedly with a big smile on her face. "We are feeding the fishes! Look at how adorable they are!"
Apollo tilted his head a bit to look into the pond. "Yup, you are right." Without any hesitation, he immediately asks them about Ares.
"Anyway, I'm here to ask you about-"
"Wait," says Eileithyia cuts him off. "Hebe, listen up. I need to have a private conversation with Apollo right now. Can you wait here while I talk with him?" Although Hebe is sad when hearing that, she slowly nods her head. "Thank you, Hebe. Now follow me, Apollo".
She leads him to her room. "Alright. Here should be okay. So, what are you going to ask previously?"
Again, without hesitation, he immediately tells her his reason to meet her, "I want to ask you about Ares".
Eileithyia immediately takes a deep breath of relief. "I knew it. Thankfully I manage to stop you before you can say anything. Hebe will cry if she hears anything about Ares. She loves him so much and hopes he will come back until today. To make her stop crying, I asked her to feed the fish with me. It has been our daily routine since Ares' disappearance. You almost ruin that for her. Your blunt honesty can be very dangerous, you know…"
Apollo feels quite bad about the whole situation. He knows that being too honest cannot always end well. But he cannot lie. As a God of Truth, he HAS to always tell the truth, no matter how hurtful it could be to the one hearing. "I'm sorry about that. I really do. Thank you for stopping me back there".
"You are welcome. So, why are you asking about Ares all of the sudden?"
"Hermes asked me to help him find Ares. So that's exactly what I am trying to do."
She looked at him confused. "But it has been 13 months since then. There might be no clues left to find him!"
"I know that. That's why I hope talking to other Gods and gaining more information on what happened when he disappeared might trigger my prophecy power. So, first off. I might want to ask about Ares with Hera and Zeus. What is your opinion on that?"
The moment she hears his question, she almost reflectively slaps him in the face. But she holds herself back. "DON'T. Just like Hebe, they are still grieving. Especially mom. They are trying to move on right now. They truly think that Ares will never return."
Apollo takes a very deep sigh of relief. "Thank God I went to meet you first. I don't want to face their outburst". He suddenly wondered about Eileithyia's reaction to all of this. "So how about you? How did you react to Ares's disappearance?"
As soon as the question hit her, sadness immediately hit her. "I'm sad, of course. I'm both Hebe and Ares' big sister after all. I have been taking care of them ever since they were born. You can argue I'm so good at helping my mother and taking care of my siblings that I eventually become a Goddess of Childbirth. We three are close, so I am sad when all of you can't find him until today. But if everyone is sad, no work will be done. So, I try to keep my composure and help my family to cope".
"So you are the one become the rational adult here," said Apollo with a disappointed tone. She is still young, and yet she pulls the weight for others.
"I won't deny that. But even Gods can feel sad and upset. That's why I can't just tell them to stop crying. Let's stop talking about this. It won't help with the investigation, right? Let's continue with the interrogation."
"Alright, tell me the version of what happened on the day Ares was being kidnapped". She racks through her memory trying to remember everything that happens that day.
"I think I remembered he went to training outside Olympus. But I think he just wanted to avoid mom and dad. I remembered they were fighting over father cheating with another woman again. Ares looked extremely upset with the fight and used training as an excuse to leave Olympus". She is visibly saddened by the memory. "I wish I stopped him from leaving..."
"You can't change the past. We can only try to find him now. Is there anything else you can share with me? Maybe like who did he meet before he leaves?"
"Well, he did tell me he would be leaving for training. And I think I saw Athena talked to him too".
"Ah, of course. Where there is Ares, there will be Athena. Do you know what they are doing?"
"No, but I think they simply converse normally. No tension whatsoever".
"I see. I will meet Athena after this then. She must have known more on what happened that day."
Eileithyia takes Apollo's hand and puts it on her chest. "I pray that you are successful with your mission, Apollo."
Apollo nods back with an assuring look before going to meet Athena.
Apollo sets his track toward the library. Athena has always been either training or reading in the library. But mostly reading. Despite helping in many wars, her true passion is reading and absorbing as much knowledge as possible, even if she will never reach the amount of knowledge Apollo has. But also unlike Apollo, she tried to consume as much knowledge as possible in hope that the knowledge she learns can be applicable in real life and help people. Apollo might know everything and anything, but he usually doesn't want to help unless they ask his help or many people care about the issues. Apollo always amends her for her unlimited dedication.
He reached the library and peeked inside. Sure enough. She is in there, reading countless books. Apollo tries to get her attention.
"Hello, Athena. Can we talk?"
She tries to ignore him, but she eventually realizes that Apollo isn't planning to leave her alone, and puts down her book.
"What do you want?" asks her, clearly annoyed that Apollo disturbs her reading session.
"I need help with finding Ares."
Athena's eyes widen when she hears that name. She hasn't heard that name in months. Her expression doesn't change much and her tone is still serious, and yet Apollo can sense a gentleness in her words. "...Well. I'm amazed that someone still looks for him after all these months. Who is looking for him?"
"You can tell I wasn't doing this on my accord, huh? Hermes did."
"Of course it was him… They were pretty close before this whole incident." She changes her sitting direction so she could face Apollo directly. "So what do you want to know?"
"Anything, really. As long it can trigger my prophecy power."
She looks at Apollo in disbelief. "I think I understand why Hermes comes to you first, since we are not getting along well. But you are really bad at this, huh?"
Apollo is very offended that Athena is questioning his skill. "And what in the world do you mean by that?"
"I still didn't know who did it and where Ares is, but I have laid down the most possible scenario that happens that day based on the existing evidence".
Now Apollo is looking at Athena like she is crazy. "That's not possible! There were only the avalanche and the traces of blood below it! There is no way you can make any good conclusion out of that!"
"Trust me, that is quite enough. At least enough for me to deduct the possible scenario of Ares' kidnapping". She looked very confident with her deduction.
Apollo is quite annoyed with the fact that Athena very confidently claims she knew what happens with such a lack of evidence. "Well, if you are so smart, why didn't you tell me what happened that day, huh?"
"Whoever kidnapped Ares has an agenda with Olympus. They probably wanted to attack Olympus, as per usual. But for whatever reason, they canceled the mission and kidnapped Ares instead."
"What if they did come to kidnap Ares?"
"Ares is the most hated God in Greece, except for a few places like Thrace. Do you think it would benefit them at all to kidnap him? Also, Ares is maybe dumb and bad at fighting, but his raw power is not to be underestimated. If they wanted to kidnap Ares, facing him head-on is a dumb idea. So the kidnapping was not their main agenda. I think they just want to attack Olympus. To be fair, that might be an even dumber idea. But at least there is something to be gain if they attacked Olympus, but definitely not kidnapping Ares"
He wants to disagree with her, but he is not allowed to say anything else but the truth. "I don't want to say this, but all of that does make perfect sense. I can't understand how you can come to such a plausible theory."
"It's because you are too focused on pure facts. You didn't want to make assumptions or theories on something you don't know about. I understand you are a God of Knowledge and Truth, but some truth can only be decided after creating some hypothesis and thinking of all of the possibilities".
"Sorry, I don't care about all of that. You definitely make a correct assumption about me". Apollo never likes to be lectured, surely like most Gods in Greece. But he never minds if Athena lectures him. She is one of the few gods who can match his brain capabilities.
"Alright, let's continue discussing the scenario I had in mind. We already knew that the avalanche happened, but we never talked about why Ares is under it."
"That is a stupid question. Of course, he was there because he was standing around the area where the avalanche is! Duh!"
Athena is unmoved by Apollo's insulting remark. She has a feeling that Apollo would agree with her in the end. "You are correct, but WHY did Ares standing there? Wasn't he just training in a completely different place quite far from there? Why would he go there?"
Apollo is hit with the revelation. He doesn't want Athena to be correct, but he has to always tell the truth no matter what. "Because he heard the kidnapper coming to attack Olympus…"
She adorns her face with a victorious smile. "If he can hear and or feel them from afar, we can conclude that the kidnapper is a titan. Only they would be big enough to shake the ground so greatly that Ares can sense it from his training ground. Continue on. So I believe Ares saw the kidnapper. Whether he chose to report to Olympus or attacking them directly, it didn't matter. The avalanche happened and he got badly injured because of it. The kidnapper saw him and panicked. They then attacked Ares."
"Weren't Ares injured by the avalanche? They could easily kill him, didn't they?"
"I believe they wanted to lure us to their place and planned to attack us if we tried to save him. If this is true, it would be a smart move on their part. But those idiots didn't think to leave a letter that could lead us to find Ares. Do they think just because we are Gods, it means we know where everyone is?"
"To be fair, if I am a human, I would exactly think like that".
Athena just stares at Apollo, doesn't know how to explain her feelings on that statement. "I'm just stating a point… Of course, I know humans wouldn't know our limitations since we are stronger than them…"
"So in conclusion, the kidnapper is Titan that was planning to infiltrate Olympus but Ares figured it out and thwarted their plan. And they kidnapped him so they could lure us in but failed to inform us where they are. Am I correct?"
"Yes, exactly. Stupid Ares… Got injured by an avalanche and got kidnapped because of it...How clumsy could he be…?" Despite the wording she used, she is certainly sad and worried about Ares.
"There is something I still don't get, though. If you already know all of this… Why didn't you actively look for him?"
"As I told you, in the end, everything I mention here is just a speculation, but specifically on the kidnapper identity. But the problem is, what we know about the kidnapper is just too general. Almost all titans are bad and want to destroy Olympus. Unlike us, Titans live all over Greece. Even Hermes, with his inhuman speed, is still incapable of checking all part of Greece."
Apollo hates that Athena gives him hope and then immediately dash it away again. "So what is the point of all of that? It doesn't help me with finding where Ares at all!"
"I already told you from the start that I didn't know about the specific… You are putting too much hope on me." She takes a deep sigh. She attempted to calm herself and get rid of the disappointment she put upon herself. "Despite the lack of specificity, that doesn't mean we gain nothing out of it. If my theory is true, there is one way we can figure out the kidnapper and find Ares' whereabouts."
With that kind of assurance, Apollo has no excuse to not listen to her hypothesis. "Which is?"
"Before that, I need to elaborate on more things first…".
Apollo sighed in annoyance that Athena just can't get to the point. But Apollo also knew she would never do it if it's not important. "Okay, I'm listening".
Athena slightly cracked a smile before continuing. "There is some hole in my theories. They indeed kidnap Ares so it would lead us to their lair. But why would they come to that conclusion? As you said, they could easily just kill Ares or gravely injured him before continuing their climb. There is no reason for them to change their plan just because they have an injured eyewitness."
"That is true. Let me try this. If they have the upperhand against injured Ares, why didn't they just continue the climb? Why did they cancel their mission and bring Ares with them? I can see it now. It's because they also have a casualty on their side. Whether it's because Ares or the avalanche or something else entirely, the kidnapper got hurt and had to retreat."
Athena shows her smile once more, this time bigger than the last. Her smile is like a teacher that is very proud of her student. "That is exactly correct. The kidnapper retreated so he could heal up his injuries. It would be suicidal if he continued on his climb after all. So I am going to place my bet that as soon as they healed up, they will return to this mountain to continue their plan."
"Which means… We can capture them and interrogate them on where Ares is!" As soon as he says that, his eyes see nothing but white. His foresight ability has been activated. He will soon see visions hopefully related to Ares. In his visions, he sees two giants hunting for animals, and then he also sees Artemis in his vision for some reason. Does she somehow have a connection to them? He slowly regains his vision back. Athena calmly watches over Apollo, since she is used to seeing Apollo getting vision randomly.
"Welcome back, Apollo. What did you see?"
"I… I see them! I see the titans that kidnapped Ares! There are two of them! I think they are hunting at the moment… But I also saw Artemis in my vision…?" He immediately stands up and runs toward the door.
"Where are you going, Apollo?"
"I have to go meet Artemis! I have some information I have to gain from her! Go find Hermes and tell him we would have a meeting soon!"
"Wait, you know we don't get along, right-" But Apollo already left the room before she could finish her words. She can only sigh in annoyance. Calm down, Athena. You only need to meet up with Hermes and bring him here for the meeting. Just do it quickly and everything is going to be fine…
A/N:
Finally, I'm back. I don't know why I have such a hard time writing this sometimes. I hope this chapter is not too long for you and has good enough pacing. I might update it if I find some part of it not good enough or if maybe there is some scene that I could cut out to make it have better pacing. But for now, I think this is good enough. I don't want to delay it longer than it should have.
But yeah, I have a different idea on how the Greece God acts and behaves, I hope you guys have no problem with how I make Apollo and Athena.
With that said and done, I hope you like this story!
