The Choice: Chapter 1: The Journey
A Xena: Warrior Princess fanfiction
Aniah
mailto:AniaHope@aol.com
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I am SO SORRY everyone for my long writer's block. Er…it's still going on, but I'm hoping that if I get down to work it might…go away? One can only hope!
This story be also known as: THE XENA EUBONICS INTEGRATION. Heehee. I like bluntness.JJJJ
Disclaimers: I don't own anything but the plotline and my own thoughts. The rest belongs to…The Execs who made Xena and then killed it.
* * Xena's POV * *
One would think that Joxer could learn how to scramble a simple egg…I got astride Argo II. Virgil, Joxer, Gabrielle, and a subdued EVE-not-LIVIA all followed me into the semi-abandoned village. Most of the people were at the waterfront, being blessed and cleansed against their past sins. Eve clung to me, her hair ratty, and tunic and leggings dirty. The kindly old shaman, a Priest of Eli, gently led my daughter into the clam waters. "with this abolution of Poseidon's blessed water, I pronounce you Free of all Sins and Corruption," she hugged him, and tears were falling down both her, my, and Gabrielle's cheeks.
I put my arm around Eve, and led her back up the steep bank. "Let's get some decent clothes, all right?" I asked her. She put her head on my shoulder like she was only eight years old, and we rode back to Joxer's village and the inn he ran with Meg.
My double came out and greeted her husband and son with a happy kiss and hug. "Who's this?" I introduced her to my daughter. "She looks like a friggin' train wreck," Meg commented with her usual bluntness.
"What's a train wreck?" Gabrielle wondered. I was just thinking the same thing as the hostler took Argo and we went inside.
* * Ares * *
"What did you say?" the God of War took a sip of barley beer. A minor warlord was trembling below his dais, hat off, in one of Ares' temples between Athens and Amphipolis.
"I…I…My-men-and-I-didn't-get-there-in-time…" he rushed, falling to his knees. "Please, Great God of Bloodshed and Brains, don't hurt me!!" Ares rolled his eyes, wishing he were somewhere else.
"Zeus-Poseidon-Hades," he swore under his breath, "go away. You bother me." He waved a hand and the unfortunate warlord got a fiery boot out of the temple. "Let's see where my paramour is now, shall we?" Ares asked himself, snapping his fingers. A shimmering vision solidified into a TV-like picture focusing on Xena, Gabrielle, and Livia sitting at one of the tables in Meg's tavern. "So now they're both on the side of peace and justice?" he was dubious that it would last long. "Well, I've fulfilled my side of the bargain, Xena, it's time you started on yours." Ares sat up, and in a purple mist, vanished.
* * Xena * *
"…And then, when I was ten, I saved a baby from a runaway herd of cattle!" Virgil paused in the tale of his childhood, with proud Meg and Joxer looking on. He has Joxer's ego, Meg's half-wit cunning, and some type of courage I can't figure out where he got it from. Wrenching myself from Meg, Joxer, and Virgil's presence, I dragged Gabrielle away from a pair of men from Gaul and Livia from a Hestian Virginal Priestess who was on her way to the nearest temple. We climbed the stairs to adjoining rooms. Gabrielle went into the smaller one. I tried to coax EVE-not-LIVIA onto the bed beside me, but she refused graciously and instead curled up on a pallet, tight as a kitten.
I sat up for half an hour, reading an old scroll of Gabrielle's, from our travels in Chin, when a purplish mist I knew too well fortold of Ares' arrival. "Dammit, cantcha just leave us alone for a night?" I demanded, setting the scroll aside and turning away from where the God of War appeared, on the other side of the bed.
"Awww, Xena, I thought you liked me. Well, in any case, you're stuck with me. Of course, if you'd rather my sister Athena killed Eve in a fit of terror, well, that's your call, isn't it?" He bared his teeth. "By the way, Aphrodite says hi, and that we make a perfect couple!" I swatted Ares with the cushion I had been reclining against.
"You S.O.B. Just stop rubbing it in, all right? I'm yours, we've comprehended that. Get over it," I stood up, preparing to go somewhere where I could sleep without the presence of a divinity.
"Xena, where ya going? Xena? Oooh…that bitch is going to GET IT." Fists clenched, I stormed downstairs as Ares teleported away. I grabbed my sword and a rag and started to polish it furiously. Bleary-eyed, Gabrielle thumped down the rickety stairs.
"I thought I heard the sound of divinity fuming," she yawned, and grabbed the kettle from behind Meg's counter.
"Yeah, well, screw him. Just because I'm probably carrying his kid doesn't mean I'm going to be his live-in. We can stay on the road till my seventh month, at least."
"How do you know you're pregnant, Xena?" Gabrielle wondered.
"I just know." the side-kick left it at that. "Livia's asleep?" she nodded. "Fine, then. I guess I'll try again to get some sleep, as well. Night," the pissed-off Warrior Princess stretched, and stomped up the stairs.
I'd hate to be in her combat boots, Gabrielle thought sullenly. Hey, wait, what ARE combat boots?
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Thus, not long, but I thought it was funny! email me! AniaHope@aol.com ja ne!
