Disclaimer: I don't own PJO or HoO or Claymore…
Power is when you have every justification to kill someone, and then you don't. ~ Oskar Shindler
Third Person POV:
It had been a long time since Teresa had felt so utterly revolted at something.
The smell of burnt flesh wafted through the air, reaching her nostrils even through her failed attempts at stopping it. Even being a Claymore, as she was, this much carnage was not a familiar sight.
A whole city – a once-well-known metropolis – was on fire. The people were panicking, trying to find a way out; away from the hellish landscape behind them, and they were scrambling around, running as gunshots rang throughout the city. Even from all the way up here, on top of the wall, she could see the fear on the people's faces, as they were mercilessly murdered in the streets of their own town. And where she couldn't see it, the fear was evident through the voices of the damned, as they screamed their way into oblivion.
She should have been used to it – that smell of burning, charring flesh, and those screams of the dying. She'd heard enough and seen enough throughout her life to be shocked at such a scene, but she couldn't help it. There was something vastly different in knowing a monster was behind such carnage, and that the beast would be punished for the crimes with his life, and in knowing that she could do nothing but watch as humans – people – went and caused such destruction.
She was forced to stand there and guard the gate, preventing the townsfolk – the very same ones she was sworn to protect; the people she had taken an oath to not kill – from escaping the village; from getting away from this… from the pain, from the fire, from this raw carnage, and from what was sure to be certain death. The other 3 Claymores and she were stopping these innocent folks from getting to safety.
Under her breath, she muttered, "I don't like this."
From beside her, she heard Sophia and Noel murmur their agreement. It was incredible that they'd heard her in the first place – she'd not intended them to, but then again, it would've been hard not to hear her if they were trying to focus their ears on anything that wasn't a scream as hard as she was…
"Stop talking; we must follow our orders." There. There it came… Irene's standard response to anything and everything regarding the Organization.
'Must follow orders' – it was like she was completely incapable of saying anything else! If the Organization told her to do anything – anything at all, she would do it without question. Even if she knew it was wrong, she would do it for them, and follow instructions to a 'T'. That wasn't the most annoying part, however… after all, they existed solely to fulfill the Organization's needs. The most annoying part – or rather, the saddest – was that multiple times in the past, Teresa had seen uncertain looks flash over the girl's face whenever the two had been partnered up together and given a… questionable mission, but then, she'd also seen the way Irene would just calmly shake her head and stand up, ready for whatever mission was offered.
She was too professional about her work; professional to an unhealthy extent, and Teresa knew that from experience. Noel, apparently, did not. Clearly offended by Irene's words, she turned to face Irene as if to see if she was being serious, and upon finding some answer in Irene's face, she drew up the most exasperated expression Teresa had ever seen, before asking Irene what the fuck she meant by 'orders.' She had ever been the diplomatic one of the group…
Though, to be completely fair to the girl, Teresa would have been just as angry as she was… but she had just grown more used to dealing with Irene's bullshit than anyone else probably could. That didn't make Irene's dismissal of their situation any better though. Their orders were literally to stand and watch hundreds of men, women and children be slaughtered, and Irene was willing to follow blindly.
Killing fellow Claymores when they had broken laws – those were sound orders; she had no problem following them. Demanding payment from villages after helping them – well, it was morally gray, but still, she could accept it without asking questions… the money did go to helping the people in one way or another. Wiping out villages when they didn't pay – that was just- no, actually, that was also in the morally gray section, was it not? The Organization didn't personally wipe out the villages; they just let the Yoma in the area do their thing. It was selfish, sure, but without the money they were making from the villages, they wouldn't be able to afford to continue dispatching Claymores off to wherever they were needed.
So, it was in the best interests of the people living in other areas… that made it less of a crime. Still, those actions, while being questionable, were still… on the more acceptable side of things. This? This was just pure horrible. This was manslaughter. Manslaughter in the hundreds; and without any sane rhyme or reason.
It was proof – solid, definitive proof – that the Organization was just every bit as bad as the creatures it was established to fight.
Or, in reality, it was proof that the Organization was even worse than the Yoma. The only reason offered by them for conducting such indiscriminate killing of the defenseless was saving PR. The reason behind this massacre was to stop the spread of the knowledge that the Organization were responsible for the creation of the Yoma in the first place. It was truly sickening. All this death just to save face. At the very least, those foul beasts, horrid as they were, and despite how much she hated them, had a reason to kill – they did it to stave off their hunger.
She was shaken from her thoughts as one more feminine scream sounded through the streets of the city, before cutting out suddenly. Presumably from the woman having lost her head, and having her windpipe severed in the process. Relative silence descended upon the city again, as the fire crackled away at the wooden walls of some of the nearby houses, and the remaining survivors kept their mouths shut, hoping against all odds that they wouldn't be found.
The only sounds remaining after the constant barrage of screams had ended was the once-loud crackle of the fire burning away at the few timbers and leaves still left uncharred, and Noel's seemingly endless whisper-rant of disgust to Sophia aimed at their employers. Even that, however, came to an abrupt end as the structure holding up a nearby house gave way, causing the entire building to buckle inwards and cause a crash that echoed off the rather tall walls of the city.
The loud noise was enough to startle both Noel and Sophia out of their conversation, and with the fire having fizzled out after running dry of fuel after hours and hours of burning, Teresa got to enjoy an entire minute of absolute silence, before it was interrupted by the soft sound of a water droplet impacting the ground.
She felt the next one land on her cheek as she looked up to the now-cloudy sky. One more dropped. And another… soon enough, the slow, light drizzle had turned into a heavy shower. The water came down in sheets, making loud pitter-patter noises as it landed on the hot, charred wood, causing steam to form and slowly rise up and head towards the clouds currently drenching her uniform.
It was a welcome feeling, in all reality. It made her feel all that much better about their current situation, for whatever reason. It was almost as if the water brought down by the rain washed away all her problems – the tenseness, the fear, the anger, the hate, the malice. There was none of that; the rain coming down was taking all that negativity away with it.
It was a pleasant feeling, brought on solely by nostalgia born and bred from the few memories she had of her past… from the only happy memories she had from her past – memories of prancing around in the rain like a carefree child, splashing around in puddles, and giggling, all while a young woman watched and laughed from the shelter of the doorframe of a nearby house. The scene was beautiful…
Regardless of her efforts to stop it happening, Teresa's breath caught as she was sucked into a whirlpool of her memories. Her mother's face flashed before her eyes, in that same scene from the road outside their old house, with an ever-present smile on it, and the occasional giggle. Those eyes; so full of love, so full of hope; they shone with happiness as they watched Teresa – as they watched herself…
Such happiness… from such trivial things… it was amazing to see someone – anyone – get such happiness out of watching a child play in the rain. It was one of those things only a mother could do. With a pang of pain, she was torn from the thought as the image twisted and whipped its way into another.
It was another image of the same woman – of her very own mother, with the same dark hair and those same warm, brown eyes. Except that this time, they were filled with fear. The soft smile was gone, replaced with a face of pure terror, lips parted in a never-ending scream, as she looked upon the giant purple beast that had burst out of her husband's body.
A shrill scream tore through the image, though she couldn't be sure if she had actually heard it, or if it was just her mind replaying the last moments of her mother… it sounded much too similar to the latter for her to know for sure, and she refused to think and linger on it lest her mind should choose to replay the images of her mother being torn asunder…
"He wasn't here." A masculine voice spoke from somewhere in front of her. It was a voice that was familiar to an extent, but one she didn't recognize.
There was a short sigh, followed by a response, "No, no he wasn't. The mission's been a failure…. Again."
Slowly, Teresa opened her eyes, which she had slammed shut in an attempt to stave off the flashbacks and blinked them a few times to adjust to the light. The rain was still falling, although it had now slowed to a mere drizzle, and the town had been completely destroyed. Between the fire and the heavy rain, even the toughest structures in the city had proven too weak to hold up. The already weakened and charred wooden beams holding up the houses and shops had given way when pools of water had coalesced on the rooftops.
It was quite the dreary sight, when viewed in combination with the large, black clouds rolling over the valley, or the dried patches of blood on the walls of the nearby buildings. The sun had gone and hidden itself behind the clouds, and the entire vale looked dark and depressing. Considering what had just transpired here, Teresa didn't think the description was wrong.
The low-pitched, baritone voice of the first speaker snapped her focus back to their conversation. "This was a waste of time and resources… Rimuto's not gonna be happy."
The reply was barked out with a short laugh, "Ha, well, we were just following orders, eh? We'll pass the blame onto Dae. He's the one out for that demon's blood."
The first man hissed at the other, "Still a waste of time and resources. And stop laughing; it's not right to disrespect the dead."
The other male's laughter ceased almost instantaneously upon hearing his partner's comment, and he bowed his head in silence as they walked by, muttering out an apology to the dead. Then, he shook his head once, straightened up, and replied, in a much more serious tone, to his partner, "A waste of resources, indeed, Raga… this whole mission doesn't make sense. How is the recovery of one man worth the slaughter of so many innocents? Why did we even kill them in the first place?"
The response came with a rather definitive tone, and a slowly fading intensity – the latter being a result of increasing distance, "He's displayed an exceptional control over his Yoki in the past. We wouldn't have been able to single him out from the crowd if he were here. He would have to use his powers to save himself, however, and he would only use them if he were placed in danger. And to your first question, Dae-sama has need of him, and it is not our place to question it."
And then, under his breath, he muttered out a slow sentence, the words spoken so softly that Teresa had to strain both her ears and her Yoki to the uttermost to hear them. "But if you can call Perseus a man… then you've clearly not met him…"
'Huh…' she thought to herself. 'Well, that's interesting. Apparently, the entire point of the mission was to find Perseus.' Perseus…. That was the name of the first Awakened Being… at least, that was what she'd been told.
It should have been a happy thought, knowing that what they'd done had been in an attempt to catch a killer. And yet, it just made her image of the Organization look worse. They weren't even trying to kill the Yoma, but they were more than ready to kill everyone else to do naught but find him. She snorted in disgust at that and muttered out, "These people just keep getting worse and worse…"
-Line break-
"What?"
"You heard me, I'm sure… get to work."
"What!?"
"Oii! Dauf, this is getting boring. Surely, he can't be this dense!"
"WHAT!?"
"Oh, dear god… this boy… look, I don't have the time for this. Dauf, give him a bucket and a mop… let him clean up this mess on the floor."
"No, no, no, wait. I don't think I heard you right… you want me to…. You want me to clean your floor…"
"Yes… that's what I said… isn't it?"
"Wait, you're asking ME to clean your floor… ME!?"
Their dialogue was cut short, however, as Dauf interrupted by shouting at the small masculine figure standing in the center of the room, ordering him to do as the girl on the throne said.
In the center of the room, the small boy took in a deep breath and let it out again, the noise reverberating off the walls of the otherwise silent room. Slowly, he opened his mouth, as if to say something, and the closed it again with a shake of his head.
"Count to ten… count to ten… deep breaths… slow, deep breaths." He mumbled under her breath, with his hands making an obvious effort to count upwards from one to ten on his fingers at a PAINFULLY slow rate.
So slow that, by the time he'd reached no more than seven, Riful was already bored. "Daaauuffff," she drawled, "Go see what's wrong with him; he's not doing what I told him to!"
Percy gritted his teeth and growled out a response to the so-called Empress of the West, "I do not take orders from YOU!"
Riful sighed and let her head drop onto one of her hands, which was resting on the armrests of her pseudo-throne, before looking to her consort, and saying, "Dauf, take care of this…"
Percy looked incredulously to the girl sitting on the throne, and then to the six-foot tall man, roaming his eyes over the male's form, before snorting and plopping down on the ground. "So, you don't recognize me, then. That's nice to know. But pray, do tell, what will he do, hmm? He doesn't look strong enough to be able to rip a sheet of paper."
Dauf, of course, being the big idiot that he was renowned for being, took the insult to heart and screamed out, forcing his Yoki to pour out and convert his small body to his much larger Awakened form.
Percy just sat back and watched, yawning at the transformation as if it were something he got to see every other day, which only served to anger Dauf more. The giant held a hand out, pointed in Percy's direction and with a scream of both: fear and agony, he shot a metallic rod towards Percy. It missed the boy entirely, landing a good ten feet behind him.
The result was clearly unexpected on Dauf's account, as it showed on his face. Riful looked disappointed as she stared at her consort, and Percy just looked bored as he looked down on his coat, plucking out stray fibers from the black cloth to pass the time.
Dauf fired another rod at Percy. And another. And another. Then, he went for the quantity beats quality treatment and fired an entire barrage at the boy. Of course, he missed every single time. At the end of it all, Percy was still plucking and preening his coat, while Riful sat at the edge of her seat, with her eyes narrowed at the boy in concern. She knew Dauf could be an idiot, but no one – and she meant NO ONE, could miss a target 40 feet away a hundred times over. It just wasn't possible. Especially not when your ammunition was BIGGER than the target…
And Dauf… well, he looked constipated, in Percy's humble opinion. A myriad of emotions were showing through on his face, from confusion to anger to fear – with the latter dedicated more towards what Riful would do to him for making her look stupid than towards him. And all those emotions made his face scrunch up to make it look like he was constipated.
Riful's critical gaze slowly shifted from the apparently harmless boy to her dearest consort, who looked ready to panic. "What are you doing, Dauf? He's right there. RIGHT THERE. DEAL with him!"
Dauf nodded frantically and spoke in a panicked tone, sounding so frantic that even Percy looked up to stare at him, "Y-yes, Riful. I won't miss this time… I promise."
Percy cocked his head to the side, with a teasing smirk gracing his lips, "You shouldn't make promises that you can't keep, Dauf-kun… it's awfully rude."
To his surprise, though, Dauf, for once in his life, DIDN'T rise to the bait. Apparently, when faced with Riful's eternal disappointment, he could look past anything and everything to fulfill her goals. Heh… Cute.
Dauf raised his hand – which was now shaking from Yoki exertion – and pointed the palm out straight at Percy's face, before drawing in a shaky breath, steadying his hand and firing the bolt.
Percy made no attempt to dodge it, and unlike he had done previously, he made no attempt to redirect its path using his powers from Pluto. Instead, he reached up, towards the multi-ton object heading for his face at the speed of a bullet… and flicked. Physics stated that he should be squashed. Every book on science out there would have stated he had zero chance of survival. Every scientist, mathematician and scholar who had ever lived would have argued that he didn't stand a chance of countering the momentum of the metal rod.
But Yoki was great like that. All magic was, in fact. It ripped up the theories of science and chucked them into the bin. As such, his Yoki decided that his flick was more than powerful enough to counteract the momentum, despite the fact that his 8 year-old form had almost no muscle mass.
Now, the projectile was trapped between two great forces. One was the power of Dauf's Yoki, with which it had originally been fired, and the other was Percy's unending reserve of power – both Godly, and otherwise. However, the existence of the force named gravity meant that the rod couldn't stay floating in mid-air forever.
Well, that and structural integrity. Something had to give, and since, in comparison with the two's supernatural powers, the rod was as squishy as an ant, it was the rod that gave way first.
On contact with Percy's hand, the rod shattered like a glass pane which had had a rock thrown through it, with the shards scattering in all directions randomly.
Percy, of course, was prepared for this. Dauf, on the other hand, was not. Having underestimated his opponent, Dauf was caught completely unprepared as the metal shards shredded through the muscles and tendons of his legs. His massive size belayed him by making him a bigger target which was easier to hit. Percy, however, had been prepped for the oncoming battle, and had his Yoki pushed to the forefront of his body, just under his skin, which caused the metal to bounce off harmlessly, as if he were a rock, instead of a boy. Moreover, since he was sitting on the floor, and was in the form of a child, he made too small a target for the shards to hit effectively.
Sighing at his opponent's screams of pain, he slowly stood from the ground, and dusted off his coat. "To be fair, Riful, your boy-toy never really stood a chance. He was third in his own generation; a generation that was meant to be a whole league below my power."
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Riful attempting to make a move, and smirked. He waved a hand in her general direction and she froze like a rock. Turning his head to face her, his smile widened when he saw the expression of pure panic flash over her face.
"W-Why can't I m-move? What sorcery is this?" She was stuttering and stammering, a clear sign of her fear, considering how calm her usual personality was.
It brought a laugh to Percy's lips. "Sorcery? Ha-ha! Sorcery, eh? This, girl, is no sorcery. This is just Yoki manipulation!"
His child-like appearance burned away to reveal his immortalized eighteen-year-old body, complete with the blond hair and the silver eyes. The full image of Perseus the Slayer. Or so they had loved to call him, anyway. They had thought it to be an insult, for some reason. He loved the nickname. It was exhilarating to be addressed as slayer. After all, was that not his job? Was that not what he was supposed to be doing? If it wasn't, then it still felt good to be recognized for doing it anyway.
With a savage grin on his face, Percy stepped towards the now-panicked Empress of the West. "So, tell me, girl, do I need to ask for your permission to pass through? Tell me, do you think you can even stop me?"
With every step he took towards her, her expression turned slightly more fearful, and he relished in it while he could. After all, it wasn't every day when you could get such a reaction out of an abyssal one. It was quite rare, in fact, considering how rarely he even met them.
And even when he did, Isley would take it in his stride and just accept that Percy was stronger and not give a fuck about it. It was annoying, truly. And the new girl down south was good for nothing but running away. The one time he'd run into her while scouting out some villages to burn down and destroy, she'd run away, tails clutched between her legs. So much for being a demon cat. More like glorified pussy.
Meanwhile, Percy was now starting to pity the poor girl. She was still afraid for her life… not the best situation to be in. Releasing his control over her, Percy turned to the other male in the room.
"How have you not healed yet?"
His only response was a wail of pain.
"That… You're possibly the worst Awakened Being I've seen to date… The damage wasn't even that bad. It was just a few tendons. HOW have you not healed yet?"
Another wail of pain.
"Ugh. Fine. I swear, you're all so fragile. One flick… one flick and you're down for the count. How useless your Yoki is…"
This time, his response was a whimper of fear and pain.
Rolling his eyes at the fool, he turned his attention back to the Abyssal One, snorted as she tried to crawl away, and spoke to the whole room, "I'm being kind this one time. If I see you causing me trouble ever again, it'll be your heads. You're lucky Dauf didn't bring me that bucket and mop; there are more ways to use those than to clean floors."
And with that, Percy walked out of the Fort on Mount Shire, starting his journey southwards from Alfons. It was time to draw out the top-of-her-class Claymore of the next generation. The 75th generation, if he remembered that correctly. He'd been shocked to see the number, of course, since he hadn't realized how many iterations the loops of Claymore had run... 75th generation…. That meant that this was the 75th cycle of these games that the Organization played. He'd run through this entire charade 75 times over already… Heh…. "Talk about feeling old… On the bright side, I've at least got tons of work experience."
He added the last bit with a chuckle, knowing how little work experience meant when no one would hire him for work anyway… it was kinda hard to get a job to stave off your boredom when you wanted to eat the interviewer.
It usually ended with bones, screams, and patches of dried blood. Then someone would walk in, look around and scream, and then, Percy would leave the town behind as a flaming wreck. That was always the best part about pretending to be an interviewee.
-Line break-
(Somewhere far, far above the lands of Lautrec)
On a normal day, as a normal person, if you looked out of your window in mid-spring, you would see wonderful valleys and beautiful rivers.
On a normal day, as a normal person, if you then turned towards the inside of your house, you would not see an angel with white wings, calmly sipping tea from a cup.
On a normal day, as a normal person, said angel would not have a knowing smirk on her face.
Clare was not having a normal day. Neither was she a normal person.
Sighing, she turned to her sister, and asked her the all-important question… "Why are you smiling?"
Her sister's smirk only grew, much to her frustration. "You've done something…" she said, slowly, "Go on, tell me what you've done now…"
Teresa's smirk turned to a shade of downright evil, and Clare sighed once more, head falling into her hands. This…. This was the kind of stuff she had to deal with on a daily basis. On a normal day, as a normal person, you wouldn't accuse the white-winged angel sitting in your dining room, of heinous villainy.
But then again… it had already been established that Clare… was not a normal person. So, she posed the question to her sister.
"Villainy?" And there came the response… "Oh, my dearest sister, how you wound me with your words. I could never do any villainy, could I? Such a frail little angel as me; how would I ever succeed in doing such a deed?"
Clare's eyebrow twitched. Slowly, she turned back to her window, knowing that pressing on now, as it were, wouldn't lead anywhere.
The view was surprisingly stagnant… there wasn't much that looked… off.
The beautiful mountains of Lautrec; The snow-capped peaks of Alfons; One stunningly beautiful cone volcano; The scorching red sands of Sutafu; The flatlands of the South; The golden glow of Rabona…
Well… nothing seemed off…
Oh, dear God… that was the problem wasn't it… There were no plumes of black smoke rising into the sky, no unexplained avalanches crushing hundreds of people, no mad teenagers running around as 50-foot tall mini-typhons…
It should have felt good to have such a nice change, but it didn't. Maybe that was because of that feral grin on Teresa's face, which she was trying to hide behind her teacup… maybe it was because of how hectic things had become of late… maybe it was because her sister WASN'T running around the palace, trying to find ways to fix the Fates' problems…
No… it was DEFINITELY because of that last one. Teresa had been on edge ever since Atropos left…. And now, she was drinking tea, and sitting back, relaxing on her couch.
Already dreading the answer, Clare asked her sister, "Why is it so silent around here, Teresa?"
"What could you possibly mean, Clare?" The grin widened. "When has it not been this calm 'around here'?"
The vein on Clare's head threatened to pop.
-Line break-
(Several hours later)
Clare looked between her sister and the human version of her… "That's a HORRIBLE idea!"
Teresa – the goddess – stared back at her with the most confused expression on her face… "Why?"
"WHAT DO YOU MEAN, 'WHY', TERESA!? HOW CAN YOU NOT SEE THIS IS A BAD IDEA?"
Teresa just sighed and looked at her sister with disappointment as clear as day on her face, "What are we, sis…"
With anger that was born of her sister's disappointment in her, fueling through her veins, Clare screamed, "We're GODS, TERESA! We don't play a hand in mortal affairs!"
Teresa sighed again and tried posing the same question to her sister, "Yes, Clare, we ARE gods… gods of what, exactly?"
Clare's anger subsided a bit, giving way to confusion, as she responded, "We're the twin goddesses of love…"
"Yes… So, now, do you see how this is a good idea?"
"Do you even HEAR yourself when you speak, Teresa? We are GODS. They are MORTALS. WE DON'T PLAY AROUND WITH MORTALS!"
"They're not mortals, Clare," she said, taking another sip of her tea, "They're part-immortal."
"HOW DOES THAT MATTER!?"
"How does it not? Tell you what, why don't you calm down and take a seat. Explain to me why this is not a good idea."
With a scowl on her face, Clare did what her sister had asked her to, albeit reluctantly… VERY reluctantly.
Teresa made the go-ahead motion with her left hand, signaling that it was fine for her to speak.
"Your plan… is to manipulate two Claymores…. To make them fall in love."
"Yes…"
"Two MORTAL Claymores… people who can DIE."
"Well one of them is a semi-immortal demi-god, and the other is infused with flesh that doesn't let her age or die… But, yes…"
"Teresa, the Ancient Laws state specifically that we CANNOT interfere in the lives of mortals! And semi-immortal IS STILL MORTAL!"
There was a long pause to their conversation as Teresa sipped her tea. It was only after the now-empty vessel had clinked onto the saucer, that Teresa spoke, "The Ancient Laws are more like a book of guidelines, Clare. Besides, they weren't even made for OUR universe, so it's more than a-okay to go around them."
"But STILL! There are so many ways this can backfire!"
"And how would that be, Clare? The plan sounds pretty foolproof to me."
Clare's right eye had now begun to spasm. It was moving so violently that one couldn't call the action 'twitching' anymore…
"Teresa, you realize that you can't force love, right… It's your JOB to know this… The moment either of them break free of your spell – even if it's just for a second or two… they'll know it's fake. Especially in the case of Perseus… he's lived his entire life being manipulated by Gods… he won't fall for this…"
"I KNOW that, Clare. I'm not stupid. I've been a Goddess from the same day as you have. I'm not trying to force anything here… I know how poorly that can go; we've seen it firsthand before. We've tried it and we've failed. Here, the stakes are too high, Clare; you know I wouldn't try something that could lead to failure… can't you have a little faith?"
Clare sighed and rubbed her forehead, before speaking up, "Teresa, you're not exactly making it easier for me to understand your plan. It's just that… it's been some 25 years – or more, since Atropos left, Teresa, and this is the only plan you had? THIS?"
When Teresa made to speak, Clare cut her off before she could have the chance, "And it doesn't matter if you had other plans, T…. This was clearly the best you've come up with… or you wouldn't risk so much on it. At least do me a favor and explain what you plan to do..."
Teresa was, on one hand, shocked to see the concern in Clare's voice. She'd never liked the Fates all that much – Atropos had been Teresa's friend; not Clare's… but on the other, she was happy that Clare was at least willing to listen.
"Look, Clare. We don't have many options right now, do we? No… no, we don't. We can't go and fight Chaos ourselves… he'd be able to beat us into the ground because it's his universe. We would be powerless there." Seeing Clare's slow nod as a sign to continue, Teresa forged on, "But if we can't fight him there, and he won't come here, then we can't do much to help the fates ourselves, can we?"
"No, no, we can't… All we CAN do is vest our hopes in that boy, Perseus. And, if you've ever checked up on him in the last 50 years, Clare, you would know he's not going to even try to fight. Without the Fates constantly pestering him to do so; he's had the chance to think for himself, and he's long since realized that it's incredibly stupid to fight the impossible fight."
"He's not going to do the right thing, Clare…. He won't fight… It's been left up to us to convince him. If you have any other ideas… I'm not averse to hearing them."
There was utter silence in the room. It was evident by that silence, that Clare had no good ideas, either. "Exactly, Clare… My plan does sound a little… foolish; even to me… but it's the only thing we've got. Besides, even if it fails, there'll be little consequences for this world or us. It's only Earth that will be doomed to Chaos."
The silence in the room was stunning as she closed her mouth, in wait for an answer from her sister, and after a minute or two, when it was clear that there would be no response, she sighed and continued, albeit in a slower, softer tone, "See, Clare… if we try to talk to him, he won't listen to us because we're gods, and he pretty much hates our kind. If we try to force him out of our universe, then he'll try to fight us, and no matter who wins in that fight, the outcome will be the same. Either he'll be dead, or we'll be defeated, and Earth still won't have her savior."
"The only way we have out of this situation is to get someone else to convince him to fight. The Fates did a pretty good job on that… until they didn't. And now that they're gone, someone else needs to do the job for us, because we can't do it for ourselves."
With a sigh, she continued, "Besides, this girl – Teresa… she's my namesake, and by virtue of her name, she's bound to act like a miniature version of me. And she already does. If- no, WHEN the issue is brought up in the future, she'll behave like I would, and I know for a fact that I would fight to save my family, if I were in that situation. She'll convince him to fight and then, that would be that. What they do after… is no concern of mine – I'm only bothered about the Fates, and nothing more. I'm not trying to be Aphrodite."
A minute of silence passed between them, before Clare sighed shakily, and stood up. She turned to leave the room, but then looked over her shoulder and spoke, "Fine. I still think it's a stupid plan, but you're at least right in saying we have no other options. I'd tell you to just throw every pin at the pinboard and hope for something to stick, but I know we don't have the time for that. You've told me enough times before: 'Every minute we spend not helping is another minute – or another fifty years – that they have to hold out.' Do as you would, Teresa, and for the love of Rabona and its pantheon…. T, I hope it works out. I'll aid you in whatever ways I can, should you ask for it."
With those rather cold parting words, she left the room, leaving Teresa to slouch back into her seat.
-Line break-
(Somewhere near Teo)
Percy watched as the blonde stepped into the village. He'd sensed her coming, of course, but much to his shock, he'd only been able to sense her when she was half a mile out. That was a show of how good her Yoki control was.
He watched as she looked around the village. She took one look at the village folk who'd gathered to see her, and then shot off with her Yoki.
"First one down…"
"The second one…"
"The third…. The fourth."
Interesting… She was fast enough to cut them down quicker than they could realize it was happening…
And there went two more… so, she was quite strong, too. And she'd done it all without releasing the barest shred of Yoki. Her muscles weren't bulging, her body wasn't deforming, and her eyes hadn't turned golden, either. Pretty strong, then… Stronger than what Isley had been before he Awakened.
Percy tensed up in anticipation of the battle that might occur. He didn't dare to release his Yoki yet… that would spell a sure doom for him, and he wasn't sure yet whether she'd sensed him at all. He only tensed the muscles of his body, so that he would be able to leap to either side, should the Claymore's Claymore come cleaving down on him.
"Now then… I felt the presence of seven Yoma when I was outside the city."
Ah, and there. She hadn't sensed him, after all. The tension vanished from him, and his posture slouched again, with the effects of the epinephrine that had suddenly taken over his body slowly fading away.
The sound of the Claymore's speech brought Percy's attention to her once more, and he turned to see her slice a Yoma down the middle, while he tried to use a little girl as a shield.
The Yoma sprayed blood all over the little girl, but surprisingly, she didn't even budge. How interesting… The girl looked… unaffected by the blood… and unsurprised that it was purple… how very interesting…
Percy looked up once more to the Claymore, and saw that everyone's eyes were locked on the girl in front of her. 'Even they think it interesting, hm?' Percy thought with a slight chuckle, 'Bet that's not a sight you get every day around here.'
The Claymore, however, tore her eyes off the girl and walked off to the town's inn, probably to stay the night.
'And now comes the time for decisions… what am I going to do?' he thought to himself… He could start a fight now, but the Claymore was clearly quite strong, and the fight would no doubt exhaust him. Moreover, the attention it would draw to fight using that much Yoki was not something to look forward to.
There was really no point in letting the woman go free; not after all the effort it had taken to get here to come down to this shabby excuse of a village. He'd had to pose as a Yoma for two whole weeks in Teo before they even sent the request for a Claymore. Painfully slow fools, as it were… Then, of course, there'd been the effort required to gather seven Yoma in one town, so that the Yoki emitted from there would be sufficient to draw the attention of the Claymore coming to Teo. The last of them – the one with the girl had only arrived a day back, after Percy sent out a rather large pulse of Yoki to draw the Yoma to him…
So, there was no sense in running. Besides, if he beat this Claymore, and absorbed her Yoki, he could very well become stronger than all the Abyssal Ones combined…
He was already two-thirds the way there, having beat Isley, his army, and then, Riful and Dauf within the span of three days. Maybe it would be slightly different if he had to fight them all at once, but there was a high chance it wouldn't.
Awakened Beings such as the Abyssal Ones always fought with a hundred percent of their Yoki, and while, on the one hand, it made them horribly efficient and incredibly strong, it also had its disadvantages, on the other hand. One of those, for example, was how easy it became to control them. If you had more Yoki than your opponent did, then all you had to do was simply overpower their Yoki with yours, and turn them into glorified puppet dolls. Which was exactly what he'd done with Riful.
After seeing him flick Dauf to pieces; or more precisely, shred his body with the pieces of his own metal rods; Riful had flooded her body with Yoki, going straight to a hundred percent, ready to fight or escape should the need arise. That, of course, made her a puppet to him.
Claymores, however, fought by releasing their Yoki somewhere between zero percent and eighty percent. And of course, the more you had, the less you would use. Using the same move on them would be useless, since they weren't fueling their Yoki to every single part of their bodies. It would be like attempting to freeze all the water in a pipe; but doing it while there was no water in the pipe. It would achieve absolutely nothing at all.
'Heh, if it had been that easy, what would the point of training even be? Every time something comes at you, just freeze all the Yoki in its body, and its muscles would freeze along with it. Then, a single swipe of the greatsword to finish the act.' Sadly, everything was NOT that easy.
But then, if he had to fight this Claymore, it would be ideal to boost his odds. Would do him a great deal of good if the Organization sent reinforcements after feeling his Yoki. Well, after DAE felt his Yoki, anyway. Not everyone was a genetically enhanced cyborg, after all. Not everyone could sense Yoki.
The first thing that came to mind was trickery. But then again, what trickery could you use against an opponent who could sense your every move? Yeah, not a great idea. Getting the element of surprise in the fight could definitely prove advantageous. If he could take her out without her having seen it coming, then that would be a boon.
'Oh, wait. She's gone to the inn, hmm? Must have been a long journey from Sutafu to all the way over here…' Percy thought, dark chuckles bubbling past his lips. 'The girl must be tired, as all humans are… she'll be needing the sleep, hmm…. And people let their guards down while sleeping.'
The idea was ripped out of his head, however, as the Claymore came charging back out of the inn. 'Well, so much for THAT plan,' Percy thought bitterly. He seemed to be having some great streak of bad luck these days… first, he'd sounded off alarms near the Organization's HQ, then he'd run into Riful on the way south, then it had taken him nearly 4 weeks to find a suitable village, followed by another 2 weeks spent between Teo and here… and he'd not had the time to get some food along the way, either. All he'd eaten in the last year or so was the five men he'd had to kill in Teo, to get the village head to call for a Claymore.
And now, it looked like his next meal wouldn't be until 'Miss Teresa' reached her next destination.
Sighing, he started making his way to the town gate after the Claymore. Well, after the Claymore and the little girl she'd inadvertently picked up.
'Heh, at least the kid's having a worse day than I am… Ah, the small blessings of life..' he thought, as he stalked out after the girl with the now-bruised face.
-Line break-
(Somewhere far, far above Lautrec)
A purple-colored man stepped out of a portal onto the floor of a balcony that was flying somewhere far above the ground. His curved ram-like horns seemed to suck in the surrounding light, and his entire body cast an eerie glow all around him, even though he was standing in direct sunlight.
Seeing no distinguishable features on the man's face, Teresa turned her head up to look at the indent where the eyes should have been, and sighed.
"Why, hello, Teresa… it's been quite the long time…"
"I've come to ask a favor."
AN – Yesssss! Well, I'm back, for the most part. Probably only back for a few weeks since I have exams coming up again next month – which, again, WHY? What is wrong with the education system, ffs…
Anyway, it should probably be enough time for me to finish this story, considering how I'm thinking chapter 18/19 should be the end…
Which is a shock, btw… when I started the story, I was gonna leave it as a one-shot for a worst case scenario at CHB that could realistically happen if Zeus had another extramarital son. I hadn't even planned to upload it on the site! But then, when I re-read Leviathan, I realized the potential for a similar plotline and just went with it when a friend suggested that I write a full story…
Even then, I thought I was just gonna follow the Leviathan plot and end the story with Percy fighting Chaos and losing… but someone told me, "No one likes a bad ending," and I just went with the motto~
One Hundred Thousand words was not something I actually expected to write! And thank you guys for the faves and follows (above 70, when I'm publishing this)
And can someone please give the man a name…. I refuse to write entire dialogues with him being referred to as 'god of darkness.' (The character at the end – God of Darkness from RWBY)… PM me the suggestions, if you have any! And one for his brother, too…
Also, the chapter name's a good one, eh? With the games being both the mind games that the gods plan on using on our poor, poor MC, and the game of hide-and-seek that Percy plays with the Organization?
Follow, fav and review!