"How is progress coming?"
Nathaniel oversaw the army of clones that swarmed across the dead world.
"Better than expected." One of the clones told him, handing the original a clipboard. "We've already made tremendous progress in growing the tree and the bijuu."
"Are they ready?"
"Not quite. However, we have finished setting up the full range of cloning bays. We've managed to create over fifty sets of functioning eyes, ready for implantation."
Nathaniel looked up from the clipboard, raising an eyebrow.
"That's ahead of schedule."
"This world's connection to the 10th metal, and its innate darkness allowed us to activate the eyes with a greater success rate than projected. With time, we might be able to produce fully functioning mangekyou eyes, though we have no alternate DNA to create alternate patterns necessary for eternal light. I'm afraid we still need Asura or Diana for that."
"No, we are not involving Diana." Nathaniel stated firmly.
"Don't have to tell me boss." The clone assured. "Still, you'll have to take it easy with the mangekyou abilities for now, at least until we can produce a seperate set of eyes for replacements."
"I'll manage." Nathaniel told the clone. "I see that the two-tails, three-tails and six-tails are ready for integration."
"Yep. We found a couple of hot spots on this world. Gotham, Metropolis, Central City. The ruins of some of the major sites for supernatural activity are allowing us to funnel far more power than initial projections."
"Good. Any updates on Asura?"
"None so far boss. The clone platoon you sent to scout out his universe haven't dispelled any of their members, or sent any messages, so we don't have any info."
"Fine." Nathaniel shook his head. "Dispel now, I want the full rundown and personal details."
"Got it boss."
The clone dispelled itself in a burst of smoke and Nathaniel felt a mild headache come on as the memories flooded his head. Sorting through the knowledge he had just acquired, Nathaniel took a few moments to categorise everything the clone had passed on.
The project was going well. With time he'd have a fully grown set of Bijuu to feed to the Gedou Mazo and form a Juubi. Hopefully, the tree would be secured by the time that happened and a chakra fruit could be eaten. He didn't want to end up opening a way for Kaguya, several of the personal notes of the last active Indra had warned against reawakening the ancient Otsutsuki.
Nathaniel was not going to fight his ancient rival half-cocked however. Asura had won their previous encounters time and time again. Most times it had been through the intervention of some outside force. For the original siblings, it had been the chakra provided by the members of their village, for Naruto it had been an existential feeling of hope and camaraderie, not to mention the cooperation of the nine bijuu who's powers he held, that had somehow overpowered his past self. For so many of their incarnations afterwards, someone or something had always come in. Every time, Indra had found himself on the edge of victory, his power outmatching his idiot younger brother's, but then something would turn, and Asura's allies, who had no place in the fight between the brothers, would come and boost him just enough to edge out a win.
Every time, Indra would see defeat, and every time, in the aftermath of his victory Asura's path would fail. Humanity was not meant for such peaceful coexistence. Humans were individuals, and so they formed different opinions, they thought differently. They debated and argued with each other, and then when words failed, they fought. Asura's path was fine in theory, but in the end it was doomed to failure without the power to keep the squabbling masses in line. Because of this Asura had, in every life, lost out to Indra, for only Indra ideal of the rule of strength could allow for Asura's dream of love to occur.
Then came the one life, the one time that Indra had won. His past self had isolated Asura, making sure that no power could interfere between the battle of the brothers, and because of that strategy, Asura had lost. With no allies around, no crutch to grasp onto and prop himself up, the younger brother had been bested by the older.
Indra's path, his rule by strength, had finally come to fruition and faced its test, only to fail just like his brother's.
Indra believed that faced with such overwhelming power, that humanity would submit. That to be faced with an unobtainable goal that so completely ruled their lives would make the people bow to him. He was wrong. Faced with a being who ruled as they liked, even if that rule had been just, backed only by strength and fear, humanity had rebelled. Their natural propensity for disagreement and conflict had been set aside for a single ideal, to defeat each other, to gain strength of their own and to one day dethrone the ideal that was Indra.
Immortality however, should have seen the people's dreams crushed, and yet each new generation continued to fight. Where self-destruction and deceit had spelled the end of Asura's naive and indulgence rule. So too did ambition and greed see the end of Indra's.
In Asura's times of victory, division became greater and greater as Asura no longer had the power to quell their disagreements with his strength.
In Indra's, his own strength had served as a spark, which had lit a flame that drew others to challenge him, creating greater and greater weapons and techniques in order to best him.
His past self had eventually grown so incensed at the constant conflict that ruled his realm, overshadowing his own strength and power, that he had purged the ancient power from humanity, and begun a crisis that had forced the hand of the World Forger and the Monitor, ending and restarting the universe without the use of life's most basic ability.
Nathaniel was not any of his past selves. Perhaps it was the amount of time that had passed since his last incarnation, perhaps it was his upbringing, perhaps it was just the lack of chakra in this new universe. However, Nathaniel knew that his past selves were wrong, but at the same time, so too was Asura's path. To rule by strength alone was useless in the long run, and to rule by love alone was doomed to failure because even with all the love in the world, disagreements would occur.
Living with Diana, seeing the love she was capable of, he knew that such ideals could never be absolute. Sometimes strength was not the answer, and sometimes no amount of love could redeem those who felt no remorse.
Ironically enough, it was his mother he owed most of his ideal of rulership to. Nathaniel was under no illusions that she was ever a good mother to him. Hell, he was entirely sure that she wasn't a good person, at least until she came out of his illusion.
However, one thing Nathaniel could not dispute was that she was a good queen. She loved her subjects (most of them at least) and would risk life and limb in order to protect them. But that didn't mean she wasn't ruthless and downright cruel when faced with dissent. Hippolyta had imprisoned and executed enemies, and even friends, when it became necessary for the survival of her people and her culture. She wasn't wasteful or callous with life (other than his) but at the same time she refused to suffer fools.
Nathaniel knew that if she and the amazons could just rid themselves of their outdated hatred of man and man's world, and evolve their technology beyond the bow and arrow, they might just become one of the most influential and industrious nations in the world.
Looking down at his clones as they carried out their work, Nathaniel felt a sense of satisfaction, the world was finally fitting into place, and soon he would be in a position to gain everything he had ever wanted.
Feeling another of his clones dispel, Nathaniel scowled slightly. The damn bastard had decided to dispel himself just before a board meeting. Nathaniel readied himself to head back to his own world. As much as the minutia of running a company was irritating, his clone had dispelled and it would be a waste to send another clone through the dimensions when he was already going back. Sighing, Nathaniel performed a transformation in order to take on the form that he used for his public persona. His face was all that really changed. His hair and eye colour remained the same. His face became more angular, some distinct features mixed in that had lead people to think that be might be some mixture of Greek and Asian.
His hairstyle also changed. His normally windswept and somewhat unkept hair changed into a formal and business-like cut that was slicked to the side. His normal clothes were replaced with a sharp business suit with a deep blue tie and a white undershirt.
Taking a deep breath, Nathaniel closed his eyes and focused, allowing his rinnegan to bend the universe around him and take him back to the headquarters of the Indra Corperation.
"With all due respect Mr Aetós." Mr Daniels said. "Is there room in the budget to invest the proposed amounts into both of our projects? I've reviewed it and I have my doubts."
"Your concern is touching Mr Daniels." Nathaniel smiled. "I've thoroughly looked through this quarters division of funds, and I've found a few things that I'm sure are negotiable that can free up the required amounts. Now, moving on, there has been another inquiry by Wayne Enterprises about a possible merger."
There was a hush over the board. Wayne industries had been trying to get into the Indra Corperation since it had risen to prominence eight years ago.
"Unfortunately." Nathaniel said. "There's been some problems lately in regards to their head's behaviour and the problems that exist in Wayne Enterprises' finances. I've taken personal stock of their offer and have rejected it."
No one on the board said anything. For all that some of them thought that a merger would be beneficial to the company, Nathaniel, who owned ninety-two percent of the company, from stocks to shares and everything in between, had made it clear that under no circumstances would he allow the Indra Corperation to be subsumed, by merger or otherwise.
"Now, if you will excuse me this meeting has reached its end. Thank you for your time ladies and gentlemen."
Nathaniel watched as each member of his board of directors left the conference room. When the last of the people left, Nathaniel leaned back in his chair and let out a tired groan. Dealing with world-ending threats and universal monsters was easier than trying to wrangle and satisfy the egos of a half-dozen wealthy businessmen and women. It was truly a wonder how normal people did it. Of course, Nathaniel couldn't allow Wayne, or any company affiliated with superheroes, to gain a foothold in his own company. Not only would the press be terrible should he as Nathaniel be forced to reveal their identities. It also made sure that no one on that side of things had access to his more secretive projects.
The prince rolled his eyes. Bruce Wayne might have been a genius in almost every conceivable way, but his disregard for real secrecy when it came to his equipment meant that Nathaniel had at least a dozen different ways to discredit the man if it ever came to it.
After all, Wayne Enterprises produced and developed nearly all of Batman's equipment, weapons and vehicles, not to mention the amounts spent on equipment for the league and the early watchtowers.
Using company money and facilities in order to finance his own personal hobby? What a naughty little embezzler Bruce Wayne was.
Nathaniel smirked, that little tidbit would be kept in his back pocket for the time being, safe and secure until the bat irritated him enough to reveal it. That knowledge, in addition to knowing his identity, would hopefully put and keep Wayne on the back-foot and away from him, though if he knew one thing about supers it was that bad things very rarely seemed to stick.
Firenze, Italy
A man with brown hair dressed in jeans, a white shirt and a brown coat fled out of club eros, chasing after another man.
"Please, you don't understand." He called.
"It's not my business." The man replied, not turning around.
The first man stopped short, following behind.
"He won't leave me alone- he follows me everywhere."
"Really? I don't see-"
The man was cut off.
"When I saw you tonight in the club, I told him i had to go to the... he's obsessed!"
"No he's-"
He was cut off again by the brown haired man.
"I have to hide from him to get any peace."
"So what must I do to get some?" The second man exclaimed, waving his hands exasperatedly.
"Make him stop." The first man begged.
The second man pulled out a cigarette and lit it, grimacing.
"Stop what? When we first met, you were crying. I felt pity, so I did you a favour. But these tears are different, and... no pity. You have what you wanted."
"I was wrong." He exclaimed, reaching out desperately.
"It's not my business."
"Listen to me!" The first man called out, grabbing the second man's shoulder.
The second man, who was revealed to be blonde with a white v-neck t-shirt and red pants without shoes, spun around and levelled a golden pistol in the first man's face.
"I gave you what you wanted!" He yelled. "The only thing I'm interested in hearing is thank you."
He shoved the man around, giving him a firm kick in the pants and sending him scurrying off into the dawn.
"Look, the sun is coming up... so run away. What you want now? It's not my busine-"
He was interrupted by a flash of blue light behind him.
"Eh?"
"What's going on here."
Diana, the wonder woman, stood with Hermes and Lennox, brandishing her lasso.
The blonde man levelled both of his pistols now, growling.
"A fickle heart." He spat. "That's none of your business."
"We do have some." Hermes said, walking forwards.
"Do 'we'?" The blonde asked.
"We need a favour." Hermes glared.
"A favour?" The blonde's eyes narrowed.
The two men moved closed, before they embraced and the blonde man smiled.
"Of course uncle."
As the sun rose high in the sky, and together Diana, Lennox and Hermes followed the blonde man along the streets, across a bridge to a small jewelry store.
"Pitting the sea and hell against Hera? That was a bas idea." He said.
"Seemed like a good one... at the time." Lennox replied.
"Ah, so it was yours."
"The point of it was to blind Hera." Hermes said.
"Mission accomplished." Lennox chimed in.
"True Lennox, but the cost-" Diana reminded him.
"Was someone you loved." Eros finished her sentence.
"Her hame is Zola. I need to bring her back from the shadows."
"That's why we've come to you, Eros." Hermes said to the now identified Eros.
"No." He corrected. "You've come to me because you need something else."
"The Smith is a gentleman. He doesn't take kindly to unannounced guests."
"Or guests in general, Messenger." Eros retorted.
"Doesn't like company?" Diana asked.
Eros opened the door to the store, ushering the rest in before he told them.
"Prefers his work."
Inside the store, in glass cases and on displays, were an assortment of the most beautiful works of jewelry to be found in all the world, the craftsmanship was unparalleled and each and every piece was somehow beautiful without equal.
"So do I." Lennox praised, tapping the glass that guarded one of the necklaces.
"Really?" Eros asked. "My mother finds it lacking."
"Eh?" Lennox scoffed. "What wrong with her then?"
"Absolutely nothing." Diana quipped.
"Careful there, Wonder Woman..." Eros said as they approached another door at the back of the shop.
As he opened the door, the group were met with another sight. The inside of Mt. Etna, the same volcano that had once held her brother's own prison before his escape and later her rescue.
Automatons moved around, ferrying rock and metal throughout the workshop, as Hephaestus' crippled form hammered as something on his anvil.
"Looks can be deceiving"
Hippolyta knew something wasn't right. The world her son had submerged her in was flickering, thousands of years passed and yet her son didn't age. This wasn't strange normally, as Amazons stood immune to time while on the island, however her son did not mature as all others did. He remained a child, even as thousands of years passed. Diana's birth didn't change things however. In fact, they made things stranger. Her daughter had been born not long ago, a mere twenty-seven years, but she knew that was not true. Her affair with Zeus had began and ended thousands of years ago, and so Diana must have been born then.
The thoughts gave her a headache, compounded by the pain of her child.
"You're beginning to see it, aren't you?" The half-faced voice asked, amusement permeating it's voice. "This place might not be real, but the truth can sometimes be so easily seen when confronted with what is false."
"What... what is this?" Hippolyta asked, as the images of Nathaniel's torture continued to flicker and change, skipping and expanding.
"The nightmare is coming." It said. "He doesn't even realise it yet. What he really is, what he's destined to become, and yet he still struggles in vain to be more than what he was made to be."
"My son has never let others rule him." Hippolyta groaned. She hated this creature that lurked in her son's mind. She had seen it whisper things in his ears over the decades and centuries. She heard the promises of death and despair, of revenge and torment.
"No matter what he was born, he has always risen above."
The creature snarled at her, baring a white void where its mouth should have been.
"Indra will succumb, his hatred is too deeply ingrained. You can't change that, she can't change it, and neither can that little aberration he calls a sister."
Hippolyta felt her rage climb.
"In the end, it doesn't matter. He will fall, and with time mother will be free once more. Indra and Asura have only grown more distant since the time of Uzumaki and Uchiha, and now you have driven him so far into the darkness he cannot stand the possibility of a rule not his own."
The creature's face morphed into a sickening smile.
"Either he will kill Asura, or Asura will kill him. One or the other, and with the end of that cycle mother will be released."
Hippolyta ground her teeth, Egeria had taken Nathaniel on another training session, as Diana had once more come to him in the wake of a nightmare, and the pain of her training was great.
"I suppose I should be grateful to him for this." It said. "It's been so long, without anyone to talk to. By the time this is all over, the work will be complete and we shall awake to a new world, a better world, under mother."
The darkness faded as the creature returned to whatever place it spent its time when not taunting her and the queen was left with nothing but the desperate screams of her son as he was struck by Egeria's blade.
"Please my son." She whispered as another memory prepared itself. "Hear me, there is something here, something evil. I know it is not you, as it so claims to be. It is a vile, terrible thing and I know you are not. I plead, if this is a piece of you, used to torment me, I beg that you can hear my voice. The darkness whispers that you are nightmare. I know not what it means, but I pray that you do not listen."
There was no answer to her call, no sign that her son had heard her. Instead, the next in a long line of torments played out before her as her son was forced to participate in a tournament against his older sisters. She knew what was to come. As each horror unfolded, she could remember watching so many of them without pity. Now she looked upon herself with scorn and hatred, hatred that she still could not find reflected in her son's face.
Instead, all she found was sorrow. There it sat, etched into every crevice, every line, every crack along his visage. Scars came, formed and faded and left only that same sorrow, pain and misery in his life.
Only when Diana was present, and when no other Amazons accompanied them, did even the slightest hint of light bloom in him. The warmth Diana brought was all that he knew, and yet Hippolyta could feel that even that was not untainted. Nathaniel saw the love Diana was afforded, not just by him, but by all who lived upon Themyscira. He saw it, and he envied it, for who would not, and so that love, so pure at first, was corrupted, tinged with a deep, unacknowledged jealousy that bloomed into an all consuming wrath.
Only that same, corrupted love balanced out the hate, and created a precarious equilibrium. Joy and despair, warmth and coldness, the two fought a great and terrible war within her son. His sanity began to slip, as day by day, year by year, century by century, he watched from the side as his sister was praised and he was maligned.
But despite all of this, despite her attempts to intervene, despite her new understanding of her child, nothing could be done. Helpless, Hippolyta watched as over and over again the balance shifted, coming ever so close to the edge, so close to sending him off into madness. She knew he wouldn't however. Nathaniel would remain at war with himself and with her people for a thousand more years, until his eighteenth birthday.
"AAAAAAHAHHHHRR-CH!"
Hippolyta convulsed and writhed in pain as Egeria cut both of Nathaniel's legs out from under him, leaving him laying in the arena with her sword piercing his throat, cutting off his screams.
It'll take more than weapons to bargain with hell, esspecially new as he is, and desperate to prove this version of himself." Hephaestus said, standing before a wall covered in various weaponry.
Behind him, Diana, Eros, Hermes and Lennox sat at a table.
"They are a good place to start, though." Eros quipped.
"My sentiments, Hephaestus. When my mother gave me this lasso, she said you made it. It's served me well." She presented the golden prefect.
"That?" Hephaestus considered the length of golden rope. "Not a weapon. Now this..."
He pulled a coiled up whip from the wall, unfurling it and striking. The weapon glowed an angry red, striking a shield on the other side of the room and shattering it.
"This is a weapon." He held it out to Diana. "Take it."
The five continued to speak as the work of the Smith's forge continued. Metal automatons performed a series of duties as in a vat of molten metal, a pair of eyes and a reptilian head began to emerge.
"So you just learned you're Zeus' daughter. And you decided to tangle with not just his wife, but his brother? I must say, you clearly are part of this family. Always bickering in one way or another."
"It's shameful." Hermes said.
"Really Messenger? If I'm not mistaken, you've been caught more than once-"
The sounds of panic and pain rang out as a monster made of molten metal and stone emerged from one of Hephaestus' vats. It began to rampage across the Smith's studio, grabbing of of his servants in it's glowing mouth and crushing another under its boiling claws.
"What the hell?" Diana asked as the group emerged from the room.
"Exactly." The Smith said. "I've decided to arm you, and hell is not pleased. So he's sent this abomination to foul my studio."
The god lept into the air, brandishing a hammer to strike the creature.
"And I won't have it!" He declared.
As he came down to deliver a powerful strike, the creature reared up and caught the god in its mouth.
Seeing the god in distress, Diana moved quickly. She lept into the air, grabbing a chain connected to a large vat of water high in the air. With her strength she pulled, sending the water pouring down onto the monster. The molten rock and metal cooled, forming a stone statue with angry red lines criss-crossing its body.
"Hephaestus." She said, pulling out her lasso.
Swinging it as it glowed, the indestructible rope shattered the beastly statue.
"This lasso, in my hand."
"Point take." Hephaestus conceded.
"Master."
One of the automatons, revealed to be a man in a metal suit, approached.
"Alex and Cimon..."
"Hmm." Hephaestus growled in anger and mourning. "Timeos. Prepare their bodies. They'll be commended to the forge."
"Wait." Diana said shocked. "These aren't automatons, things you made? They're men?"
"Brothers." Eros clarified.
"Your's actually." Hephaestus elaborated. "All, the male children of Amazons."
"What?" Diana exclaimed.
"It never crossed you mind?" He asked. "How you only have sisters? No, I suppose not. With your unspoken brother, I don't imagine the subject would have come up much about if there were others."
"And there were? There are?" Diana asked, gesturing around her to the men who were delicately removing the two burned bodies.
"As you can see." The Smith confirmed. "Would be that I could have gotten your prince, but Hades himself decreed him off limits from any of us, even Thanatos himself couldn't touch him."
"I... I thought it was divine." Diana sounded uncertain.
"HAHAHA!" Eros laughed. "Divine? As in the will of the gods?"
"As a god." Hephaestus informed her as he readied his hammer and one of Diana's new brothers held steady a rod of metal. "I will tell you that they don't care about anyone but themselves."
"Wonder woman. your people, thrice a century, go on raids like pirates. They take to the sea-"
"For booty." Eros interrupted with a smirk.
"Don't be clever boy. Mortal vessels be their targets-"
"Seminal mortal vessels." Eros clarified.
"And they have their way. It must seem like a dream to most men. Beautiful women offering themselves. But it quickly turns to a nightmare. Their lives, drained from them."
Diana listened to the Smith god's story, her expression growing ever more stormy as he continued.
"Triumphant, the amazons return to paradise island, and wait. Nine months later, some celebrate the birth of a daughter, some don't. So I trade weapons for the failures."
"For boys you mean." Diana said.
"Yes."
"Boys to man your forge. Did he know?"
"Who? Your prince? Who's to say if he knew at the time. A boy of six the last time you're people needed to undergo that ritual. Likely all he would have known is the disappearance of some of your people from a few days. Given how he was raised, I'm wouldn't be surprised if those few days were the greatest of his young life. All that would happen then would be the growing of your sisters' bellies, and the births."
"He was isolated as a child." Diana explained. "Kept away from most, unless it was deemed 'necessary instruction', a word I learned meant torture for him."
"Then most likely he knew nothing of what truly occured. Only that in its aftermath more children came, including you. I still regret that I couldn't bargain him from your mother and Hell, he could have been something much more than just a subject of hate."
"More? You mean that as becoming one of your servants." Diana asked.
"That sounds like an accusation."
"Better that, than question a god." Diana said, storming off.
"Is it?" Eros called after her.
"Methinks you've given her much to think about, Smith." Lennox said.
"Have I?"
"Might 'ave hit a dangerous nerve."
"Eh?"
"Just sayin'." Lennox said as he lit a cigarette off the god's fiery arms. "A tongue can strike harder than a hammer at times."
Later that night, Lennox knocked on Diana's door, hoping to speak with her. As he turned the knob, he found the bed made and the room seemingly empty.
"Aye."
Lennox was not given the chance to finish, as he was pulled forcibly through the door by Diana.
"I'm awake." She whispered.
"Right. Tha' mean?"
"Unfortunately? Yes. We both have the same idea."
Together, the two of them left the room and began to sneak through the darkened corridors of Hephaestus' forge.
"Look." Lennox said. "I ain't sayin' that I'm right all the time. In here, the wind, she can't speak to me. But-"
"This is wrong." Diana finished.
"Slavin' is what it is." He said as the two reached the bottom of a spiral staircase and peaked around a corner for guards. "Wha' about Zola?"
"We came her so we could free her. Why not spread that love?"
As the Smith god awoke, he found himself staring up at Diana and Lennox.
"Hephaestus." Wonder Woman said.
"Eh?" The good looked down at his bound body with bleary confusion.
"Lookin' for this yea ugly bastard?" Lennox asked, hefting the god's hammer over his shoulder.
"You said my lasso isn't a weapon. But when one is entwined in it, they speak the truth. And that, the truth, is my weapon."
"No." The got retorted. "Your weapon is intimidation. You blame the rope. That's the truth.
Diana gritted her teeth.
"Get-" She growled. "Up brother!"
She sent the god crashing through the walls of his forge, out into the same area where mere hours earlier she had discovered this new faction of her people.
"That is a word I've used only for one, the member of my family I held closest to my heart. It brings me joy that now I can call you all the same. BROTHERS! Amazons. It is time to rise. We are warriors, and-"
"Please, release our master." One of the men, Timeos, asked Diana without warmth.
That request stopped Diana and Lennox in their tracks. The rest of the men, the brothers and sons of the Amazons, crowded around the three as they made to stand guard at Hephaestus' side and ward off the two should it come to blows.
"You are making a horrible mistake." Timeos said. "We owe the Smith our lives. It it wasn't for him, we would have been thrown in the tide, to drown unloved."
"As my mother did to me." Hephaestus said. "Something I could never allow."
"Or worse." Another of Diana's new brothers said. "We would have been subject to the horrors of the amazons. The terrible fate they bestow onto any who they deem lesser than themselves. We have heard of the torments that were laid upon our lost brother."
"Nathaniel." Diana whispered.
"The Smith saved us from that fate. He wanted us and he raised us." Another man said
"Here we are artists." a fourth explained.
"Here we are happy." Timeos finished. "Please. release the master."
Diana looked around, seeing the frightened and pleading faces of her brothers, her family, whom she had only just discovered. They looked at her as if she was a threat, as if she might attack at any moment.
In that single instant, she recognised the look in each of their eyes. It was the look in Nathaniel's whenever he looked upon her sisters.
Bile started to rush up her throat as horror bloomed on her face.
"I... I'm" Her fingers numbly released the lasso, and she covered her mouth with her hand, trying to steady her stomach and keep from vomiting.
"Tired." Hephaestus excused. free from the lasso he laid his hands on Diana's shoulders with a sad look.
"Get some rest. You'll need it. For tomorrow, you can go to hell."
The Smith retreated, followed by his sons. Eros came up at the rear, gazing back at Diana, as she fell to her knees and held her face in her hands. Hermes came up to stand with her and Lennox, beckoning them back towards their sleeping quarters.
Nathaniel arrived back in his home, the italian sun had long since set, and was closer to rising in the morning.
"We have brothers."
Nathaniel jumped, whirling around to find Diana sitting in his couch.
"What?" He asked, taking a step closed to his sister.
"We have brothers." She repeated. Standing, but not meeting his eyes. Her face was awash in shadow, hair covering her eyes.
Nathaniel's eyes widened slightly, clearly much had happened in the mere day or two since his departure. However, there was no point in trying to hide his knowledge now, Diana would see through it, no matter how good he'd gotten at lying in recent times.
"We do." He said solemnly.
"You kept this from me."
"I did."
"Why?"
"I... I don't know."
"I met them today you know. I saw them, dressed as automatons and working Hephaestus' forge. He told me the story of the brothers of the Amazons; traded like goods in exchange for weapons forged by the boys they had sold before."
Nathaniel took another step forwards, and was thrown to the ground as Diana punched him hard across the face.
"I tried to free them!" She screamed, laying blow after blow on her only brother.
"I saw them and thought them slaves! They asked me to stop. They are happy there, happier as servants than... than what they would have been growing up with us."
Tears rained as much as blows as Nathaniel laid on the floor.
"I saw the look in their eyes. They looked at me like you used to look at Mother! If I'd known, if you had told me, if you had trusted me."
She slammed her fists down on his chest, cracking the floor.
"You lied to me, you've done nothing but lie to me since you came back. I... I hate it. I hate that this is what we are now Nathaniel. You know of things, and refuse to tell me, then the consequences of that knowledge come and strike at me. Mother, my father, Hera, our brothers, You do nothing but hide from and lie to me."
Nathaniel looked up at his crying sister.
"You're right."
Diana blinked through her tears, looking down as Nathaniel's arms came up and embraced her.
"I've lied to you. I've kept things from you. So many of them you did deserve to know. I... I thought that I could protect you, like I used to when we were young."
In spite of herself Diana smiled.
"But you don't need me to protect you anymore. You don't need me anymore. You've grown." He said, and Diana could see tears beginning to form in Nathaniel's own eyes.
"I... for the longest time, you were the only person to love me Diana, and though I hate to admit it, there were times I doubted if that love was true, or existed only for so long as you needed me. So long as I served a purpose."
The two moved to the couch, where Diana for the first time, pulled her brother into her arms and held him as he wept.
"I thought, so long as I knew these things, I could protect you. That you might still need me to protect you, but you don't. You don't need anyone to protect you anymore. Not even me." He smiled through his tears and cupped her face.
"You have been, since the moment I laid eyes on you, my most precious treasure."
Diana smiled, crying anew alongside her sibling.
"But I knew that no matter how much I might have wanted to, I couldn't keep you. You weren't mine, you never were and you never would be. You are the world's treasure Diana, your own person, and from the time you were a child, I knew that you were meant for more than our home, our people, me. I feared... no I knew, that you would move past me, move on to where I would no longer be important."
Nathaniel leaned back on the couch, pulling Diana close as she looked at him.
"So I thought, if I knew everything. If I had the answer to every question, that I might find a place in your life. Now I see that my attempts have done nothing but push you away."
Nathaniel let out a humorless laugh.
"Who would have thought. The great disgrace of the Amazons would fail, would only bring pain. I suppose mother and our sisters were right about me."
"No."
Nathaniel looked down at Diana.
"You made a mistake." She smiled sadly. "Maybe a few mistakes, but never, ever say that they were right. If there was one thing I can say with absolute certainty that our people were wrong about, it was you. My whole life, I was expected to be perfect, as the fatherless amazon of clay, as the daughter of the queen, as representative of our people in man's world."
"I seem to recall you chose that last one." Nathaniel smiled.
"Regardless, the only person who never expected anything of me, was you. You have always been the person with whom I could just be me. You offered comfort even when you were hurt. You offered peace when your life was chaos. You gave me nothing but happiness whenever we were together. Every terrible thing I was ever told about men, about you, by mother or my sisters, you proved them wrong."
Diana gripped her brother tightly finally drying her eyes.
"I love you Nathaniel. You're my brother and I love you. I lived in a world without you for fifteen years, and I can't remember a time I was happier than when I came to your prison and you sang our song.
She leaned up and kissed his forehead placing her chin on his shoulder and hugging him fiercely.
"I might grow up, I might change, and there will be times perhaps when we drift apart, but I promise you, no matter what, that I will always need you. I will never, ever stop needing you, because you are my brother.
So, brother and sister sat together, as the sun came over the horizon, and they cried and they wept... together. Always together.
This chapter was an emotional roller-coaster. I wanted to make the brothers of the amazons a little more heart-breaking for Diana since she grew up with a brother. The end bit with Nathaniel almost made me cry, so I warn you. Then again I really tried to make that bit a real heart wrenching conversation. Hope you enjoyed.
Omake
Nathaniel's Fears.
Nathaniel sat with Diana on his couch, their talk finished. Diana rested drowsily on his shoulder, but seemed reluctant to sleep.
Smiling, Nathaniel began to hum softly, rocking himself slightly before singing.
"When I was younger I saw, our mama yell, and say that I'd sinned
She broke my young heart and I cried, as she went and threw it to the wind
And our mama swore that I'd fall, that I'd be a loss, a crushing regret
And that was the day that I promised, I'd never think of love, if it does not exist
But dear one,
you are my only exception,
you are my only exception,
You are my only exception,
You are my only exception,
Maybe I knew, somewhere
Deep in my soul
That love's never real
That I've got to find other ways
To make it alone,
To live in this hell
But I've always lived like this
Keeping a permanent, distance
And up until then
I had consigned myself to my end
In loneliness
Because none of them would ever reach out but
You were the only exception,
You were the only exception,
You were the only exception,
You were the only exception,
I got a tight grip on my fate you see
But I can't let go of what's in front of me here
I know you'll leave me in the end, when you find someone
Leave me mourning how you had to move past me
You were my only exception,
You were my only exception,
You were my only exception,
You were my only exception,
And I'm on my way to believing
Oh, that i'll try to keep my heart beating"
Nathaniel yawned as he saw Diana sleeping peacefully on his shoulder, letting out soft puffs of air as the sound of her steady breathing filled the room.
"Swee dreams, little sister."
Nathaniel said before joining her in peaceful slumber