It's All Greek To Me

Puck was honestly not sure which was more disturbing – the fact that Thea had suddenly transformed into a sixteen-foot-tall warrior woman with laser eyes or the fact that no one else in the restaurant seemed to notice that anything unusual was happening.

Thea was staring down at him and clutching her spear threateningly. "Answer me, mortal!" she demanded, her voice reverberating through Puck's bones.

"What?" was the only word he managed to get out through his shock and confusion.

"Come on, Athena!" Lauren protested, standing up beside him. "Do you have to do this in public?"

"I don't believe I was speaking to you." Athena turned her glowing (holy shit) eyes back to Puck. "Well? Are you prepared to take me on in battle?"

Puck clenched his jaw. "Yes," he said.

"Puck!" Lauren cried.

Thea/Athena smiled. "We shall meet at the arena at first light the day after tomorrow."

"Uh…where?"

But rather than answer, Athena disintegrated into mist, and vanished.

Puck looked back to the rest of Lauren's relatives with a newfound nervousness and confusion to match. Most of them were getting up and leaving, completely at ease with…whatever had just happened. Missy was smirking at Puck in a way that made him wonder just how deep in shit he really was, but the rest were pretty much ignoring him. After a minute or so, Donny approached them.

"That was a mistake on your part, Noah," he said calmly. "A mortal taking on the goddess of war strategy?" He shook his head and tsked.

"Who are you?" Puck asked.

"Poseidon, the god of the sea. At your service. But not really."

…Well, that explained the supposed barnacles in his bed.

"I'm going to help you."

"Wait, what?" Puck and Lauren said in unison.

Donny smiled, his beard twitching. "I've always liked you, Dite," he said. "I know I may not act like it, but I really do almost think of you like a daughter. This is the first time that I've seen you with someone you actually seem to like."

"But…don't you want to win the bet?"

"I've already lost," Donny said with a wink. He turned and headed for the door. "Both of you, meet me at your school's football field first thing tomorrow morning."

Puck shook his head, his mind still boggled by everything that had gone down in the last… was it really only twenty minutes?

Lauren sighed. "Come on. You should sleep before tomorrow."

"Why?"

"When he says 'first thing', he literally means the crack of dawn."

"Oh." Puck was less concerned with having to get up early than he was with something that Lauren had said earlier. "What was the bet you were talking about?"

Lauren avoided looking at him as they exited the restaurant. "Uh…well…the reason that I'm here in the first place was that Donny and I got into a bit of an argument, and we made a bet that I could still get someone to fall in love with me even if I…wasn't myself."

"I don't get it."

"If I wasn't attractive," she clarified. "And before you argue with that, I know that you think I'm sexy, and frankly, I agree with you, but the fact is that when I look like this, most people don't."

"That's stupid."

Lauren shrugged.

"So…you're really the goddess of love?"

"Yeah." She grinned, her eyes glinting for a second. "Hey, does me being thousands of years old make me a pedophile if you're still a minor?"

"Probably," Puck said as they reached his truck. "Hey, so, um… can I see what you really look like?"

Lauren stared at him for a moment, as if she was trying to decide whether or not it was a good idea, but then she began to change in the same way Thea had. In only a few seconds, she was sixteen feet tall, wearing only a flowing Greek-style toga, and no longer overweight. Her face still looked like Lauren, but her high cheekbones were much more prominent and her chin more defined. Her hair was the same color as before, but it had turned to wavy locks reaching down to her waist, and was laced with strings of tiny pearls. The belt encircling her rounded hips was embroidered with scallop shells and other smaller ocean treasures. She looked…delicate.

"Don't smite me or anything, but I like the old Lauren better."

"Get your ass out of bed, Puckerman. Time to start the real work."

Puck groaned and pulled his pillow over his head, only to have it yanked out of his fingers. "Puck!" Lauren's voice snapped. "Get up. Now."

"Why?" he whined, still keeping his eyes closed.

"We were supposed to meet Donny at the football field five minutes ago. Gods shouldn't be kept waiting. Come on!" She slapped his butt for emphasis.

"You can keep doing that," he mumbled.

"Okay, that's it." Suddenly, Puck was dragged effortlessly out of bed and dropped onto the floor.

"Ow!" he complained, finally wide awake. "Lauren, it's still dark out. And how did you get in here, anyways?"

"I'm a goddess, Puck," she deadpanned. "Now get dressed, because we have to meet Donny."

Finally, Puck dragged himself to his feet and pulled on his usual jeans, t-shirt, and flannel button-down left open, but Lauren stopped him. "You might want to wear work-out clothes," she said. "I don't know what Donny's got planned, but it probably involves vigorous exercise."

Puck grumbled, but switched to gym shorts and a wife beater. It was way too early to be up.

Fifteen minutes later, as the sky overhead was just turning a rosy pinkish hue, Lauren and Puck walked onto the football field at McKinley. Donny was waiting for them in the middle of the field.

"Good morning, Noah," he said.

Puck only grunted in response, still unhappy to be awake.

"Now, Dite is going to help you as well during the fight, but you also have to be able to move quickly and think on your feet. Athena isn't Ares – she's goddess of war strategy. She uses her brain, which, trust me, is a lot more powerful than yours. She's going to play dirty," Donny explained. "So, you'll have to trick her."

Puck frowned. "How exactly do I trick a god?"

Donny grinned. "Exactly."

"Come on, Puckerman!" Lauren/Aphrodite called from down the field, her voice easily carrying through the air. She was in her full, sixteen-foot-tall body, armed with a large spear and not even appearing the least bit tired from their day's work. It was already noon, and Puck didn't think he'd ever been this exhausted.

"Get a move on, boy!" Donny/Poseidon shouted from the sidelines, also in his god-form. He held a trident that was even taller than he was.

Puck growled under his breath, clutching his human-sized spear (conjured out of thin air by Poseidon) with blistered palms and trying to think of the best attack. But he was tired and he hadn't even eaten since they were at Breadsticks the night before. The last time he'd asked for a lunch break, Donny had simply stated that Theseus, Heracles, and Bellerophon had not been allowed lunch breaks.

Whoever they were, Puck thought snappishly.

Puck glanced at the sky, twisting his spear in his hands. It looked like it was going to rain.

"Puck!" Aphrodite yelled, pounding the butt of her spear into the ground to get his attention (the soil shook under his feet from the impact, despite the fact that she was standing sixty yards away).

He took a deep breath and, forcing energy into his aching muscles, began to run forward. Aphrodite only stood still until he was a few yards away, and then swiped the blunt end of her spear under his feet, flipping him over like a pancake. He lay on his back, trying to get his lungs to open after the wind had been knocked out of them, as his gigantic and somewhat terrifying girlfriend leaned on her spear and smirked down at him. "You can't keep using the same approach," she told him. "It's way too predictable, and Athena will kill you right off the bat. She's not going to give you a second chance."

"Well, I never had years and years of Spartan combat practice, so give me a break," Puck spat, almost at the end of his rope. There was only so far a mortal could push himself.

"You need to get her helmet," Poseidon said as he came up to stand beside his niece. "Once you have it, it will protect you and you can move in for the strike."

Puck pulled himself to his feet with his spear, brushing the dirt off his arms. "So, you want me to grab a gigantic metal hat off the head of a sixteen-foot-tall woman who could easily turn me into a cockroach."

Aphrodite chuckled. "Cockroach, no. Spider, maybe. And yeah, that's what you have to do."

"Okay, why aren't you worried that someone will see us?" Puck asked.

She shrugged. "Mortals see what they want to see."

Poseidon appeared deep in thought for a moment. "I don't think Noah's going to win this one," he said. Then he smiled. "At least, not without power."

"Huh?"

"It's possible that I could temporarily transfer some of my powers to you," the sea god explained. "I wouldn't offer if you'd been trained as a soldier or if you had more than a day to prepare, but I think desperate times call for desperate measures."

Puck's eyebrows shot up in surprise. "I didn't know you were allowed to do that."

"Gods are gods, Noah. We do want we want. It certainly wouldn't be the first time a god pitched in to try to rig a fight. Now hold still."

Poseidon raised his trident, pointing the middle barb straight at Puck's forehead (which was more than a little intimidating), and then began to speak in what Puck assumed was Ancient Greek. Tiny bolts of electricity began to jump back and forth between the prongs of the god's trident, and suddenly Puck was blasted backwards, flying through the air and slamming into the ground almost fifteen feet away from where he'd been standing.

Aphrodite knelt over him as his lungs struggled to expand. "You all right, Puckerman?"

"…OW," Puck wheezed, trying to roll over and push himself onto his knees (and failing miserably).

When his ribs were finally opening normally again, Puck stood up, feeling a little light-headed. Every nerve in his body felt like it was charged with static, and the tips of his fingers were prickling.

Poseidon glanced up at the clouds that were beginning to darken as a few raindrops began to dot the grass around their feet. "Hm. It's not salt water, but it'll do," he said. "Try to change its direction."

"…uh…"

"The rain, boy. Change its path."

Puck had absolutely no clue how to go about doing so, but he figured that it was probably in his best interests to give it a shot. He tried to focus his mind on the rain now falling steadily over the field, and feel the static buzzing in his cells. The rain continued to fall normally, soaking into his clothes (both Poseidon and Aphrodite remained dry).

Suddenly, Puck was hit on the top of his skull with something hard. "Ow!" he yelped, rubbing his head. He looked down to see a golf-ball-sized chunk of ice just as another struck him on the shoulder. "Where are these coming from?"

"You froze the rain rather than directing it," Poseidon explained. "You're not used to your abilities. Give it another try."

Three more times, Puck created hail, and then on his fourth attempt, he was pelted with boiling water that left several scalds on his exposed shoulders.

"God damn it!" he yelled, rubbing his raw skin. "How much longer do we have to do this for?"

"Perhaps a different approach is in order," Poseidon said. "Try using the earth to your advantage."

"What?" Puck asked, completely exasperated.

"I am also the god of earthquakes, Noah."

…Okay, he had to admit that was badass.

A/N: Please leave a review! Next up, the epic battle!

I wanted to actually write what Poseidon said in Ancient Greek, but I only speak Modern Greek and I didn't want to use a translator. I also used the original form of Hercules, which is Heracles, or as the Greeks pronounce it, Iracles.