There were doctors, and then there were New York doctors. Doctors might see ten GSW's in their career, but New York doctors could see that many in one day. Admittedly, there were worse places to be a doctor, like Chicago, Boston, Hell, Los Angeles, even Detroit but New York doctors got used to some seriously gruesome occurrences. So to say that three New York doctors saw my condition as an atrocity to mankind, was saying something.
"You've broken all of your ribs. You have punctured both lungs, and they'll probably have to be drained multiple times a month from here on out. Your womb has been literally cut out, and your eyes have both been singed by a match being put out on them. You have several fractures along your legs, and one of your hands was cut off, while the scapula in your other shoulder was completely shattered- Oh, God! I don't know why I'm saying this!" The flighty, panicked nurse started to cry and rushed out, not realizing that I could hear her, and if I had the ability to, I would have screamed, but that's the first thing my attackers took from me; my tongue.
There was nothing I could do now but sit through the horrible pain, try to dull my mind with a morphine drip. The uniform 'plop, plop, plop', without the positive effect of the pain relief. Thalia was a flesh and bone coffin that contained me. I didn't move because she couldn't. I didn't cry out because she couldn't. I didn't die because she couldn't. It was hell on Earth, but as the scenery changed, twisting and writhing, I thought to myself, maybe it wasn't on Earth at all...
The landscape around me was steadily changing from a hospital to a palace with each breathe. Finally, the tubes, gurneys, antiseptic smell, and beeping monitors were replaced with soaring columns of marble and quartz chandeliers, the smell of honeysuckle and the faint hum of a harp.
"Normally by now I'd have said something cryptic and confusing, but I believe that if anyone deserves some real talk, it's you." It was one of those dreams again, the ones where everything is being narrated. The voice was indescribable, like someone had taken Morgan Freeman, mixed his voice with lead singer from Led Zeppelin, and then threw in a dash of Freddie Mercury and stirred, but there was something else too. It was smooth, but strong, not like an eel, more like a fox. "Ooh! I'm a fox, huh?!" The voice asked, and suddenly a fox appeared beside me, it's jaws bared and it's fangs slathering, it made a strange barking sound, somewhere between a yip and a howl...it was laughing? The fox was laughing? At me?!
"Yeah, you're pretty slow, aren't you?!" There are very few people who can't tell a god by their form...unless...no..." The voice whispered, almost shattering my eardrum with the power behind his words. The fox then curled into a ball at my feet and erupted into a column of fire which promptly vanished and reappeared as a man, he stood about six foot ten inches, with obsidian eyelashes, and a quirk of his lips that made him seem like a maniac. His eyes were an emerald green with an opulescent core, and a nose like David Tennant's. In other words, he looked like a as insane as he sounded.
"Two weeks ago, I told Zeus that you would be needed in the upcoming war. I told him that if he told you that you were a demigod and that he was your father that I would protect you, make you invisible." I frowned, this guy was making about as much sense as a pen with an eraser. But something seemed to tingle in the back of my head. It was a faint memory of my mother. I had a picture of my dad at one time, but there was something abnormal about him. Other than leaving us on our own with nothing but an extra mouth to feed, he strayed from the usual deadbeat/douche mold. He wasn't a gambler, nor was he a poor dude, he just didn't care about my mom, or me for that matter. I looked up at the fox/dude and he smiled kindly at me. "Come on, let me introduce you to the family."
I smiled, he sounded like an Italian mobster, and I tried to imagine him in a pin-stripe three piece with a thick Brooklyn accent. Completed with a black fedora. I opened my eyes from my small laughing fit and I couldn't believe it. He looked just as I had imagined, clad in a scarlet dress shirt and pinstripe pants. He was a dead ringer for Scarface.
"Thanks! I kinda like the Al Pacino look myself. Nice...Nice." He smiled at me and I tried to refrain from laughing at the swaggering footsteps that he began to take, he stuffed his hands in his pockets and nodded to some random person we passed. I blinked, we were encountering people? When did that happen? We were supposed to be alone. I don't remember there being people.
"Oh, sorry about them! They're projections, but don't worry! They're harmless enough, usually." He tried at convincing, but he sounded like he was trying to convince himself more than me. Slowly, the street emptied and the crowds dissipated, and the two of us were standing in front of a huge set of double doors. He leaned back and without turning around, gripped my hand. I frowned, but with a swipe of his hands, the door opened with ease. Suffice to say, I decided to stay.
"This, is the council. These are the gods. This is a farce, and they're all at odds." Perseus said, acting bored while surveying the room until his eyes landed on three women. They were all tall, and not Shaq tall, more like, 'Taking out Tokyoo, here comes Godzilla!', tall. (Props to anyone who gets the reference). So, these three really couldn't be judged by their height, but one of them was giving off a real; 'redheaded step-child' vibe, with, well, red hair and a grimace on her face. Not to say that she wasn't pretty, she was just...well, young. The one in the center was pretty intimidating, she had her whole glare going on, staring down at the floor with furrowed brows, but it was hard to take her seriously with the far-away look in her dark gray eyes. The girl on the end though, she was in a class all her own. She was by far the most mundane of all the people in the room, with their crisp cut clothes, their neatly trimmed beards and their flowing hair and dresses, they were all like models, but this was a teenage girl, normal, (other than being taller than small McMansions), with unruly hair, psychedelic eyes and her legs lounging across the arms of her chair, with her little smart phone, flicking at the touch screen and occasionally giggling. "They're sorta boring." My kidnapper said, disturbing my thoughts on his thoughts.
"Yeah. But they're all tall." I muttered, causing him to look back at me and smile. He nodded as he turned to look around some more before his head suddenly lurched back toward the trio from earlier and his head perked up. "What?". I asked.
"I think I've found our seat. Come along Thalia, it's not polite to keep our guests waiting." The guy in front of me said and I realized for the first time, I didn't know his name. I opened my mouth to say something, but quickly closed it again as the door burst open behind me. 'Dude', for lack of his name, dragged me behind the throne of the middle woman, and I saw something strange. "Hello, Hestia! How are you doing?"
"I'm quite fine now that you're here, Perseus. I've been looking after these two, as I promised, now, please do put on a good little performance! And you, my dear, are going to have a hard life ahead, but I'll always be here for you." A young, mousy woman said, looking first at the newly named Perseus, and then at me. I tried to process what she had just said, but suddenly it was made very apparent; Perseus had arrived.
"There are two of you." I said, surprised. Perseus just smiled and nodded his head, looking proud of himself. "I suppose I should be surprised?" I asked, leaning my head to the side. I tried to take it all in stride, but it was disturbing.
I had always lived by the code that if I couldn't prove it with science, and I couldn't see it, it couldn't be real. I had assumed that gods were stories, that there could only be one of you in the same room at a time, even that people didn't come in sizes larger than basketball courts. I assumed all this because of the simple fact that I'd never seen evidence countering that premise, but here I was, surrounded by the statue of liberty's tallest cousins, with two of my chauffeur in the room and apparently, I was surrounded by gods. Well, shit! Why am I just learning this now?!
He looked back at me, quirked his eyebrow and smiled, leaning toward me and kissing me on the cheek. "Thalia, my dear, there are much more amazing things than this to be surprised at." I blushed at him and he winked at me.
"Then I don't think I want to be part of your world bro!" I argued adamantly, stomping my steel toed boots, but the sound never even made it to the walls to echo. "So, how about you just wake me up in bed again without any of this shit and I'll just write all this 'gods' crap off as a bad acid trip, eh?" I pushed Perseus, but as soon as I touched him, I felt sick. He grabbed my arm and frowned, slowly sidling me to the ground, but as soon as I was on the floor, the other Perseus began to talk.
"Hello, ladies and gentlemen!" Perseus said, sounding like a game show host. "Have I got something for you!" He walked all the way into the middle and raised his arms like an WWE wrestler. He looked at all of the faces around him and he smiled widely, his teeth almost blindingly white. The annoying looking pissant in the biggest throne gave him a glare and slammed his staff into the ground, making it sound as if thunder was rolling right above my head.
"I, Lord Zeus, command you, announce yourself, fool! Some of us still stand on principle, unlike you, usurper!" The bandage bearded giant said. Perseus looked him in the eye and flipped him the bird, drawing a strange item out of nowhere. A shepherd's crook. He walked back to the center, near the hearth, and turned around, it looked as if he was going to bow to the council, but instead, at the last minute, he turned to the three women we were standing behind and bowed to them.
"Miladies. I am Loki, god of lies, heroes, the passing of time, and father of the fox, son of the snake, and foreboder of Ragnarok. I bow in the presence of such beauty, wisdom, and skill." He said and I turned to look at my Perseus. I nodded at him and he shrugged.
"Smooth talker." I muttered and he smiled, nodding in affirmation.
"Hello Jester, how are you?" The grey eyed goddess said, looking at the 'god of lies' with humor in her eyes. He smiled, winked at her, and motioned at his forehead, and then to hers. She laughed.
"Hey Perseus, I got that app you told me about. It's awesome." The one on the end said, leaning forward and winking at Perseus, who bit his bottom lip erotically and winked flirtatiously at her. There was no doubt that she was crushing on Perseus. All three of them were.
"Hello Raven, how are your scars healing?" The redhead asked, and the brunette smiled coyly, as if challenging her. But she met his eyes calmly.
"Want to see, Artemis?" Perseus asked, looking at Artemis with a sensual love in his eyes. "I can take off my shirt-?" He was cut off by a blush from the redhead and a grunt from the fortune five-hundred exec. who cleared his throat and gave my chauffeur a glare. He smiled and looked at Zeus. "Down to business then?"
Just as everyone began to shift into their seats and calm down, the blonde across the main pavilion jerked upright and ran straight toward the hearth, throwing himself across the coals and spewing strange words out of his mouth. Perseus wrapped his arms around my shoulders and forced me to turn around, and stare straight into his eyes. I heard the strangled cries from behind me as the man seized across the room.
"You don't want to see this, trust me." Loki said, leaning his chin on my head while whispering in my ear. "Apollo's not going to be doing too hot for a while. That's the blonde's name, just in case you were wondering." I nodded in understanding and saw that the blonde had disappeared, and Perseus was deep in conversation with the bearded king of the gods. I buried my head in Perseus' shoulder again and frowned, feeling some bond form between me and the man straight from my dreams, literally. Perseus began to stroke my head and I sighed, there was nothing stopping me now, I looked back at Perseus and nodded and he seemed to understand my sentiment exactly.
"I'm going to wake up, aren't I?" I asked Perseus and he nodded. "You better be there when I wake up, you slimy bastard." Perseus smiled down at me and kissed my forehead. I hugged him tightly again and closed my eyes, opening them again to see something I wasn't expecting.
"Ah, hello Ms. Grace, I'm your doctor, but you can call me Perseus though." It was him…
He was dressed in a white lab coat over a t-shirt and jeans. he wore thick rimmed glasses and a stethoscope around his neck. "Miss me?" He asked, winking at me.