Jaune woke up somewhere unfamiliar. He wondered where he was on, and he distantly remembered the fever dream he'd had about Auntie Summer being a werewolf, his mother and two of his sisters being eldritch abominations, his best friends being part of a secretive organisation and a cute monstergirl housemate. He took in his surroundings, and frowned when he realised he seemed to be in some sort of advanced hospital room. The walls, ceiling and floor were made of a smooth white marble-esque thing, and apart from the bed there was a dining table with four chairs, a sofa facing a large flat screen tv and a small kitchenette. There were a few doors he assumed led to a bathroom or closet, and he sighed when he realised he had probably suffered a mental breakdown for one reason or another and was being treated for it at some sort of asylum or mental hospital.
His idea, and hope, that everything that had happened over the past twenty four hours was dispelled by the sight of a small green lady wearing a maid uniform.
"Oh." The goblin blinked, realising he was awake. "Sorry if I woke you."
"It's okay." Jaune groaned, even if it really wasn't. "You didn't wake me."
That much was true, and made all the more clear by the fact that when she went back to her work cleaning up Summer's home away from home she made not even a sound, not even as she heft a vacuum cleaner twice her size of her head. Jaune shook his head and stumbled up, taking the vacuum from her with ease and earning a pout.
"I was handling it." The pint sized green maid protested, and Jaune smiled acquiescently, like one would when speaking to a child talking about the Tooth Fairy…wait…
"I know, it's just the chivalrous thing to do right?" Jaune replied, hefting the vacuum up and nodding to her. "Where do you want this putting?"
"Over there." The maid huffed, and Jaune followed her pointed finger to the other end of the apartment. "Stupid humie's and stupid rules."
"That's not a slur is it?" Jaune blinked, earning snort from the goblin.
"Snowflake humie." The goblin cackled. "No its not a slur. Go wake up your girlfriend or my vacuum will."
"My what now?" Jaune blinked, turning so fast he got whiplash. He blanked at the sight of Blake laying on the other side of the bed he had been sleeping in, thankfully just as clothed though curling up next to where he had been laying and grumbling quietly in her sleep.
Blake's sleep was further disturbed by the roaring sound of the vacuum cleaner turning on suddenly, making Jaune jump and Blake literally yowl as she leaped out of bed and got tangled on the floor in the sheets. The goblin cackled before Jaune turned the vacuum off and gave her a dark look, earning an unapologetic shrug in return.
"Newbie's get hazed." The goblin explained. "Get used to it."
"We might not be staying." Jaune gritted out, and the goblin blanked for a moment.
"Are you sure?" The goblin prodded unabashedly, blinking slightly. "Agent Summer made it seem you were."
"Agent Summer is an optimist at heart who isn't always right." Jaune retorted. "Are you here to actually be useful or torment us?"
The goblin muttered something and went back to her work, though she rather pointedly left the vacuum alone. Jaune shook his head before heading over to Blake, who was fighting against her sheets.
"Blake?" Jaune asked, and the sheets stilled. "Are you alright?"
"Help!" She squawked. "The sheets-they're trying to eat me!"
"No they aren't." Jaune sighed, kneeling down and helping unwrap the cocoon Blake had accidentally made for herself. "Better?"
"Light." Blake panted, face flushed and sweaty from the stuffiness of the sheets and the franticness with which she had fought against them. "Never thought I'd be glad to see the light. Thank you Jaune."
"No problemo Blake." Jaune smiled, helping her to her feet and haphazardly tossing the sheet back onto the mattress. He would've tried to make it neater for Summer, but apparently she had a maid and he was not open to the idea of giving that maid less work to do after how she'd acted. His belly rumbled, and he considered asking her directions on where to get food, but he shook his head. The goblin maid seemed like the sort of person who'd give him directions to a place where he'd end up being the food instead. "Come on, let's go see if this place has a cafeteria or something."
They headed out of the large apartment room silently, neither knowing where the shower was, if there was any, and not wanting to risk asking the maid on the chance she'd send them to the sewers or something. He stared down the ends of the hallway, which was littered by identical looking doors only distinguished by strange symbols he did not know or recognise. He turned to Blake and shrugged, earning a shrug in return, and he shrugged again before turning right. It was the right way after all, or so his father always said whenever they'd gotten lost on their camping trips.
The hallway split into another two different hallways turning left and right. He decided to jog down the other way and peer over the edge of the end of the hallway to the left, only seeing another right and left turn to similar looking corridors with more symbols on the doors. He sighed before turning back and turning right, and at the end of the corridor was a single turn to the right. He followed it down and noticed the wall to the left was barren of rooms, until they came across double doors in the middle of the wall. He turned to Blake, shrugging again, and then stepped through the doors to be greeted by a flight of lengthy but not steep steps. He sighed again, stretching his arms before beginning his ascent, Blake just behind him to the left.
At the top he was breathing more heavily than before, but he wasn't out of puff and he wasn't sweating too heavily. The main problem with it was the fact he'd had to walk up a long flight of stairs in the morning. At least the sides were lined by plants that were somehow growing under the ground, or they were plastic or some sort of supernatural thing. He shivered at the thought of them being Venus fly traps of some sort, before shaking his head. If they wanted to they would have ate him already. He shoved open the doors at the top of the stairs and blinked when a wide pool of water stretched out before them. There was an artificial beach, rocks and even some wooden huts of the type you would see on holiday. A few people were crowded around the huts, and Jaune was allured by the sweet smell of coffee.
"Greetings." An old man with a pushy beard greeted as Jaune and Blake settled on a pair of stools. He was tall, and despite his apparent age there were few wrinkles Jaune could see, and his skin was a bronze hew as if it was tanned from long days on the beach. He wore beige cargo shorts and a flowery Vacuoan touristy shirt. They drew the attention of the other customers as they settled into their stools, and Jaune tried hard not to stare at Centaur, lion-lady with wings thing and a cyclops. "You must be new to the Circle. What are your names?"
"I'm Jaune." Jaune replied, smiling politely at the man. He had an air of gravitas to him, one that made Jaune feel at ease, and he wondered what sort of supernatural being, if he was any, the man was. "This is Blake."
"I believe it is a good morning." Blake said, nodding at the man tiredly. "But it is hard to tell here."
"It is indeed morning." The man chuckled, grabbing two cups and filling it with coffee from a machine behind him. Jaune took it gratefully and sighed when he felt the caffeine flow through him, whereas Blake looked like she had swallowed a lemon. "Is it not to your tasting?"
"It is bitter." Blake replied, putting the cup down and smiling apolgoetically at the man. "I mean no offense."
"There is none taken." The man smiled. "I can add some milk or cream or sugar, but even then it may not be to your liking. Would you like to try tea instead?"
"Jaune usually puts milk and sugar in the coffee's he makes me." Blake said, smiling proudly. "He is a brilliant cook!"
"Sounds like a keeper." The old man smirked, and there were snickers from the other customers that made Jaune blush with embarrassment. "Milk and sugar coming right up."
He added the other ingredients and stirred with a spoon before handing the modified, or rather improved if you were looking at it from Blake's perspective, cup of coffee. Jaune didn't mind whether his coffee was black or had milk or sugar in. He valued it for the morning boost it gave, not its taste. He took another sip and sat in silence with Blake before blinking.
"Uhm..." He began awkwardly. "I don't mean to be rude but who are you?"
"Ah!" The old man exclaimed, shaking his head disappointedly. "Where are my manners? I am Poseidon, over there is Chiron, the Sphinx is Horemakhet and that is my son, Polyphemus."
"Why do all those sound familiar?" Jaune asked himself aloud, and Poseidon laughed heartily.
"You'll find out soon enough." He smiled. "Are you enjoying your stay here? How has the Circle been treating you so far?"
"We...Uhm...It's nice?" Jaune replied, flinching when it sounded like a question rather than a statement. "I mean...it looks good. Plus the people a pretty nice. Mostly."
"The hazing will die down once you complete your initiations." Poseidon smiled, grabbing a dish rag from something and cleaning a cup with it. Jaune blinked when he realised it had been resting on a golden trident. "What are you aiming to become? Clerks? Informants? Cooks? Cleaners? Agents?"
"We don't know yet." Jaune replied, and Poseidon cocked his head curiously. "We don't know if we'll be staying. Blake needs to sign the Silence Accords, but if we do stay I think the plan is to become agents. I think."
He turned to Blake, who nodded firmly. Poseidon shrugged.
"Fair enough." He said. "We do not force anyone to stay here, and there are many who are uncomfortable with certain members or species here either due to past experience or...the implications of their existence."
"Well, I don't mind you guys seeing as none of you are vampires." Jaune shrugged, before blinking and wincing at how that sounded. "N-None of you are right? You also don't have vampire friends...do you?"
"No." Poseidon chuckled. "I am not a vampire, nor do I consort with many."
"I certainly don't." The Centaur, Chiron, said, downing his drinks before sliding it over to Poseidon. "I best be going now. Your children won't train themselves."
"Some of them do." Polyphemus grumbled, before giving Jaune a dismissive look. "I do not consort with blood-suckers neither."
"Nor I." Said the Sphinx, whose name Jaune dreaded trying to pronounce. "Just call me Sphynx boy. There are few of my race and many dwell far away from here."
"Are you telepathic?" Jaune thought, though the Sphynx made no sign of having heard him.
"Polyphemus, help Chiron train your brothers and sisters and cousins today." Poseidon instructed, turning to the Centaur who had tried sneaking away. "Do not forget to pay for that coffee old friend."
"I'd never dream of doing otherwise." The Centaur smiled, though he was still trotting away. "Add it to my bill I owe you."
"With the interest on that and by the time you pay that back I'll become a trillionaire." Poseidon grumbled, though even still he wrote something on a pad of paper behind the bar. Blake tapped his arm and pointed to the water nearby, and he blinked when he saw it roiling angrily. Poseidon sighed, and the waters stilled. "You'll have to actually pay today Horemakhet. Chiron's familiarity has grated on my nerves and charity."
"I was going to anyway." The Sphinx replied, tailing flicking lazily as it cast a glance over at Blake. "She needs to sign the Accords? What is she?"
"We...Uh..." Jaune blinked, thinking back to everything he'd heard in what he had hoped had just been a very strange dream. "I think Auntie Summer mentioned something about her being a Shadow or something?"
"Hm." Poseidon said, as the Sphinx hissed lightly and jumped a few stools further away from them. "Auntie Summer? Are you Jaune Arc?"
"Yeah." Jaune blinked. "Was I supposed to mention that?"
"Not unless you want people to demand to know how you survived an encounter with the Schnee, whether you are a Shadowling your self or whether you're willing to join the Circle." Poseidon shrugged. "Your aunt has spread quiet a lot of stories about her favourite nephew."
"You look adorable in a dress by the way!" The Sphinx called, and Jaune immediately blushed. Blake seemed to scowl, but she also seemed worried.
"Am I...Am I bad?" Blake asked quietly, staring at the Sphinx. "Why does she fear me?"
"Your kind is notorious for its rarity and the rampages that have occurred." Poseidon said, giving Jaune a pointed look. "Almost always because of the loss of their mate. This has caused a number of tall tales and stories, most of which are entirely misinformation born of lack of knowledge, some of which are true."
Jaune turned to Blake, who stared downwards with a downcast expression, he patted her back before realising her hand was free, taking it in his own and squeezing it gently. She smiled tentatively, before blinking and staring past him.
"Ohhh! Fresh meat!" Someone called, and Jaune turned and blinked when he saw a horde of women in the shallow water. "You better come with us before the Sirens arrive blondie. We'll look after you. Promise."
"For some reason I doubt that." Jaune mumbled, turning to Poseidon, hiding a wince as Blake's grip became a death grip squeezing his hand of all life. "Uhm...who are they?"
"Nymphs." Poseidon sighed. "Water Nymphs, or rather a mix of Naiad's, Nereid's and Oceanid's. In other words, trouble. My people are awakening, it is best if you left."
"Right." Jaune nodded, blinking awkwardly at the admittedly very attractive women beckoning him to the sea. "They don't want to eat me do they?"
"Possibly." Poseidon shrugged. "That's mostly what the Sirens do, but they've been getting bored stuck here most of the time. I wouldn't put it past them to do that, but if they don't wish to simply tease and seduce you then they probably intend to either drown or torture you. Or both."
"Then we will be leaving now to prevent that." Blake said, standing up suddenly and trying to drag him away. "Come on Jaune!"
"But we need to pay!" Jaune protested, and Poseidon chuckled.
"First time for first-timers get it on the house." Poseidon winked. "Besides, you don't have our currency."
Something caused the water to roil suddenly, and the nymphs gathered on the shoreline yelped and fled into the shallows, something dark seemed to loom in the distance in the water, and bubbles started to boil on the surface of the otherwise calm water. The once calm expanse of water was roiling with turmoil and with an unnnatural aggressiveness, as if it was something specific causing the chaos, rather than an act of nature.
"Leave now." Poseidon ordered authoritatively, grabbing his golden trident. "You too Horemakhet. Take them to Agent Rose if you would."
"Only because you asked so nicely." The Sphinx grumbled, casting a worry look at water ever it was in the distance. "Follow me new bloods."
Jaune was not going to object, and neither did Blake as they raced after the Sphinx across the artificial beach towards a set of doors they hadn't come in from. The Sphinx beat them, having flown there, and she yelled at them to hurry up, eyes wide with fear as she looked behind them.
"Do not turn around!" The Sphinx ordered, and only the complete and utter terror in her eyes made Jaune acquiesce. He had seen enough movies on the subject to know that either something was chasing them or there was something behind them so monstrous they would freeze with fear and lose their minds. Or something.
Blake didn't have pop culture to fall back on, and her curiosity was too great.
"No!" Cried, realising what she was doing as he head turned back. She gasped and froze, and Jaune frantically tried dragging her along the beach as he heard the water crash and roil thunderously and wind blow from out of nowhere.
"Foolish girl!" The Sphinx cried, leaping forward and trying to help drag her along as well. "How is it even here?!"
Jaune gritted his teeth, pulling harder and harder, doing his best to ignore the sounds of a titanic clash behind him. Lightning crackled out of nowhere, and something truly horrible bellowed so loudly he felt the earth shake above and below him.
"Come on Blake!" Jaune urged, pulling her along desperately. "We have to go!"
She dug in her heels however, and it took the concerted effort of both himself and the Sphinx pushing with all their strength to get her through the door. Blake keeled over, shaking and moaning in pain. He hovered over her, unsure of what to do an paralysed with fear.
"What do we do?" He asked the Sphinx. "What was that?"
"We wait." The Sphinx sighed, shaking sand out of her wings. "We cannot hold her down since she will hurt herself, but we will also have to make sure she does not roll down the stairs or something like that. As for what that was...you'd best ask Poseidon. This is his domain, and I only come along for the coffee in the morning."
Jaune turned to Blake, hands hovering over her and heart pounding. He gritted his teeth as anger surged over him, and he never felt as powerless as he had before. Just what in the hell was going on here?
Suddenly, darkness engulfed him, and he heard the Sphinx say his name before all went dark and black and utterly silent.
Then he saw.
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There is nothing. Nothing but everything. Nothing and nothing. Nothing and something
The universe, the seat of all life, is a mere speck before the comprehension of the nothing. The universe, the seat of all life, was something that should rarely be considered, as it was uninteresting compared to the vast mystery of the nothing beyond it, alluring the curiosity of something.
There was pain, sharp and sudden. There were monsters incomprehensible to the human mind and psyche, eating away at the something, biting and chewing and tearing as they spilled out from the nothing.
Tear drops of dark something fell from nowhere, spilling out across the many universes scattered before something. They tumbled and fell, breaking into droplets the size of the sun. Some fell through into a void where they'd fall for all eternity. Some landed on planets, some shattered them and others broke against them.
The droplets were suddenly alone, disconnected from the nothing and scattered across worlds across universes. Then they were disconnected from themselves, broken into individual droplets scattered here and there and everywhere.
They were forced to become things. Forced to become…themselves.
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The droplets were separate and alone and scared. They did not know what to do, what to feel or what to think. They did not know if they could do those things. The light bore down on them and hurt them, burning as bright and as sharp as the teeth of the monsters that ate away at the something.
There were things. Different to them in many aspects. The things were kind. The things were cruel. The things were good. The things were bad.
The things called themselves hoomans. The droplets did not know what to name themselves. The hoomans called them...Shadows, and they feared them, and they loved them, and the Shadows became them.
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The Nothing had a name. The name could not be spoken, could not be thought of, because uttering it would harm the hoomans. They could not understand, could not comprehend, the vastness that lied beyond what they understood. They did not know of the terrible horrors and the nor the awe-inspiring wonders that lay beyond their grasp of the feeble reality that kept them sane.
The Nothing was a Something. Now the Nothing is truly Nothing. Gone. Dead. Destroyed. Cosmic tears in the fabric of the universe remain from it's scattered, broken remains. Dark, oppressive black holes, strips of radiated shrouds that would destroy anything it drifted into, ruined debris the size of planets that would draw in other worlds and smash them against it.
The Nothing had not been alone. The Nothing had not been weak. It had been destroyed by something greater than itself. Something far beyond the comprehension of the hoomans or even of the remaining drips of Nothing. Something was coming. Something was here.
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"Greetings grand-daughter." Said a voice, oily and wet, warbling and slick. Blake did not know where she was, but the words were spoken with genuine power inside of them. She fell to her knees, cradling her head as her mind rang with pain. "Apologises. It is hard to forget you no longer remain whole."
The words remained spoken in a strange sounding tongue, but they hurt no longer. Blake had a distinct feeling she was being talked down to in the way one would speak gently to a toddler or baby.
"Who are you?" Blake whispered, voice echoing in the dark void around her. She could barely make out the silhouette of a shape in front of her, a writhing mass of something that lay just beyond her sight.
"I am your great-grandmother." The voice replied. "I have many names in many tongues, but I shall use one that will not harm you by hearing it. You may call me Tianthid, Mother of the Great Seed."
"The Great Seed?" Blake asked quietly.
"Life." The being, Tianthid, replied. "I am the mother of Life. The Universe is my child, and you are my great-grandchild, though not born of any union of beings. You are what remains of my granddaughter, Cluthia, the Great Seeker of Knowledge. You would know her as curiosity."
"Then...What am I?" Blake asked, and she heard the sound of wet, sticky flesh roiling together as the being made an angry rumble.
"You are what remains of her. She was torn about by our mortal enemies, the Old Ones. They seek to destroy and conquer. We seek to create and guide. Our war started when they murdered Cluthia many aeons ago, though as one of the Elders she could not truly die. She lives on through you, and many other beings like you, and many other beings unlike you. You are not her, but you are still my family. Why are you here young one?"
"Here? I don't know where I am?"
"Remnant." Tianthid replied calmly. "Why do you dwell there?"
"I do not know." Blake answered quietly. "I just am."
"You are younger than I believed." Tianthid rumbled thoughtfully. "At least you do not dwell on Terra. Our enemies hold there is growing stronger by the century. Hm. Remnant is neither ours nor theirs. Perhaps you could change that?"
"What are you asking me to do?" Blake trembled, suddenly feeling as if hundreds of millions, even billions, of eyes were staring at her all at once.
"We create life, and we must also guide it to ensure it does not destroy itself." Tianthid explained. "We are guardians, and to guard we must have a hook, an anchor, something to tie us down to the lives we seek to protect. We must be worshipped."
"You want to be made gods. Of humanity. Of faunus. Of Jaune."
"Humanity does not dwell on Remnant." Tianthid scoffed dismissively. "Only a cheap copy. The real war for that species' soul is elsewhere, and we are not winning. We must secure Remnant, and dozens of other worlds with life on them, in order to have the strength to resist our opponents advances."
"I will not help you!" Blake gritted out, straining underneath an invisible pressure bearing down upon her. "I will not let you subjugate Remnant! You will not take Jaune!"
"Do you truly not remember?" Tianthid remarked, scorn filling her tone now. "The pain?"
There was pain, sharp and sudden.
"The fear?"
There were monsters bearing down on her, tearing and ripping and shredding.
"The enemy?"
Dozens of dark creatures stared at her, watching her pain and feeding off of it. They tore her apart from her very core and scattered her across the universe she had long dismissed in favour of the great mysteries that lied beyond.
"Do you truly desire for them to win?"
The seas roared and hoomans screamed in fear as lightning tore through the sky. The lightning left cracks there, and dark monsters poured through the tears in reality. The seas seemed to burn, and a titanic figure emerged, roaring triumphantly as all who saw it fell into madness and despair.
"You are young. You must learn quickly. This is war."
"Y-Your war." Blake gritted out. "And I will have no part in it."
Silence rained in the void. There was a burst of light, and Blake blinked as the dark shape just beyond her vison roiled and raged as water and lightning fell down upon it. Dark shades emerged from the void, charging towards the being that had brought her there, and three figures burned their way towards them in the horizon, burning gold through the darkness.
"Very well then." Tianthid rumbled. "Perhaps you will come to your senses in a few centuries. We have more time than the mortals do afterall."
A pile of dirt, washed over by hundreds of millions of years. The land was barren of life, and Blake was alone. But Jaune was still there, though the atoms that had once bound him together had long disappeared. All that remained was a few specks of distant waste, but even that would be gone soon. The sky was burning red, and Blake was consumed by the approaching sun. She would dwell inside the star for millennia, silently mourning the mortal whom she loved, the mortal who she would never see again.
"No!" Blake protested. "Liar!"
A wet tendril of flesh emerged from the dark, covered in slime and littered with all-seeing eyes. The slimy, wet tip touched her head, and Blake found herself spinning into nothingness.
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Jaune woke up with a start. The Sphinx above him sighed in relief.
"What a relief, your aunt isn't going to kill me." The Sphinx remarked, before turning and making a noise of surprise. "It would look like your girlfriend is awake now too."
"Blake?" Jaune gasped, remembering her convulsing on the floor like she was possessed.
"J-Jaune!" She exclaimed back, and he pushed himself to his feet. He staggered over to her, and held her tightly. She hugged him back, but her grip was noticeably weaker than usual.
"What the hell happened?" He asked quietly. "I was so worried about you!"
"I...Me too." Blake coughed weakly. "Worried about you I mean. I don't...I don't know what happened."
"What just happened was a potentially reality destroying incursion that should not have occurred for at least another hundred years." Remarked a smooth voice beyond them. Jaune jumped and saw a tall man at the doors behind them, with black hair, dark eyes and pale skin. He wore flowing, black robes and had an dark, sharp crown sat atop his curly hair. He looked at them with the calculating look of a predator assessing it's prey. "As such, we caught almost unaware."
"Why here?" Blake asked, and the man gave her a cool look.
"We can't be certain." He replied. "Though before it tried breaching through the Cathedral as well before being stopped. Remnant has had a number of close calls over the centuries."
"Do you know what that thing was?" Jaune asked, and he tried not to flinch as the man's cool gaze settled on him.
"The easiest term to describe it would be eldritch abomination." The man replied with about as much ease as if they were discussing the weather. "It is something far beyond our comprehension, and it certainly isn't pleasant. It is a good thing we were all here to stop or it, or rather that my brothers weren't busy whoring around as they usually do."
"Come now!" Came a jovial voice through the doors. A mountain men stepped through, wearing nothing but shorts and sandals. His bushy hair was steel grey, curly and joined by an equally bushy beard. His eyes were an electric blue, and he had a charming smile on his face. He also had abs that could cut glass. "Even if I was partaking in my usual adventures I would have come as soon as I was aware there was trouble. You were the last to arrive this time Hades."
"Blame Persephone for that." Hades retorted, though his face softened at the mention of the name, and the cold look on his face turned into a warm smile. "She has found a new show she likes to watch, though only together of course."
"Naturally." The other man snorted, slapping Hades' back and shaking water from his hair. "You old sap. Eh. Monogamy shmogany in my books."
"We're well of aware of that by now Zeus." Poseidon said, casting a worried eye over Jaune and Blake before nodding upon seeing they were physically well. "It's good you two survived. We lost a number of nymphs today."
"Any of yours?" Hades asked, a hint of worry in his tone. Poseidon shook his head, and Zeus shrugged and patted his back.
"Ah well, you'll replenish their number soon enough eh?" He remarked, waggling his eyebrows. Jaune blinked and found himself frowning, like Hades, whilst Blake looked vaguely lost and the Sphinx just rolled her eyes. Poseidon had a stony look on his face. "If not I'll gladly volunteer my services. I best be off now."
Zeus hummed something and jogged down a few steps before pausing and turning back round, eyes widening when he realised there were others there.
"Horem-a-something!" Zeus greeted with a wide smile, jogging back up and towering over the Sphinx. "How are you my dear? Change your mind about repopulating the world with your kind?"
"I remain uninterested." The Sphinx snorted. "I do believe even if I did procreate with you your wife would simply curse my spawn."
"Ah, don't worry about ol' Hera!" Zeus grinned. "She's mellowed over the years. She likes to vent her vengeance directly on me these days. Kinda kinky if you ask me."
"I didn't." The Sphinx deadpanned, and Zeus chuckled before casting an eye towards Blake and Jaune, making him stiffen.
"New bloods eh?" Zeus smirked, leaning back and gesturing at his chest and abs. "See something you like?"
"No." Blake deadpanned, and Jaune bit back a chuckle. To his horror, Zeus mistook it for a coy move, and he leaned over Jaune with a wide grin.
"Looks like we have a taker." Zeus smirked, eyes trailing down Jaune's body pointedly. "Not too bad either, if not a little noddle-y and soft. I'll shape you up in no time sweetheart."
"That's enough Zeus." Poseidon interrupted, stepping forward and putting a hand against his brother's chest to push him back. "Stop harassing the newcomers. And Horemakhet."
"So that's her name!" Zeus exclaimed, winking at the Sphinx and shooting finger guns at her. "I'll make sure to remember that next time darlin'. Ta-ta now, and remember to tell me when you've claimed new bloods Poseidon!"
"Sure." Poseidon remarked, grimacing openly when Zeus turned around. "That's just...totally."
"Totally!" Zeus replied, raising a hand in the air as he jumped down the stairs. Jaune noticed something golden jangling in his pocket.
"Will he ever grow up?" Hades wondered, and Poseidon sighed next to him.
"I fear that so long there is a willing someone out there he will remain the way he is." Poseidon shook his head. "There's no point in us trying to reign him in. He still thinks himself a king. We should let his 'queen' keep working on him."
"It is unfair on Hera." Hades retorted quietly, and Poseidon sighed again.
"I know. Go enjoy your new show." He said, nudging Hades with a smile. "Persephone may be no Hera, but I wouldn't want to draw her ire, least of all over the Housewives of Argus."
"Of course you'd know." Hades grumbled as he strode away. "Amphitrite has you whipped more than me nowadays."
"Cheeky bastard." Poseidon snorted, turning to Jaune and Blake with a wan smile. "Apologies for getting you to caught in that. Just some family stuff. Zeus can be a bit much at times, but he won't go to far these days. Just say no, he'll get the message, though he might try his luck a bit before the message sinks in."
"It's...alright." Jaune said, though there was no denying how uncomfortable had had felt when the man had started flirting with him. Was that because he was just uncomfortable it had happened or was it because he secretly liked it? Wait...was he gay?!
"I dislike him." Blake said, struggling to her feet. Jaune helped her up, taking her hand in his and feeling his heart start to pound at the close contact and proximity between them. "If he tries to flirt with Jaune I will cause him great harm."
"That...Is likely." Poseidon said, shooting them a wary look. "It won't come to that though. He's got the message now. I hope. Horemakhet, can you take these two to Agent Summer whilst I secure the Seventh Sea."
"Sure." The Sphynx shrugged, tail flicking in agitation. "At least you know how to say my damn name."
"Right." Poseidon grimaced, turning back to Jaune and Blake. "If you two wish to remain in the Circle then feel free to come back and visit, I promise that it's normally much calmer than it was today. The worst you usually have to look out for is the nymphs being mischievous, the Sirens coming to shore every now and then."
"Thanks." Jaune nodded, helping Blake stand and giving her a worried look. "We will. The coffee was nice. Plus the company's decent."
"I'm glad you think so." Poseidon smiled, and Jaune could see his relation to Zeus when he did so. Both of them had the same wide smile, the only difference being slightly different laughing lines at the edges of their eyes. Poseidon turned around and entered what he'd called the Seventh Sea.
Wait a minute...the Seventh Sea?!
"Come along children." The Sphynx sighed, clearly seeing Jaune's look and deciding to get a move on. "I have work to do and Summer will probably be worried sick by now. If you have any further questions about what just happened or about anything in general, then just ask her. I'm too old for this crap."
Jaune, despite him being less than two decades old, couldn't help but agree.
A/N: Next update on 25/10/2023.
