Hermes looked mostly relaxed, whistling a tune along with the radio, as he drove down the street. Out the windows, the view was…odd. The van was on a road, as one might expect, going past buildings. But the scenery did not fully mesh. The road was solid and continuous, but it went past cottage houses with large gardens and picket fences that sat alongside city skyscrapers which in turn were alongside graffitied underpasses, alongside stately homes, alongside a small wood that bordered a pizzeria. There were no obvious seams, each bled into the other naturally, yet it could not be natural because no city in the world had such a haphazard layout.
Hermes did not seem bothered by this, just kept whistling, glancing down at where his phone was mounted showing a map. At least, that is what one might presume. The phone was angled towards Hermes, not the camara, so for all the viewers knew he could have been watching some video or checking on his domain. Map was most likely, though, considering the context.
"Turn left in two hundred feet," a woman's voice said, with just a tad too much natural inflection to sound like an automated recording. Then, "Turn left here."
Hermes kept going straight, still whistling, lightly drumming a beat on the wheel. He was not completely at ease; there was a tenseness in how he held his shoulders, in the way he fidgeted, tapping the wheel, glancing in his mirrors then back again to the road, then at his phone.
"Hermes, I said left," the woman's voice repeated, louder and more insistent.
"This way's quicker," Hermes insisted. "We'll hang a right at the cathedral, cut through the carpark, swing through the warehouse district, and then it's just a jog to the left to get to Fleet Way."
"Recalculating," said the woman's voice, sounding aggressively automated this time, and then, "I have found the fastest route. Do a U-turn now."
"Oh, let him go his way," grumbled a male voice, still from the phone. "We'll get there, however we go."
"I will not," the woman insisted. "If we have to double over ourselves one more time to keep to the schedule…that always puts me in knots, being in two places at once."
"I like it," insisted the male voice. "Sometimes he forgets he fed us in the first instance and we get two rats instead of one."
Hermes ignored the phone. He went past a diner, then a gym and finally turned right at an old cathedral. The road became bumpier and the van suddenly swerved into a carpark, except the entrance seemed to also be the exit, and the van was going past tall, derelict buildings.
"See," said Hermes, "The map never recognizes the carpark as a proper road. I told you, this way is…"
Which is the exact moment when something slammed hard into the van. The camera whited out, came back to a jumbled image where Hermes was clinging tightly to the wheel, expression tense, a streak of gold across his forehead, the outside view upside down, then a long burst of static, with stilted audio.
"What the f…no, no n…George tex…ck the signa…Wh…Marth…n…ru…gotta doub…ack an…shut u…if…too sma…no roo…I…just go…he's com…just…oak…go go go now!"
The camera cut in sporadically. At one point a close up of Hermes' nostrils. Then his knee as he manages to get himself upright in his upside-down van. Then his caduceus, two serpents in the act of entwining themselves. Hermes, twisting about with his cloak, clearly finding it hard in the enclosed space. Then Hermes again, kicking at his door, caduceus in one hand and harpe in the other, no cloak in sight. Then the door is open and the van is empty.
The bursts of video and static went on for a bit, noises even harder to make sense of as they are outside, far from the camera's microphone and without any kind of visual to help, but it was loud, whatever was happening. Then a scream, loud even despite the distance, not fear or anger put agony. Silence. Then static. The visual cut in and out but the sound stayed the same. All seemed to be still. The view never changed. The sound never changed. Whatever had happened was either over, or no longer being captured by the camera.
After about a minute of nothing happening, Hephaestus reached over and pressed something, and the projected footage disappeared. The surrounding gods took a moment to consider what they had just seen in silence, then a wave of conversations erupted as they all tried to understand at the same time.
A short time before, somewhere far below the gods, but rather higher than he usually dared to travel, a young man rode upon a winged horse. Percy Jackson had rather enjoyed most of the flight; not only did he not get to go flying nearly often enough, but there was some satisfaction in flying over gridlocked highways. It would have been even more fun if it weren't so worrying, the underlying cause of the traffic below.
His talk with Travis had been brief but concerning. As if he weren't already on edge and worried even before. The lunch with his dad had been nice, if slightly stilted in the ways such dinners often are when a dad tries to connect with his adult child who he barely raised but still loves.
"I'm doing good," Percy had told him, and it was true. Sure, he still had to deal with the occasional monster, but it turned out monsters are pretty opportunistic; like most predators they preferred children and weaker prey, and at some point as he grew older and stronger there had come a tipping point when, instead of attracting every monster around, his smell seemed to repel most of them. So now he got to enjoy the perks of being a half blood with fewer of the downsides. He felt more settled in himself; ADHD was still a part of him but it was like dealing with waves; he'd learned to surf instead of letting it crash over him. He knew his own strengths and his fatal flaw and he felt he was finally getting to live his life, not just survive.
Neither of them mentioned the godhood he had turned down. Percy could not honestly say he did not have any regrets, and he suspected he'd have even more the older he got, when his body started to show the frailty of being mortal, when death approached. But he had also visited the camp and seen for himself his impact on the children there. And he knew he'd have even greater regrets if he had become a god. People who imagined it would be exciting and fun, living forever as a deity, must never have met the gods. Gods either live through endless tragedies, or they become something so Other that they no longer care. Percy could not imagine giving up his friends, his family, his feelings of love and compassion for others in the world without losing a part of himself. And he did not want to know what it would feel like to have friend after friend, family after family, and always be left behind.
But knowing he made the right choice made facing his dad even tougher; his dad was one of those who faced tragedy after tragedy and just when it had seemed that his son might be an exception, that Percy would not die and leave him, Percy had said no.
That didn't stop the two of them from having what relationship they could have. So…lunch, from time to time, to catch up. And then Percy had gone to use the bathroom and when he came back…
The mist hid exactly what was happening because being a half blood did not ensure immunity to the mist. His own mom actually could see clearer than he could, despite his divine blood. What he saw was a waiter holding a wine bottle to the back of his dad's neck. That would have been weird but not alarming, except for the way Poseidon looked.
He was stiff, hands grasping at the table tightly, face so pale it was white, eyes wide and staring forward. He looked almost as if he'd just seen Medusa's face and had been turned to stone, except his clothes still held color. And there was a line of gold, coming from his nose. That was…gods bleed gold, not red, and Percy had seen gods bleed ichor before but not like this. No clear attack, yet clearly something was hurting him.
"Hey!" Percy shouted, hand going to his pocket to retrieve his sword. Before he could brandish it, the waiter stepped back. The effect was instant; color returned to Poseidon's face and he gasped in a deep breath, falling slightly forward, knocking silverware to the ground. There was a split second when Percy had to decide who to go to, his dad or the waiter.
He chose his dad. Maybe it was the wrong choice, but at the time it had felt like the only choice.
"I have to go," his dad had said, after, once he'd recovered enough that his hands stopped shaking and he'd wiped his face clean. He looked almost entirely like his old self except for minute shivers still running over his body, as if he were cold. "Such a weapon…and an attack on me, so openly…I have to go and tell my brother."
"What should I do?" Percy had asked.
Poseidon looked at his still very much not immortal son, smiled gently, and said, "I'll be in touch."
If he really thought that would keep Percy safe and out of things, he did not know his son at all. The very first thing Percy did was call Annabeth.
"If they are powerful enough to take on Poseidon, why did they run from you?" was her response, sounding utterly baffled over the phone, followed by, "And why didn't you run after them?"
"I thought it better that me and dad stayed together; for all I knew they were trying to lure me away," was Percy's answer.
"Smart thinking," Annabeth decided, and Percy was very glad she could not read his expressions over the phone because he was horrible at lying to her and he very much did not want her to know that he'd thought up that excuse after the fact. Then, in a tone that Percy knew meant her mind was already a hundred miles away and it would do little good to continue the conversation she muttered, "A weapon that can hurt a god by touching his skin without leaving a wound…" and then, "I'll look into it." And she hung up without another word.
"A man could take offence at that," Percy muttered as he too hung up, but his heart wasn't in it and in fact he was still grinning fondly at their exchange. Then he wondered what else he should do. Contact the camp? If someone is attacking gods, the camp is an obvious weak spot. And a god lived there. Or should he just stay out of it? Yes, someone attacking his dad was alarming, and he didn't want them to get away with it…but he was tired of fighting. Maybe this was a one off; some half blood who had followed Luke and was trying his own form of vengeance on his own. Maybe it was a new kind of monster. Maybe it was an overlooked titan. Whoever it was, and whatever weapon they wielded, did it have to have anything to do with Percy? He'd already done his quests and fulfilled his destiny and now he was finally enjoying his life. He didn't want a new adventure.
On the other, other hand…that was his dad they had attacked.
So when Travis called, Percy had to hear very little before he was ready to join him. Blackjack was convenient, not to mention a bit bored in the stables, and the flying horse had gotten him to the right city much faster than the gridlocked roads would have done. Now that he was there, however, he was having some trouble finding the right street. This wasn't a city Percy knew and the quick map he'd scribbled out for himself on a napkin wasn't much help. He was fairly certain he was at least in the right neighborhood as he let Blackjack land and walk sedately down the street. The mist stopped anyone from seeming to notice such an unusual sight, though he still got a few second glances. Percy wondered vaguely what they saw. A man on a regular horse? Whatever it was, it wasn't exciting enough to get more than a second glance.
"Excuse me," he tried at a cross walk towards a man walking an enormous dog. The dog wagged its tail and Blackjack let out a harsh snort in its direction.
'It'll want to jump up on me next,' he complained.
"Yes?" said the dog's owner, neither seeming to notice the horse's agitation nor his own dogs excitement as he vaguely patted the dog and murmured, "Down, Zeus."
"I'm looking for Fleet Way?"
"Sorry," the man said with a shrug. "I don't know all those little streets. Could direct you to Main Street."
Somewhere nearby, there was an odd sound, not very loud but big, like the distant rush of a train through a tunnel, and there was a tremble in the ground. The dog barked.
"No thank you," said Percy, already nudging Blackjack to move on with a gentle tap of his heel. "I think I know where I need to go."
'Should we be heading towards monsters?" Blackjack demanded, but obediently did move on.
"We're trying to find the Stoll brothers," said Percy, "And where else would they be but in the middle of trouble?"
'Whatever you say, Boss,' said Blackjack, before trotting them down a narrow alley.
Above them, far above, Hephaestus returned with a small flashdrive. He had to take a moment to set up his own equipment and a moment more to find the most recent moments, but soon everyone was able to see the footage of Hermes' last moments before the attack. He turned it off after and did not partake in the ensuing eruption of noise as everyone started to discuss it at once.
Zeus sent a roll of thunder over them and they silenced once more, before turning his attention to Hephaestus.
"Is there any way to enhance the quality?" he asked.
Hephaestus looked put upon and, while he did not actually roll his eyes or sigh, still had a very 'must I really explain this' vibe going on. Surprisingly, Zeus did not react to it, just waited for the answer.
"What we have is what we have," Hephaestus said. "At best, one might be able to isolate background noise to remove or better hear it, but I can't retroactively improve the image. There is a second camera in the back of the van, but unfortunately, when the van flipped some packages fell over it and knocked it out. So this is all we've got."
Zeus nodded, as if Hephaestus were only confirming things for him and not as if he had no idea what his son was talking about. He drummed his fingers on his throne, staring off as if lost in thought. No one dared talk while he considered things. He was playing with the master bolt in his other hand and small bursts of electricity sizzled over his suit.
"Athena, Hephaestus, I want you working together. Hephaestus, isolate the background noise. Athena, I want a coherent transcript of what was spoken," Zeus decided. Goddess and god glanced at each other; neither particularly liked being a team player and they were not close siblings, but the looks weren't hostile. If anything, they were resigned. Zeus looked over the others for a moment, still playing with the master bolt as if it were a fidget toy, heedless of the way lightning danced up his arm and down his leg.
"Artemis," he said next, "Take your hunters and see if you can track this…this attacker."
Artemis nodded sharply and left at once, without even waiting to be dismissed or find out what anyone else would be doing. Tracking was best done when the trail was fresh, after all.
"Apollo, go with her. I want no gods alone until this is handled." Apollo nodded once and ran after his sister.
"Hecate, you will work with Poseidon and, when they have finished their tasks, Athena and Hephaestus. You all are best suited to discover what weapon has been launched against us so effectively."
"Me?" demanded Poseidon, confused rather than annoyed or rebellious.
"You alone felt its power and can still speak of it," Zeus pointed out. Then he leaned in closer, a low whisper just for his brother, "Do not leave Hecate alone." Then louder, to everyone, "No one goes anywhere alone."
In a differs part of Mount Olympus, Asclepius stood alone. Well, he had two gods on two beds before him, but they did not really count seeing as they were his patients and, for all intents and purposes, missing the essence that made them gods.
At a glance, they both presented remarkably similarly. Both were disturbingly empty. Both had suffered some physical trauma but nothing that suggested they should be laid low as they were. But, now that he had two people to compare, there were differences.
Dionysus was, completely and utterly still. If Asclepius didn't know better, and he wasn't completely sure that he didn't know better, he might have called Dionysus dead. His heart did not beat. His lungs did not breathe. His body was a completely empty husk that just happened to look like a god. But gods are not as humans are, and a lack of vital signs did not mean the same thing. The body did not live but it also did not decay as a real dead body would. It just existed, in stasis, as if waiting for whatever had been stolen to be put back.
Hermes…Hermes breathed.
And now that Asclepius had something to compare Hermes to…that was actually weirder than that Dionysus didn't.
If everything about Hermes, his very essence, was gone…what was directing his body to act as a body? What was different?
It probably took Asclepius longer than it should have to work it out, but then, he was not as close to his uncle as his father was, and the fact that the body was unconscious had thrown him. You can't have one instance of a god be knocked unconscious and another instance up and about. That isn't how it works. When a god felt the need to divide themself, as Hermes was prone to do what with how vast his realm was, they weren't cloning themself so much as using the fact that a god manifesting in the mortal realm is never revealing their whole self and so they are able to present as multiple selves at the same time. They are the same body in two places (or three or four) and wounds to one is wounds on the other.
But…being empty wasn't exactly a wound. What if…what if there were an instance of Hermes…an instance that still had enough personhood to be awake and walking around? And no Hermes could walk around without functioning vital organs. So of course both Hermes breathed, both hearts pumped ichor through veins, both bled and lived as one.
There was another Hermes. And he was injured. And he was still out there. Lost. Somewhere.
Asclepius turned and ran for the throne room.