Apollo was in high spirits, enjoying being with his family, both divine and mortal, until his brother walked in. That is not to imply he disliked Hermes, or that his baby brother killed his vibe or anything of the like. Apollo loved his brother and, more to the point as there were many Apollo loved who he still would avoid, he liked his brother.
Okay, after the glitter bomb Apollo was…not exactly annoyed, Hermes didn't do malicious pranks and in all honesty Apollo kind of liked how the glitter made him sparkle…perhaps the best way to say it was that he owed Hermes a prank in turn. But that was for later. Tonight was for fun and family. And then Hermes walked in and if the meeting hadn't started right then…Apollo was the god of health, and he knew unhealthy when it walked into the room.
He wasn't too worried, not really, not enough to stop the meeting or drag Hermes to his bed. No need to allow new malicious gossip about his brother by confronting him in front of the lesser gods, or for Apollo to leave his own children's side to care for his wayward brother. Hermes was clearly sick, at least to a healer like Apollo who was also very familiar with how Hermes' energy usually presented, but Hermes was also an immortal god. Apollo could wait. Anyway, Hermes was acting normal, able to defend himself with all his usual finesse from the worthless little god who dared disrespect him. No, Hermes might be uncomfortable, but he'd survive the meeting. Apollo could quietly approach him afterwards. It's not like Hermes was about to keel over like some mortal for being a little overworked.
Until he did.
Hermes condensed his full godly essence and Apollo had only a couple of seconds to recognize that his brother had become a child, a small child, and there was no way that was by choice, before said child collapsed to the ground.
Apollo moved fast, but not faster than Hermes' own children who had been surrounding him. Several cried out in dismay and hands reached for their father, only to jerk back with cries of shock, even pain. Apollo knew why when he forced himself down into his smaller guise to be on their level and reached himself.
Hermes was hot. Not just mortal fever hot but hot enough he likely triggered the mortals' somatic reflex, the temperature radiating off his skin perhaps double what it should have been. Now that Apollo had his hand skin to skin, he could sense Hermes' ailment. He was sick, though not the kind of illness that mortals got, no germs involved of any kind. No, when a god ailed there were generally four possible causes: poison, mental or emotional distress manifesting physically, low energy caused by overdoing things, or physical wounds from divine weapons or magic. Usually, with Hermes it was a mixture of overwork and malnourishment that depleted his energy and downed him. This time, there was also a strong element of poison at play, albeit partly a poison of Dionysus' realm rather than one malicious in nature, overlapping emotional anguish.
Apollo felt the unnatural heat, felt the sickness, and growled softly to himself as he gathered the ridiculously small and light child into his arms, making sure to include his staff which had shrunk with him. He intended to teleport them away at once, but the worried whispered voices of children stopped him. They were his realm to.
"What's wrong with him, Lord Apollo?" one of the children dared to ask, their tone attempting to be calm and respectful but not able to hide his fear.
Apollo took one look at their shocked and frightened faces and forced himself to keep all of his own dismay out of his voice as he answered lightly, "I think my baby brother has been pushing himself too hard. Again. Probably drank a bit too much nectar…kind of like when you kids stay up all night and then down a bunch of sodas to stay awake."
"Is he going to burn up?" a smaller child asked with a frightened gasp, a natural worry for a half-blood considering what happened to them if they had too much of the food of the gods.
"No," Apollo assured her warmly, making sure to sound sincere and hide any of his own upset, "I will take care of him."
"He just needs to sleep it off," agreed a new voice; Artemis had joined him, her hunters surrounding the children of Hermes and Apollo. Apollo appreciated the white lie he couldn't share himself. Hermes didn't just need to sleep it off, but the kids didn't need to know the details. They needed reassurance that their dad and/or patron would be okay. That he would be, Apollo was almost certain of. Mostly. Almost completely sure. Just not sure enough to say it as a definite, god of truth that he was.
Gods were immortal beings and they did not die…but they could suffer and it is never pleasant to watch someone you love suffering. And…in a way, gods are their energy manifested as a physical being. Hermes was his realms and his realms were strong so Apollo wasn't truly worried…but gods who lose too much can fade. There is a tipping point…when a god is so weak they cannot act upon their realms which in turn malnourishes them further and they become weaker, have less ability to nourish their divine body, so they become weaker still…
Hermes had strong realms and he was surely not even close to that point, but Apollo could feel his brother's divine energy beneath the burning heat and it was disturbing to the feel, horrifically low but also burning hot, which is not how energy should work. Apollo's head said Hermes would be fine, but his heart feared. He shared none of this with the children, of course. He did not, could not say 'he will be fine' because he was the god of truth and wanting and hoping were not the same thing as knowing. So he just tried to heavily imply it.
"I'm going to take Hermes to help him get better," Apollo said, warm and sure of this at least. "Why don't you kids go on to the party? I know Hermes wouldn't want you to miss out."
The kids did not look convinced, but the worst were the faces that looked disappointed.
"Will we still get to see you?" Apollo's daughter asked, honest in her feelings where others might hide them to spare Apollo. Apollo winced, because it wasn't fair, he knew how the children looked forward to the solstice as a time to be with their godly parent. He didn't know how to answer, because he had to help Hermes, had to leave in the next few minutes, but…
"Of course you will see him," yet again a new voice announced with great confidence. The eyes of the surrounding children widened as Zeus himself joined them. "If my sons are unable to join you this night, then I will make sure you all have a full day to be with them just as soon as they are able."
There were a few cheers at that, though most were too awed or, in the case of Hermes' children, too worried to react. Artemis approached her brother and put her hand on his arm, gave the child he held a frown that hid her worry, and said, "Take our idiot baby brother. I will watch over the children here."
"Thanks, sis," Apollo agreed brightly, and she made a show of wrinkling her nose.
"I've told you not to call me that."
Knowing that the children were in good hands and not daring to delay any longer, Apollo prepared to teleport away. Then he thought better of it (with the way the night was going, someone would be blinded and things were traumatic enough for the children as it was), and carried Hermes towards the door, meaning to teleport once far enough away from the group. He tried to shield Hermes from the eyes of the other gods, not his family of course, but the lesser gods who were still scattered about the throne room. Apollo knew how much Hermes was going to hate it when he was well enough to understand he'd actually fainted in front of the entire court.
Except there was less attention on them than he expected. It would only fully come out later, but the fact of the matter was, no one who wasn't family had been paying particular attention at the moment when Hermes made himself small. Afterwards, he'd been completely surrounded by the half-blood children. Maybe it was obvious something had happened in the middle of the kids, but not what, and Apollo's brother and sisters and aunts and uncles all trusted Apollo's handling of it to go and protect Hermes in a different way: calmly encouraging everyone to leave for the party without allowing them to pay any notice. Hermes was still going to be embarrassed later just for it happening in front of family, but it was not the humiliation it could have been.
That was something to worry about later, though. Because in the moment Apollo held his seriously feverish brother to himself and could not fully escape the fear that 'later' was not guaranteed. They teleported to Apollo's temple, to the room in the hall of healing usually reserved for family. It was here he helped Hephaestus when his chronic condition affected him. Here that Apollo treated Artemis, Ares and Athena while they showed off their war wounds. It was here he scolded Dionysus when his revelry led him to doing something stupid.
It was here that he laid Hermes upon a bed, his body disturbingly tiny compared to where he lay, his caduceus at his side. The snakes immediately left the staff to crawl over Hermes, growing to their natural size upon leaving it instead of the miniature versions it had forced them into.
"George, Martha," Apollo greeted them while busily getting ready anything that might be useful, his tone on the edge of urgent but also calm and focused. "How much nectar has Hermes drunk?"
'Do you want to know how much in the last hour, in the last day, or in the last week?' George asked, sounding disgruntled in his worry.
Apollo's hands clenched and he said, "Let's start with the last hour, and go from there."
'Three bottles,' George answered instantly.
'Thirteen within the last day,' Martha added, and Apollo, for a moment, could only stare at them aghast.
"Thirteen?" he demanded. "How?! How was he even still…seriously? Were they at least small bottles?"
'Only 6 ounces,' George answered.
'But he's been mixing them with energy drinks,' Martha added.
"He's been doing what?!"
"Huh," said Dionysus as he staggered in, looking for all the world like a drunk accidentally stumbling into the wrong room. "That explains a few things." Then, when Apollo just looked at him, "I thought you might want my help. Felt like he's been drinking my kind of poison."
"Can you detox him?" Apollo instantly asked, because that would go a long way towards helping.
"Maybe," Dionysus agreed. "Mixing mortal and divine…he's an idiot." The last was said fondly, and Dionysus went up to the bed and started to place a hand over Hermes' chest. His hand recoiled as it got near while he muttered a surprised curse in Greek. Then he completed the move, saying, "He could fry an egg, right now. Can't be good for him, I imagine?"
He glanced at Apollo.
"No, and that's the first thing I'll be addressing after you do your thing," Apollo agreed. The temperature was a problem if for no other reason than it was likely doing its own damage and Hermes would then need to be healed from that before he could begin to recover from anything else. It wasn't as scary as a fever in a mortal, not deadly but…not good.
Dionysus…did his thing. Sort of.
As the god of wine, revelry and insanity, Dionysus had the power to sober people up…or to intoxicate them, to clarify their mind or drive it to insanity. Nectar was not exactly what he usually had to deal with, as it was neither mind altering nor addictive, but lived in a class of its own. It was, in a way, like sugar for the gods. It could provide a boost in energy, but too much was not healthy, and it was only a short-term solution to a god's nourishment needs. An energy drink for mortals was even worse, providing a physical boost with no nourishing substance behind it at all.
Dionysus closed his eyes and he tried and…
Hermes' small body stiffened, and for perhaps a tenth of a tenth of a second, Apollo swore he saw Hermes turn transparent. Dionysus stumbled quickly back from the bed and Hermes was lying still and quiet and solid, still too pale, cheeks flushed from fever, chest softly rising and falling as he lay asleep.
"What was that?" Apollo demanded, trying to force his own heart to regain a natural rhythm, trying to convince himself that his eyes had played a trick.
"I can't…" Dionysus stuttered out, and then, voice filled with rage, "That idiot! That…" It went on for almost a minute, switching between English and Greek.
Apollo finally grabbed him and made him look him in the eye. Dionysus stared at him, suddenly not angry at all, instead blinking back tears as he said, "I can't fix it. Not right now. I think he depleted himself so far that it's all that's sustaining him. Like…like a fire deprived of all solid fuel burning off of oil. Remove the oil and the fire…goes out."
"How is that even possible?" Apollo demanded. No one can push themselves so hard they burn themselves out completely. Not even Hermes. His body should have dropped from exhaustion long before he could reach this point. Then he would have naturally refilled his reserves as he slept.
'He's been going non-stop for two weeks,' Martha said. 'The longest I've ever known him to go before he crashed was eight days.'
'We told him to stop. To rest. To eat,' George added. 'He said he was fine. His 'awesome drink' was keeping him going.'
"Divine and mortal," Dionysus muttered. "Nectar to feed his divine energy, caffeine and sugar to feed his physical. The complete idiot."
It made no sense and went against everything Apollo understood about medicine but…he'd seen for himself what had happened.
"I…I need to bring down the fever," Apollo decided. Now he put his hand over his brother's chest, inbetween Martha and George. It made Hermes appear even smaller, his large hand dwarfing the boy's body. He could feel the heat beneath his hand, feel Hermes trembling minutely, feel his small heart racing, his breathing soft and slow. He could feel the wrongness, the energy too low (almost non-existent if Dionysus were correct) as he burned through the nectar. Apollo drew from his own domains and pulled the excess heat from his brother's body.
As he did so, yet another god ran through the door.
"Where is he?" Zeus demanded, wide eyed and frantic. Of course. He held a connection to his sons. He would have felt it when…when for that brief moment Hermes was on the verge of fading.
Apollo could not think too hard about that, did not even turn around to console their dad, because now was not the time to freak out or have a breakdown. Now was the time to be a doctor. Later, later he could react to what could have happened, just as soon as he had made sure that it didn't happen.
He had to take the fever down gradually, because the last thing Hermes needed was to have his body thrown into shock, but slowly the body beneath his hand went from horrifically, burning heat to unusually hot and then to a natural body heat. He pushed healing into the body as he went, fixing where the heat had harmed. Finally, he removed his hand completely and stood back.
"Is he…better?" Zeus asked behind him. Apollo had been aware of his presence as he worked, heard his voice, and Dionysus, but had not paid them enough attention to know what they said. Probably his brother explaining while trying to calm the madness that came to a father when his child is in danger.
"He needs energy," Apollo answered. "Divine energy. Real sustenance. He needs rest, too."
Apollo considered Hermes in the bed. He was still dressed in his Solstice clothes, and with a frown, Apollo switched them out for a soft white tunic. Hermes was pale, almost as white as the tunic, though at least the fevered flush was gone. He did not move at all. This was not a healing sleep but something closer to a coma.
After a moment of study, Apollo turned to face Zeus and Dionysus.
"Ambrosia can strengthen him, but it will not replenish his divine energy. Nor can Hermes gain nourishment through his realms beyond the natural feedback of prayer, sacrifice, and supplication. We can aid by encouraging the mortals to sacrifice…but he is so far depleted it may not be enough to do more than maintain him as he is before it is burned away. It won't be enough for true healing."
"Then…what?" Zeus asked, and Apollo could not remember seeing that exact expression on his father's face before. Thunderstorms are loud and chaotic and powerful. They never cowered and they grew quiet only as they dissipated into rain. Zeus looked…small. His eyes were not on Apollo but past him, on the bed.
"We shall have to give him some of our own divine energy," Apollo answered, as if that were simple. Zeus turned his eyes away from Hermes at last to stare at him.
Dionysus stared too, but with a half mad smile on his face as he said, "Have you joined me in my realm, brother? Gods do not share energy. The last time any gods tried it was rejected. Violently. A god knows his own essence and will not accept another's."
"I do not mean it to come from just anyone," Apollo answered. "And I do not mean for us to grab a bit of ourselves and force it into him. I think, though…for those who are most compatible, those who have realms that overlap with Hermes or have a family bond…I think perhaps it will be accepted."
"How would we give him such energy?" Zeus asked. "If we aren't going to just 'shove it in'?"
"Infuse an item with our energy and allow our children to make the sacrifice to Hermes," Apollo answered.
"Huh…" Dionysus said, "That's mad. I'm in."
"And if it doesn't work?" Zeus asked, his eyes now boring into Apollo's. "If even in this second-hand manner, he rejects it utterly? What will that do to Hermes?"
"I don't know," Apollo admitted. "I don't think anyone has ever tried this. But I do know…doing nothing will lead to nothing."
There was a long silence. They turned again and looked at the boy lying on the bed. Martha had curled herself up his body and was gently licking his chin, George wrapped loosely along her, his head over Hermes' heart.
"Gather the family," Zeus said. He didn't say yes or no to Apollo's plan. He didn't even say who was going to do the gathering, with their normal messenger being the one in the bed. He said his words, then approached and sat at Hermes' side, in a chair that hadn't been there a moment before, and took his son's hand in his.
Apollo and Dionysus hovered for a moment, then looked at each other. Dionysus nodded his head as if in answer to something unspoken, turned, and left. Apollo went back to the bed and placed his hand at his brother's forehead.
His temperature remained normal, but warmer than he'd left it. Apollo leached away the extra heat.
"The solstice," Zeus said into the silence. "The long night. When ancient spirits from before the dawn of time stir and even gods fear to go alone into the dark. Do you think…?"
He trailed off.
"I think Hermes pushes himself to hard to prove his worth to people who either already know it or never will," Apollo answered.
He felt the fever strain to return, burning energy Hermes did not have to spare. The longest night, indeed.
