IX
Pax assumed, "Are we there yet?" would earn him a hard enough slap to the head to kill him. At least, Pax reasoned, he wouldn't have far to go if he died.
"Hey, Lou Ellen?" Pax huffed. "If we die in Tartarus, where do we go? The current court of the dead probably isn't handing Paradise Passes to Kronos supporters, but—like—are we just here, undead, wandering in Tartarus and trying to find out way back to the Underworld, so they can pass judgment and send us back here?"
The thought made him tremble. This was definitely a place that had never been on his bucket list and, he would burn the bucket list of any friends that suggested it.
They hadn't gone far, or Pax didn't think they had gone far. The landscape was monotonous in its I'm-evil-and-depressing way and time didn't feel right. He didn't know how to explain it beyond that. The deprivation of sun and sky was making his head loopy. He was from the Caribbean; this cavernous, sunless nowhere felt like it violated nature, even if he had enjoyed swimming in the occasional cenote.
Apparently this question was worse than, "Are we there yet?" Axel, despite his seeming exhaustion, wound up a hand to slap Pax across the back of the head.
Lou Ellen weakly grabbed at Axel's elbow before he could strike.
With no fight, he lowered his fist.
Everyone was exhausted. Lou Ellen looked sickly in this burnt orange haze. By now, they could see the giant rock that she was leading them to. It should have only been a mile away, max, but Pax had no idea what that would mean on this terrain.
"Let's just not die," she suggested. There was no giggle. She sounded too tired for that. Her hand stump was tucked firmly under her opposing armpit. She wouldn't let either of them see it. Pax had a creeping feeling that something was wrong with it.
Axel had offered to turn around, to look for a way to scale the buffs behind them. Neither Pax nor Lou Ellen—especially not Lou Ellen with her missing hand—would be able to make that climb. Judging by the occasional stagger to Axel's step, helping the two little ones was wearing him down.
He had offered this after they passed some humanoid bones. Monsters, unfriendly ones, monsters that earned the name monsters, had been feasting there. Axel hid them, commanding they not make a sound.
He was afraid of getting overwhelmed down here. Since he was afraid, Pax knew to be afraid.
But, Lou Ellen said their destination wasn't far. And, Pax suspected, she knew going back would mean failing to climb that buff, and—in the unlikelihood that they succeeded—going back into the clutches of Hades' army. Which, again, might have just meant a one-way ticket back here. Might as well get acquainted with their neighbors if this was the inevitable end.
"Wow," Pax said, "I think the gloominess, acidity, and potential demise is ruining my mood. You know what we all need? A Matthias prank. Like, a good, old hack job. Remember that time Matthias 'accidentally' shot Luke in the butt with a bow?"
That earned him a slight smile from Lou Ellen and a choked laugh from Axel.
The stupid rock ahead of them seemed a lot closer. Pax could make out the glint of chains against its blackened surface.
"It was a mini-toilet plunger with enhanced super glue on the tip. Luke had to cut it out of his clothing," Lou Ellen said. She even giggled. "He never did figure out who did it."
Axel sighed, but the sound thinly covered his amusement. "Luke didn't know who did it and no one would rat Matthias out, not even Morpheus. He said he was sleeping… we had to do an extra mile of running every morning for a month as punishment."
"Totally worth it," Pax and Lou Ellen agreed.
The massive rock didn't protrude as high into the air of Tartarus as Pax was expecting.
Pax squinted and felt his spirits almost splinter again; something withered up there. They knew it would be on the rock, but seeing the humanoid thrashing, likely in anticipation, was different than hearing Lou Ellen and Axel discuss the myth.
He wondered if the others saw it. Axel must have. Despite his exhaustion, his pace had picked up, bringing them ever closer to some smaller rocks at the base of the big one.
"I've never met someone whose name is so many words. Like, how do we nickname him? Pro? Me? The? Us?"
"The 'e' in 'the' isn't the same," Lou Ellen muttered, like she knew Pax needed Alabaster here to criticize Pax's absurdism.
"It's too long a name to call him," Pax decided. "Do you think 'Rocky' would be offensive?"
"Yes," Axel said.
By then, the sight was disturbing.
Like in the myths, there was a titan chained, semi-upright, to the rock, full spread-eagle. Though, Pax suspected he wouldn't like the description, "spread-eagle." From what Pax could see, the guy was huge—at least ten feet tall. He wore a tattered piece of material might have once been a Greek chiton. The torso piece was so ripped to shreds, it was impossible to tell for sure.
They made it to the smaller rocks at the base before anyone spotted the second part of the myth.
Axel, of course, saw it first. He grabbed Pax and Lou Ellen and dragged them behind the lower lying rocks. At the same time, a piercing screech echoed around Tartarus.
Pax could hear the titan release a soft, despondent wail. Bits of sand and rock clattered down off the massive one as the titan renewed his struggles.
Pax bit his lip. He was pretty sure this guy was crying. He could hear a soft, weeping noise.
When Pax looked up, he could see why.
The attacker moved too fast for his eyes to follow it in the sky. One moment, he thought he saw a wingspan larger than a minivan and talons the length of two Pax arms. The next moment, there was a blur diving at the rock above them.
Axel stood up and drew his sword.
"Axel, what are you doing?" Pax hissed. "Massive bird of prey. In diving formation."
The talons must have dug into the rock above them. The whole thing shifted eerily. The titan released a despairing howl.
"The eagle will leave once it's done feeding!" Lou Ellen reminded Axel.
Axel unsheathed a knife from his belt, digging it into the side of the rock like a climbing pick. "It's the principle of the matter."
Axel's golden eyes glinted with fury. Although Pax knew there was no way to dissuade him, he clutched at his brother's arm, then foot as Axel dragged himself up the rock's façade. Axel's muscles bulged with strain. Considering how much extra weight he'd taken to make sure Pax and Lou Ellen's journeys were easier, Pax figured—and kind of hoped—Axel would overexert himself and flop back onto the ground.
He did not.
"'Axel's principles' is not what I want to write on your obituary! It does not have a ring to it and I cannot write it into a jingle," Pax pleaded. A jingle was already forming in his head, but he tried to banish the morbid tune.
Axel had already shaken Pax off and was half-way up the rock.
Prometheus screamed.
Something leaked over the ledge above them.
Lou Ellen and Pax jumped away from each other. Blood. They'd been splashed with the Titan's golden blood.
"Come on!" Lou Ellen said, "We have to do something."
She scrambled around the base, picking up smaller stones that had chipped off the big one in this eon long struggle. Pax went to help her. As they gathered, he could see the stump of her missing hand. The skin around the edges looked blackened, as though with gangrene. She had been hiding how quickly the magic was failing.
They took a few stumbled steps away from the rock, so they could see over the ledge.
Even from this distance, Pax felt his mouth go dry.
The eagle looked nothing like the one plastered all over American logos. Its feathers were black, except the hint of some brown towards the head. The only colorful thing on it was its golden beak, now speckled with red. One black clawed foot had anchored into Prometheus' hand, a talon puncturing him right in the wrist, crucifixion style. The other dug into the rock.
Golden blood leaked from a gash in Prometheus' stomach. A coiling rope appeared to hang out and Pax nauseously thought about how convincing Alabaster's fake intestines were. He doubted the things spilling from Prometheus' gut were just sausages. If they were, he had a lot of questions about Titan biology.
Lou Ellen grew flustered, seeming to realize her throwing arm was half-missing.
"Need a hand?" Pax offered, his voice trembling.
"You have better aim anyway. I would probably hit Axel," Lou Ellen said, looking relieved.
Axel had made it to the ledge. Soon, the eagle would notice him.
Pax dumped his extra stones at their feet.
Other than darts, Pax didn't have great aim with projectiles and he definitely didn't have the strength to throw such a distance. However, he did have specialty knowledge and equipment: any good prankster needed a slingshot.
He grabbed a stone the size of his palm and slipped a slingshot out of his back pocket, the one Matthias had made for him for special occasions.
In a blink, he'd aimed, fired, and bapped the bird in the head.
The stone smacked into feathers then flopped onto the tortured Titan's stomach. Pax would feel bad (and a little grossed out) about hitting the Titan's exposed wound after they were done saving him.
"Hey birdie!" Lou Ellen shouted. "Over here!"
They hadn't done much damage, but they had caught its attention. The eagle released another piercing scream. Its head snapped in their direction.
That was all they needed. In the moment of distraction, Axel had scrambled up to his feet beside the bird.
Before Axel could slice into the bird's back, its entire body blurred. One moment, it was about to be cat food. The next, the bird's body had quarter turned. Its beak snapped backwards. Axel's sword barely deflected that deadly point—sharp enough to cut apart a Titan's stomach.
At the force of the attack, Axel almost fell backwards off the rocky plateau.
"Keep firing!" Lou Ellen shouted, shoving another rock into Pax's palm.
Pax fumbled with the ammo, shoved it into the sling, and took aim. In the test of strength, Axel was losing this battle (which felt backwards. In the world of avian vs. feline, Pax generally voted on the one with more teeth.) The glint of Axel's sword turned into a smear as he and the bird parried talon, beak, and blade blows. Axel kept nearly losing his balance, twisting to avoid the occasional, cartoony pinwheel.
Pax became very happy that Axel had trained for trapeze before they were taken from their Uncles carnival troop.
With Lou Ellen's cheering, Pax released his rock. The projectile caught the eagle's wings as they extended, looking like a black tidal wave of death.
The eagle was not happy to have its dinner interrupted. To be fair, Pax supposed it would be super rude to have someone attack you when you're trying to enjoy some raw spleen.
At the ammo strike, the wing fluttered violently. Ignoring the strike like it had the average velocity of a beach ball, the eagle arched its body—it was getting ready for take off. As Lou Ellen handed another rock up to Pax and he took aim, he knew take off would be bad. Even with Axel's cool Mayan features, Pax boys were not born for aerial combat, trapeze training or not.
"We need to get closer!" Lou Ellen shouted. She must have realized they weren't doing enough damage from this distance. However, if they got too close to the bluff, Pax wouldn't be able to shoot over the ledge. Still, they had to try and get a sweet middle spot. He took a careful step closer, already loading the next projectile that Lou Ellen had shoved his way.
The eagle arched back onto one talon to strike down with the other.
Axel went down.
Lou Ellen and Pax screamed—
The eagle clawed at Pax's downed brother, pecking violently. Even with their attacks—Pax now unloading rock after rock, shrieking for Lou Ellen to load him up with the largest ammo they could fire, this wouldn't be enough. Some tiny voice in Pax's head whispered that this was just like the time he'd seen Julian almost kill Axel in the arena. He was about to lose his brother, and there was nothing he could—
Axel rose back to his feet on the other side of Prometheus. The bird continued to claw and peck at the spot Axel had been.
Pax's jaw dropped when he realized what had happened.
The eagle was pecking where Axel had pinned one of its wings with his sword.
Lou Ellen's and Pax's screams went from horror to cheers.
He couldn't tell if Axel had used a trick of the Mist, was actually that fast, or if Prometheus had somehow distracted the bird and helped Axel. Honestly, Pax didn't care.
All Pax cared about was how awesome his older brother looked when Axel lunged onto the bird's back and plunged his dagger into the back of the bird's head.
Thanks for reading! I hope you guys enjoyed and are staying safe! Stay tuned next week to meet our Titan of the hour—Rocky—I mean Prometheus.