Disclaimer: I don't own Percy Jackson or Harry Potter.
The Ever Twisting Wind: The Gaean War
Chapter Two: A Nuclear Filler
Beta: *Beta Wanted*
"Hold still would you! How by Tartarus will I be able to hit you if you keep dodging like that!?" Andi cursed as clad in the Storm Mail created by a transformed Wendy, she shot Wind Hammer arrows at Alice using Skyline (Oρίζοντα/Orízonta) as they sparred. Arrows that she shot at her Technodjinn friend at a rate of fire that was comparable to a machine gun.
A spar that they were conducting in the gardens of Andi's palace whilst her various servants spectated as the two gods awaited some actionable intelligence on Gaea, the Gigantes, and their forces. A garden that Alice was leaping, spinning and rolling throughout like a master gymnast as she pulled off some impressive acrobatics to dodge the goddess of the wild's arrow barrage.
You know, it's honestly amazing how Lady Alice can pull off those moves in as tight a skirt as the one she's wearing. Andi heard Wendy send her telepathically as she continued shooting arrows at her friend.
"Evading you, my opponent's, attacks is perfectly natural in a spar." Alice retorted to Andi's earlier taunt as she continued to pull off moves that would make an Olympics gymnast jealous whilst wearing a long sleeved, white dress shirt and a tight blue skirt.
Yeah, Alice's gymnastics are pretty awesome. Andi couldn't help but agree with Wendy's assessment of Alice's evasive skills. Betcha she's either using something built into that android body of hers or some godly trick.
Or she's just that good. With how much she loves skirts, I wouldn't be surprised if she went out of her way to practice in them just so she could fight to her maximum ability whilst wearing them. Wendy hypothesized as they watched Alice use a handstand to redirect a jump out of the way of one of Andi's arrows before spinning around in the air and aiming her gun, fired off a burst of bullets of crackling emerald lightning that intercepted the arrow, and its dozen or so counterparts, that had been homing in on her.
No one's that good. It's physically impossible. Andi retorted as she was forced to pull off her own evasions as Alice finally found the wherewithal to counterattack, firing off hundreds of those crackling emerald lightning bullets of hers with a single pull of her gun's trigger.
If you say so, Andi. Wendy replied, sounding unconvinced as she pulled off her own desperate evasions by zipping and jinking through the air to evade Alice's retaliatory barrage. An assault that was increasingly added to by occasional beams of the crackling emerald lightning-like energy that seemed to make up all her attacks. Beams that were each as quick as lightning and broad as a freight train. But, more importantly, we need to change tactics, Andi. We'll not be able to win this spar if we just keep evading. We need to attack.
I know. Andi replied as she tried to shoot towards Alice like the fastest of gusts with Skyline shifted into its two foot xiphos form in a bid to engage her friend in melee. Just returning fire with her arrows would likely get her nowhere, Alice specialized in ranged combat. No. If she wanted to win this, she'd need to try something new and that meant trying some melee even if it wasn't her forte either.
"You think I'd let you get close, Andi?" Alice shouted back with a chuckle as she began once more using her gymnastics, this time not to evade Andi's arrows but instead to maintain her distance from the goddess of the breeze. An effort that she amplified by using the time manipulating devices built into her eyes, Chronometrons if she remembered correctly, causing them to glow a ghostly emerald green and her movements to blur as she began to move at superhuman speeds.
"You think you can keep me away for how long exactly, Alice? I mean, using those Chronometrons of yours is super draining isn't it? So how long do you think you can keep it up?" Andi shot back at her friend.
"Long enough!" Alice replied confidently as she continued her attempts to maintain distance with Andi and kept continually increasing the intensity of her unending barrage, forcing the goddess of the wild to evade her attacks even as she herself kept trying her best to close the distance.
A state of affairs that essentially left the two sparring goddesses in a stalemate. And as things settled into it, Andi began to feel her mind wandering.
I really wish that Father wasn't such a coward and didn't pass that non-interference edict. As fun as sparring with Alice is, I would rather be spending time with Will!
You're just horny. Wendy teased as Andi finally managed to get close enough to attempt a swing of Skyline at her sparring partner, only for her blade to phase through Alice as the Technodjinn activated her Dimensional Destabilisation Matrix. Why don't you go spend a night or two with Antheia, Pannychis, or both of them. I'm sure neither of them would mind.
Wendy! How could you even suggest that!? Andi scolded her partner as she shot them away from Alice as the machine goddess counterattacked by firing a salvo of beams at her from point blank range. You know I want to stay faithful to Will!
Yeah. Wendy admitted as Alice's beams died out and they found themselves all the way on the other side of the gardens they were fighting in from their opponent. But you're a goddess and it's not like they're particularly known for being loyal to their partners. So if you want-
I know that! But I don't want to be that type of goddess! I don't regret Pikra and Xený but I don't want to be unfaithful to Will again if I can help it. Andi replied heatedly as she quickly conjured a wall of winds that barely deflected the massive heavy beam bombardment that Alice shot her way.
Whatever you say, Andi. Whatever you say. Wendy said as they shot up over their wind wall and toward Alice once more, intent on once more attempting to bring the fight into melee. I'll remind you of your resolve in a few hundred years.
Andi wanted to get angry at Wendy for the mere suggestion that she would be disloyal to Will, but she knew her partner was coming from a place of kindness. It did not always seem like it but Wendy wasn't Human and didn't think like one. Now as an Aurae, most of her thought processes were pretty similar but she, like all nymphs, was immortal and to beings like that, fidelity to a single romantic partner for eternity was almost inconceivable. And as a goddess now, Andi was immortal too. The only reason she still clung to her desire to be faithful to Will was her lingering human mortality. And even in her short time as a goddess, she had already proven herself to be rather unsuccessful in remaining true to her boyfriend, what with siring Pikra and Xený. So, she could totally see where Wendy was coming from.
Please change the topic, Wendy. Andi nonetheless ordered sternly as they found their second attempt to close the distance with Alice much more difficult than their first. The Technodjinn had seemingly learned her lesson from their first go-around and had filled the distance between them with enough energy bullets and beams that it wouldn't have looked out of place in the toughest level of a bullet hell game.
Sure. Wendy said obligingly as they failed to avoid being herded into a large energy mine and found themselves hurled by the subsequent explosion near to a set of marble stands where Katie and a group of Andi's other Dryad servants were seated and cheering for her as they watched the spar. What do you want to talk about instead?
The sight of Katie gave Andi the answer to that question. Thus, even as she shot back into the air, narrowly escaping the concentrated barrage of every one of Allice's nearby projectiles as they zeroed in on where she'd crash landed, the goddess of breezes replied. You don't mind if I vent a little? About how stupid the Campers are to only just figure out that they could use Katie's mortal father to pass messages to his daughter and through her to me thereby bypassing Father's edict.
Whatever floats your airship, Andi. You're my goddess. Wendy replied with a mental shrug as they performed desperate evasive maneuvers as Alice poured on the fire in their direction. And yeah, the Campers were dumb. You'd think that with children of Athena living in Camp that they'd have figured out this loophole fairly quickly but I guess the Mist did a number on them.
Yeah, I guess it did. Andi agreed as she shifted Skyline back into her favorite bow mode and used it to intercept some of the literal storm of bullets and beams Alice was shooting at her, thinning the barrage enough that she could evade around the rest. But can you blame Aunt Demeter for asking Lady Hecate to use it to make the mortals, both Campers and otherwise, forget Katie existed? She just wanted to make her daughter's transition from her mortal life as a Half-blood to her immortal one as a Dryad as easy as possible.
Not that it completely erased Katie's existence from the memory of the world. Her mortal life was still remembered among the immortals and, in an act of mercy, her mortal father still remembered her just fine. For the other mortals though, her memory was increasingly hard to grasp. Thankfully, someone at Camp had eventually remembered Katie existed and that she could be used to contact a god that might help them make sense of why Percy had suddenly gone missing and the all gods had suddenly gone incommunicado.
Though considering how little Andi could tell them, perhaps it wasn't as much of a breakthrough as they had hoped. She was able to tell them why the gods had suddenly all started ghosting them but that didn't really help them much. At least she didn't think it did.
But there at least, she was helpful. On the Percy front, all she was able to tell them was that he was alright. A fact that left Annabeth distraught and caused her to send increasingly heart wrenching letters pleading with Andi to tell them more. It broke Andi's heart to read them, but she couldn't mess with Hera's plan, not without earning the Queen of Olympus' ire and potentially endangering Percy. Hera was vindictive and might harm him if her plan was thwarted out of a desire to rescue him. Nevermind what the Gigantes might do to him if Hera withdrew her protection of him as he made his way across the United States to Camp Jupiter.
I want to help. I really do. But my hands are tied!
Sometimes being a god sucked. It gave her awesome power but so much of the time when it counted, her new nature prevented her from using it!
"Andi! You're distracted!" Alice shouted, catching the goddess of the wild's attention and pulling her from her thoughts at the same time as in a burst of green binary, she dropped some kind of concealment spell to reveal that whilst Andi had been distracted, she'd been planning something big.
"Shit!" Andi gasped as she saw that Alice had pressed herself against the very inner skin of the zeppelin palace and had gathered together a massive orb of roiling energy in front of her gun whilst under her concealment spell.
A spell that if Andi hadn't been so distracted, she'd have at least sensed was there and could use her Μυστικά μάτια της θείας σαφήνειας (Mystic Eyes of Divine Clarity) to peer through. But like an idiot novice, she'd let her mind wander and was now caught in the crosshairs of Alice's powerful attack whilst totally unprepared.
"Eat Necron Gauss Energy, Andi!" Alice shouted as she fired off the biggest energy beam that Andi had ever seen straight at her. It was so massive that Andi didn't think that she could evade it, not without teleporting out of her palace and forfeiting the spar, so that left blocking and tanking the immensely powerful attack.
"Wendy, full power to defense!" Andi shouted in a panic.
Got it! An equally alarmed Wendy shouted back as she poured all her power into bolstering the defensive strength of Andi's Storm Mail whilst the goddess herself threw her arms forward and channeled a not insignificant amount of her own power into conjuring the sturdiest wind wall that she could.
Alice's beam slammed into Andi's windy barrier with the force of a tsunami and it instantly cracked under the strain of keeping it at bay but it did not collapse. Valiantly, Andi's hastily conjured wall held for a good half a minute before it finally succumbed to the raw power that the Conscience of the Technodjinn's attack had unleashed against it. As it did, Alice's beam, diminished in its strength but still extremely potent, proceeded to wash over the Storm Mail-clad Andi. Unlike her barrier, the sturdy armor that Wendy had transformed into held even against the furious energies pitted against it.
Argh! Pit, this hurts! Lady Alice really put in a crap ton of power into this attack! Wendy whined as Alice's beam swept them along and sent them crashing into the skin of Andi's zeppelin. It was thankfully petering out by this point, so it didn't blast a hole through it, just slam them into it hard and scorch it badly. Nothing a little cleanup by some of the palace's Aurae servants couldn't fix.
Not that Andi paid attention to that fact. Nor did she even notice Wendy's complaint. She was a little too preoccupied with an obnoxiously fervent prayer that had filled her mind just as Alice's beam had burst through her barrier.
Oh mighty Andromeda Aurae, goddess of the wild, we implore thee! Please grace us with your presence and smite these fools who dare to desecrate the wild with their foul human science. Come forth and show the world the error of their ways, Oh Great Mother of the Wild! The chanting voices of a coven of environmentalist Witches out in New Mexico filled her mind.
"Pause the spar!" Andi shouted to Alice as she flinched as the volume of the prayers booming in her head upped an octave, bypassing all the filters that she had put in place to prevent them from distracting her until she had the time to deal with them. This annoying group of her followers must have found some way around them somehow. A ritual to amplify the strength of their prayers perhaps?
"Andi? Everything alright? Why are you flinching out of nowhere?" Alice asked as she teleported to Andi's side, her gun holstered.
"Some of my worshippers have come up with a workaround for my filters and have filled my mind with their prayers." Andi explained with a wince. "Sorry about this but I think I better go see what they want or they won't let up."
"Why don't you just send an instance?" Alice asked, shooting Andi a teasing smirk.
Andi played coy and shrugged. "No reason. I just want to go in person to put these people in their place."
There was a loud scoff and Wendy changed backed to normal, revealing that underneath her Storm Mail, Andi was wearing a Wizarding dueling outfit consisting of a ruffled, high-neck, long sleeved shirt with a collar held closed by a jeweled choker; a rose, long sleeved rose vest with blue trim; a leather belt with attached pouches; checkered dark blue trousers; and dragonhide boots.
"Yeah right." Wendy said with a roll of her eyes. "The real reason that Andi doesn't do that is because she sucks with instances."
Smirking, Alice turned to Andi knowingly. "Is that true, Andi?"
Clearly her friend knew the answer to that but instead of confronting the Technodjinn about it, and likely doing exactly what she wanted, Andi just blushed in embarrassment and nodded. "Yeah. I can pull it off when I really have to, but not all the time. So…"
"You know, I can help you work with that." Alice offered. "At a price, of course."
"Whatcha want?" Andi asked with a sigh of relief. She did need some help with her instances and she trusted Alice wouldn't price gouge her for her help.
"Well, nothing too egregious." Alice said with a smile. "All I want is a chance to go with you to meet your worshippers. I don't have any of my own, being more tied to a concept than to a particular group of mortal believers, so I'm curious to see yours."
"You sure that's what you want, Alice?" Andi asked as she summoned a floor length, hooded, emerald cloak and threw it over her shoulders, so that she looked the part when she visited her Wizarding worshippers. "It's not going to be all that interesting and you might be my liaison with the rest of your family, but you're under no obligation to go with me everywhere."
"I know." Alice said with a nod. "But I am genuinely curious what your worshippers are like. Besides, going out with you is better than doing nothing here. As luxurious as your palace is, Andi, it got boring a while ago. Weren't we sparring to kill time?"
"Okay then feel free to come with me if that's what you want." Andi said with a shrug. "Also about our spar, we'll complete it another time, alright?"
"Sounds good." Alice said with a smile. "So where are we headed? And how are you visiting them anyway? Isn't it against Zeus' prohibition?"
"In reverse order, the Wizarding world is special. It's like a gray area between the mortal and divine worlds so it's not covered by Father's edict. Plus they summoned me which adds another layer of justification to allow me to drop by. As for where we're going? We're heading to New Mexico," Andi told her as she extended her power over them, and Wendy, and teleported them to their destination in a burst of electric blue light.
Andi's teleport deposited both of them and Lady Alice in the middle of a ritual circle inside a protest camp near a large construction site for, what if the half-built iconic hyperboloid-shaped towers were any indication, a nuclear power plant.
"Lady Andromeda," the Witches of the coven that had summoned Andi said as they all reverentially prostrated themselves before their goddess. "We are honored that you heeded our call."
"I always answer the prayers of my faithful." Andi said with a forced smile, before adding more bitingly. "Especially ones who are so fervent in their calls for my aid."
"Pardon us, my goddess. But we were truly desperate." One of the Witches, their spokeswoman apparently, said, as she lifted her head and looked at Andi beseechingly. "We have tried everything to stop the construction of that travesty against nature-" She said, gesturing at the mostly complete nuclear power station. "But despite our best efforts, we have been unable to do more than slow its construction."
"Everything indeed." Andi said with a disapproving glare. "Attempted use of the Imperius Curse on workers on the site to engage in sabotage? Acts of violence? So much so that the Magical Congress of the United States of America (MACUSA) had to deploy Aurors to rein you in? It truly seems you have tried everything indeed."
The Witches squirmed at Andi's obvious disapproval.
"But that is not my concern. The MACUSA have taken those guilty of crimes in and will see justice served for their crimes." Andi said with the confidence of a goddess with the omniscience that implied whilst conveying the implicit threat directed at the MACUSA for if they failed to meet her expectations, the latter of which was a message directed towards the undercover MACUSA agents in the gathered Witches' ranks. "What concerns me, and frankly confuses me, is why would you even want to destroy that nuclear plant?"
The Witches exchanged confused looks at this before their spokeswoman finally gathered the courage to answer with a question of their own. "It is a danger to nature, is it not, my goddess?"
"Yeah, I suppose." Andi said with a shrug. "But it's also a source of clean energy."
"B-But, but, what about renewable energy and the threat of radiation contamination to the environment that it poses?"
Andi sighed as the Witches hit on one of Wendy's goddess' pet peeves.
Oh, this is going to be good! Wendy thought with a grin. Honestly, the Witches were lucky Hunter and Hedwig were off on a Quest. If they were here, they would have aggressively backed Andi up and when they did so, they were scarily intimidating.
"Look!" Andi said, shooting the Witches a stern look. "As it is, nuclear power is currently the safest and most reliable source of energy in the world. Just look at the statistics." At this, in small bursts of electric blue light, a pamphlet that Wendy knew contained the statistics that Andi had mentioned appeared in front of each of the still prostrating Witches. "Renewables such as wind and solar aren't only unreliable, can't generate anywhere near enough power but also, depending on circumstances, produce more carbon emissions than simply using fossil fuels to produce the same amount of electricity. Maybe that won't be the case in the future, but it definitely is the case now."
By the looks of shock on the Witches' faces, this was news to them too. Wendy knew it was to her when Andi first told her about it. The vilification of nuclear power and the aggrandizement of renewable energy in popular culture had really done their job to skew minds. Or maybe they were just shocked that their goddess was disagreeing with them. Mortals always did tend to project their beliefs onto others, even their gods.
"You have no idea how many idiot so-called environmentalists like you have invoked my name in vain for their causes." Andi said, shooting the Witches who had summoned her a dark look. "And now that I have a captive audience for me to vent to, I am going to use the opportunity to its full potential and let it all out."
"Here let me help with that." Lady Alice, clearly thoroughly enjoying seeing this side of Andi, said with an amused grin as she conjured a screen and projector that she used to show a powerpoint with the relevant information that Andi was presenting.
Wendy, Lady Alice asked, reaching out to the Aurae as Andi continued her presentation. Is Andi really this passionate about the topic of nuclear power? Or is this just her venting her frustration at being summoned for such a petty reason?
Why are you asking me, Lady Alice? Why not ask Andi instead? Wendy asked, shooting the Technodjinn a questioning look.
And interrupt her when she's in stride? The machine goddess sent back, gesturing at Andi as she gesticulated determinedly as she continued with her presentation.
Yeah, if you did, she'll probably get mad.
Exactly, so I'm asking you, her partner, instead. Lady Alice said with a grin. So~! What about it? Is Andi really this into the nuclear power issue?
Yeah, she is. Wendy confirmed with a nod. Andi's really super pro-nuclear.
That's surprising. Lady Alice mused, tapping her chin thoughtfully. I would've thought that as a goddess of nature she would be against nuclear power like most mortal environmentalists.
I'm more objective than that. Andi said, joining the telepathic conversation.
At the same time, as if explaining her position towards Lady Alice, she began shifting her presentation. "If it's carbon emissions and climate change that you are worried about, then they're invoking the wrong goddess. I'm the goddess of the wild. Not the goddess of stagnation. The wild adapts to changes in the environment, it always has. It'll adapt to this round of climate change like it has the countless previous rounds since life began. Sure, some species might die but that's just how things work. In the end, in the immortal words of Dr. Ian Malcolm in Jurassic Park, 'life finds a way.'"
That's a surprising position to take, Andi.
Yeah, I know. Andi replied even as she continued her lecture by discussing how the wild had adapted to various climatic changes on both local and global scales both in the past and how it was doing so now. I haven't really spoken to them about it but I'm sure a good chunk of the other gods of nature don't agree with me.
Why do you say so?
Well, I know my opinions are likely unpopular among my peers. Gods are influenced by Humans and those people concerned about nature generally think like these ill-informed Witches. I can only maintain my own opinion on things from my time as a Human because of my youth as a goddess. I haven't had much time to be influenced by Human belief yet.
Even if the other nature gods don't agree with you, I do and I am sure many do too.
I definitely do. Wendy chimed in.
You're biased, Wendy. Andi said with a mental laugh as she concluded her lecture and asked her captive audience if they had any questions. But thank you for the support. You too, Alice.
"Pardon me, my goddess." One of the Witches said as she nervously raised her hand.
"Yes, what is it?"
Gulping nervously, the woman answered. "Well, what, uh, about Chernobyl? Doesn't that prove the danger of nuclear power?"
Wendy couldn't help it. She palmed her face in exasperation. She knew it was the obvious counter example! Did the mortal really think Andi hadn't taken it into account when forging her opinion?
Rolling her eyes, Andi answered the question. "Chernobyl, Three Mile Island and all nuclear disasters ever were accidents deriving from human error. Errors taken into account in new generation nuclear plants which are built with safety measures that prevent such accidents from ever happening again. Nuclear power is safe!"
Her firm declaration was met by terrified nods from the Witches, much to Wendy and Lady Alice's amusement.
"Good." Andi said imperiously. "Now that you understand that. I'll be making a move. Remember to read those pamphlets I gave you and familiarize yourself with the truth. And the next time you encounter an issue, do your research! I don't want you to be such idiots again. Is that clear!?"
""Yes, my goddess!""
With that resounding promise from the mortals, Andi gave them one last satisfied nod before she waited for Lady Alice to dismiss her conjurations before wrapping all of them in her power and teleporting them away in a burst of electric blue light.
Alice had been expecting Andi's teleport to transport them back to her friend's palace. As such, she was surprised when it deposited them in the middle of an extremely barren and dramatic volcanic field. It took a picosecond for her divine electronic systems to identify that they had ended up in the Pahoehoe Lava Flow in El Malpais National Monument. And another nanosecond to determine that someone had intercepted the goddess of the wild's teleport.
The culprit for which it took another microsecond for Alice to identify as the Gigantes standing in front of them: Thoon, the Bane of the Fates. Said Gigantes was a shriveled, wizened giant that was short for his kind, being less than thirty feet tall. He had ratty gray hair, a wrinkled face, eyes milky with cataracts and dragon-scale legs as white as frost. Lastly, and rather surprisingly, instead of armor like Enceladus, Thoon wore a tattered sackcloth tunic.
"Thoon? What are you doing messing with us? Looking to get a thrashing like we gave Enceladus the other day?" Andi asked, shooting the elderly looking Gigantes an unimpressed look.
"I'll be the one delivering a thrashing, little goddesses." Thoon retorted with a snarl and drew a massive meat cleaver out of the folds of his tunic. "After his defeat in your fight with him in Olympic National Park, Enceladus was quite cross with me and was quite happy to show me his displeasure. I am here to return that disfavor to you."
Ignoring him, Alice glanced at her friend. "Andi, any idea how Thoon redirected your teleport? My sensors can tell he's responsible but not quite how."
"He probably used his Destiny Manipulation to change the teleport's fate."
Alice nodded. "That makes sense."
"Are you ignoring me!?" Thoon demanded angrily, flourishing his weapon threateningly.
Andi and Alice shot him an unimpressed look and Andi answered his question. "Of course we're ignoring you. It's not like you're a threat."
This response expectedly infuriated Thoon and the Giganties let out a furious roar and charged at them. In response, Wendy immediately changed into Andi's Storm Mail and wrapped herself around her goddess in preparation of the fight ahead and together the two of them evaded the swing of Thoon's blade by shooting into the air. For her part, Alice just activated her Dimensional Destabilisation Matrix and let the Gigantes' swing phase right through her body.
"That toy of yours won't save you, machine girl." Thoon taunted as he flared his power and Alice felt her Dimensional Destabilisation Matrix glitching and automatically shut down due to the mounting errors in its systems.
Dammit! Thoon's Destiny Manipulation is a pain! Alice thought as just before Thoon's blade would've cut into her now unphased body, she activated the Chronometrons built into her eyes to accelerate her perception of time and the speed with which she could move through it whilst combining it with some gymnastics to evade the Gigantes' attack.
As she did, Alice glanced at her friend as she floated above the battlefield. "Andi, can you leave this to me? It would be a waste for both of us to fight him. He's too weak to justify it. Besides, I have some pent up aggression from our interrupted spar earlier to work out."
"Sure. Go ahead, Alice." Andi said with a shrug as she put away her divine weapon, Skyline, and gestured at Thoon, signifying that he was all Alice's.
"Thanks, Andi!" Alice told her happily as she pirouetted out of the way of yet another of Thoon's swings whilst summoning her gun into her right hand and leveling it at the Gigantes. "Eat Gauss weaponry, Thoon."
With that, Alice pulled the trigger and sent a single large bolt of crackling emerald green energy shooting from the barrel of her gun that exploded as it flew through the air towards Thoon, causing it to separate into dozens of other bullets that zeroed in on the Gigantes. Now, as large as Thoon was, he shouldn't have been able to evade Alice's fast moving bolts. However, annoyingly, the cheating son of Gaea and Tartarus used his Destiny Manipulation to somehow allow him to evade them nonetheless. With laughable ease no less!
"You will have to hit me first, machine girl." The Bane of the Fates said as he slammed his massive meat cleaver down on where Alice was standing just a second ago. An attack that she only narrowly avoided through a Chronometron boosted leap back. An evasion that she combined with firing off a powerful beam straight at Thoon's face.
An attack that should have hit home but in another cheating use of his Destiny Manipulation, he defied all logic and managed to hop to the side, allowing him to avoid getting blasted. Yes, he only escaped her attack by a narrow margin but he escaped it nonetheless!
"You cheater!" Alice cursed the Gigantes as she pulled the trigger of her gun in quick succession, firing hundreds of energy bullets and beams that soon filled the entire area. Yet, despite being trapped in the middle of this bullet hell, Thoon was unfazed. Relying on his Destiny Manipulation, he was dancing through Alice's deadly barrage with annoying ease.
"Hahahaha~! Is this the best you can do, little girl!?" Thoon taunted as he weathered the storm of projectiles that Alice was shooting at him in a bid to kill him.
"Argh! If I can't take you at range then I'll just have to do it in melee!" Alice shouted back, her frustration boiling over.
Putting her words into action, Alice shifted her gun into a scythe with a blade glowing with a ominous green aura and a shaft built around all kinds of sci-fi tech. With her changed weapon in hand, she amped up the Chronometrons built into her eyes to manipulate the flow of time around her so she could even faster before charging forward to attack Thoon.
Despite her having outright announced her intentions, Thoon was still somehow surprised by Alice charging in front of him. He thus failed to raise a guard in time to block or parry her scythe as she swung it at his stomach. More importantly, he was too stunned to attempt anything with that annoying Destiny Manipulation of his. Thanks to that, the Phase Blade of her scythe easily cut through Thoon's Gigantes durability, causing him to let out a roar of pain and fold over in agony.
Alice might have not realized the extent of the Giant Invincibility that the Gigantes possessed during her fight with Enceladus but she had learned her lesson since then. Thus, she knew that though she finally had Thoon at her mercy like she wanted, she couldn't finish him off. No, as much as she hated having to do so, she had to resort to a much less satisfying means of eliminating the threat of the giant.
"It's time for you to take a hike, Thoon!" The Conscience of the Technodjinn declared confidently as she shifted her scythe back into its gun mode, pressed it right into the gaping wound of Thoon's stomach and pulled the trigger.
This sent a beam of raw gauss energy hurtling at supersonic speeds through the Bane of the Fates' innards. If he was a lesser being, it would have shot out the other side, blasting a hole clean through the giant. But sadly he was not, and all it managed was to painfully, and admittedly quite comically, send the Gigantes flying.
But he wasn't tossed into the air on any old trajectory. In the same instance that she'd fired the beam that launched Thoon into the air, Alice had also reached out with her powers and summoned a vast stone pyramid with a rectangular gateway built into it that acted as an extradimensional portal. A gateway that phased into place at exactly the right moment for her opponent to go flying through, just like her computations had predicted he would.
"Good riddance to bad rubbish." Alice said with a triumphant grin as she dismissed her portal, causing it to phase teleport back to the base she'd summoned it from.
"Yo, Alice, what was that portal?" Andi asked as she floated down to join her.
"It was a Necron Portal." Alice explained as she dismissed her gun and rolled her shoulders to relieve some of the tension that the fight had built up in her muscles. Her body might be an android but it was fully anatomically correct and though it was much more high spec than the average Human's, it was still susceptible, albeit to a much lesser extent, to many of its weaknesses. "It should send Thoon to the surface of the sun, though I'm pretty sure he'll use his Destiny Manipulation to escape that fate and we'll face him again soon enough."
Andi let out an annoyed sigh at this even as she landed next to Alice and released her Storm Mail, allowing Wendy to transform back to normal. "Don't remind me. At least defeating Thoon will have a positive effect."
"How so?" Alice asked, cocking an eyebrow curiously.
"Whatever else he is, Thoon is a deity of fate, so defeating him means fate will go our way in some way." Andi explained. "Since, you know, we just symbolically defeated fate?"
"Ah!" Alice said with a nod of understanding. "Any idea in what way will fate shine on us?"
Andi shrugged. "No idea. But if I'd have to guess it'll be in some way that isn't really important to us. The Fates tend to be stingy like that."
"Don't let them hear you say that, Andi." Wendy chided her goddess. "Or you'll get on their bad side."
The goddess of the wild just rolled her eyes. "Hardly. The Fates take pride in their stinginess."
"Really?" Alice asked, surprised.
"Yeah. Think of it this way, that they can be stingy even with other gods is a sign of the kind of leverage they have over them, no?"
Alice blinked in surprise. That made sense…
"Right." She said, uneasy about the implications of just how much influence the Fates might have over the lives of even gods like her. "So, what you're saying is that if I was making a bet, I should place it on whatever boon they give us for defeating Thoon to be for something inconsequential like say about the nuclear power issue we talked to those Witch worshippers of yours about?"
"Thanks for giving them ideas, Alice." Andi said with a groan. "But yeah, that certainly fits the bill as something we want but which isn't really that important to us."
"Sorry."
"Don't mention it." Andi said, waving Alice's apology away.
"Andi, Lady Alice, are we done here?" Wendy cut in. "'Cos it's getting late. If we waste any more time here I'll miss today's episode of Days of Our Lives."
Alice joined Andi in shooting the Aurae a disbelieving look.
"Since when have you started watching soap operas?"
Wendy shrugged. "Recently. It's not like we have much to do since Lord Zeus' edict. I picked it up to pass the time cooped up in the palace."
Andi winced and nodded. "You know there's nothing stopping you from interacting with the mortal world, right, Wendy?"
"I'm your partner and Aurae lieutenant." Wendy countered. "If Ida is your right hand then I'm your left hand. Whatever I do is subject to just as many restrictions by Lord Zeus' prohibition as you are, Andi."
Andi sighed. "I guess you're right."
"Today's episode of Days of Our Lives starts in a few minutes." Alice spoke up with a teasing smile directed Wendy's way, causing the adorable Aurae to blush with embarrassment.
"And we wouldn't want Wendy to miss part of her favorite show." Andi added, offering her partner a playful grin of her own. "So let's go."
"Let's." Alice agreed as she stretched out her power over all three of them and teleported them back to Andi's palace. Like Andi said, it wouldn't do to have Wendy miss out on her favorite show just because they wanted to tease her. Besides, it would be more fun teasing her as she watched it!
Katie Gardner, daughter of Demeter and Dryad lieutenant of Andromeda Aurae, goddess of the wild, sat on one of the bleachers grown out of the roots and branches of some of the bigger, sturdier trees in the garden of her goddess' airship palace. She was seated next to Ida, her goddess' mentor and right hand woman, and a host of the other Dryads and Aurae that served as servants for the palace with one of the numerous cats that freely roamed the gardens - having been brought into the palace after Wendy, their goddess' partner and Aurae lieutenant, fell in love with the animals - sitting on her lap alongside her Mimic, Brick, which served as the pot for her plant self as they all watched Andi spar with her friend, Lady Alice of the Technodjinn.
"Get her Andi! Beat her!" Katie cheered for her goddess enthusiastically as the goddess that had saved her life by reincarnating her shot a storm's worth of Wind Hammer arrows at the Technodjinn that had ended Katie's mortal life.
"I see you are still holding a grudge against Lady Alice for killing you." Ida observed without even looking away as the machine goddess managed to evade Andi's barrage. Something that wasn't really a surprise. Lady Alice had faced this particular tactic of Andi's during their last spar already.
Andi was aware of this too though. So as Katie expected, she had mixed things up by hiding Αερο (Aero) arrows in the midst of her more standard Wind Hammer arrows. Being more powerful than a Wind Hammer, the Αερο spells exploded with much more powerful bursts of wind. Lady Alice clearly didn't expect this and, much to Katie's satisfaction, was repeatedly hit by the explosive gusts created by the Αερο arrows as she misjudged them as the less powerful Wind Hammer arrows.
"You've got her on the ropes, Andi! Take her out!"
"I want to scold you for unreasonably continuing to hold your grudge even now," Ida said as Andi took advantage of Lady Alice being caught off guard by her slipping in the Αερο arrows and began gathering her power for a knockout blow. "But you're cheering for our goddess so I can't really justify it."
"Then don't." Katie told the Oread with a smirk. "Just cheer for Andi!"
Ida sighed. "I suppose that's all I can do."
"Prepare to lose, Alice!" Andi, clad in the Storm Mail created from the transformed Wendy, shouted confidently. "επικαλούνται: κατάρρευση (Invoke: Implosion)!"
At her invocation, the space around the disorientated Lady Alice began to distort until a powerful vortex suddenly formed. A maelstrom of twisted space that drew everything around it in. Well, almost everything. Lady Alice was weathering Andi's spell like it was nothing at all.
"Andi! Did you forget about my Dimensional Destabilisation Matrix and how it lets me selectively phase out of the physical world?" Lady Alice taunted as she raised her gun up at Andi.
"Andi! Dodge it!" Katie shouted in warning.
It came a second too late however as even as the words left her mouth, a truly massive beam of crackling emerald energy shot from Lady Alice's gun. One which had more than enough velocity behind it to easily escape the suction of Andi's κατάρρευση generated vortex and streak through the air towards the goddess of breezes. Of course, Andi wasn't blind to this threat and immediately began evasive maneuvers but against the super fast, superpowered beam, it was no use and she was soon hit dead on!
"Andi!" Katie cried out in alarm alongside the entirety of the spectating crowd.
Their worried voices were so loud that it almost drowned out Andi's κατάρρευση generated vortex finally imploding with a loud boom. One that was accompanied by a frustrated and pained hiss from Lady Alice.
"Dammit! Just my luck that my Dimensional Destabilisation Matrix ran out of energy just before that spell cut out." The Technodjinn cursed as she looked at the ruin of her left arm and side. They had been badly torn up by the crushing power of the twisted space created by Andi's spell when her phasing device ran out of power just before said vortex collapsed. So much so that her false skin and flesh, which looked disturbingly organic, had been bloodily ripped off, revealing the super advanced robotics underneath. Oh, and her left arm was completely missing from the elbow down. Couldn't forget that!
"Alice, you okay?" A very battered looking Andi said as she stumbled over to Lady Alice whilst supporting a clearly groggy Wendy. "You look pretty beat up."
"Someone go help Andi with Wendy!" Katie ordered as she jumped to her feet, prompting the cat in her lap to jump off and hiss at her in annoyance. She ignored the feline however. She had more important concerns at the moment.
"I could say the same for you, Andi. You're all covered in scratches and I can sense your immediate reserves of energy are almost empty." Lady Alice said as her injuries were surrounded by a swarm of green binary bits as she healed herself.
"Still not as beat up as you, Alice." Andi shot back as carefully handed Wendy over to the care of a pair of Aurae who teleported next to her. "Besides, you'll be just as drained after you finish repairing yourself."
"True enough." Lady Alice said with a tired sigh as her recovery magic finished doing its work and the damage she'd suffered was fully repaired. "I'm exhausted."
"You don't sound exhausted." Andi said as she moved to support Lady Alice.
"Neither do you." Lady Alice replied with a smirk as she accepted the offer and leaned into Andi. "The perks of being a goddess."
"Uh, Andi, Lady Alice, if you're tired, how about some Nectar?" Katie offered as Brick pulled a pair of vials of the energy replenishing drink of the gods from the hammerspace that was his interior.
"Nah. I think I'll just take a nap." Andi said as she began walking, more like staggering, arm in arm with Lady Alice towards the treehouse grown out of living trees that served as the residential building of her palace.
"Same." Lady Alice echoed with an agreeing nod. "Besides, I prefer Energon."
"Um, okay." Katie said as she had Brick put away the Nectar and she kept pace with the two goddesses. "But then why don't you let us help you walk there since you're so tired and all."
"Don't worry about it, Katie. We're fine."
"Yeah, this walk is like our cool down after our fight."
Katie frowned at the goddesses' stubbornness and exchanged a look with Ida. The Oread just shook her head and instead turned to a nearby Aurae to issue instructions to prepare Andi and Lady Alice's beds. Sighing at this, the young Dryad resigned herself to just go along with the two goddess' whims and trailed behind them as they slowly made their way back to the house.
"I honestly think they just want an excuse to take a nap." Wendy said suddenly as she teleported in next to Katie as they reached the door to the house. She spoke in such a quiet whisper and without any forewarning to her presence that it should have startled Katie but she'd frankly sensed her fellow lieutenant of the wild as she approached.
"Yeah." Katie agreed in an equally quiet whisper. "You took some Nectar?"
"A whole vial."
"My room first. It's the nearest." Andi said as she and Lady Alice turned towards her bedroom. "You can crash there with me if you want. If not-"
"I'll take you up on that offer. I'm too tired to stagger back to my guest room, help or no help." Lady Alice said as Katie had Brick extend a pseudopod out to help open the door to Andi's bedroom ahead of the two goddesses.
"'Kay~!" Andi said with a yawn as she and Lady Alice stumbled into the room.
"Thanks." Lady Alice said as they reached Andi's bed and all but threw themselves onto the massive Alaskan King size bed, her body becoming surrounded in a cloud of green binary as she did. A binary cloud that magically changed her into her underwear which was what passed for her sleepwear.
"Don't mention it." Andi replied as following her friend's example, she changed in a burst of electric blue light into her sleepwear. Which since becoming the goddess of the wild consisted of nothing at all, thus amounted to her teleporting her clothes off her and presumably into the laundry.
Lady Alice made some unintelligible noise of gratitude before she drifted off into sleep, followed almost immediately afterwards by Andi doing the same. If Katie didn't know better, she'd have said that they had planned the whole thing as some kind of prank on her and the rest of Andi's staff. In fact, the only reason she didn't think that was the case was because just seconds after the two of them fell asleep, Ladies Pannychis and Antheia teleported into the room alongside Young Mistresses Pikralída and Xenýchtis. She might not think Andi above pulling a prank like this on her servants, her goddess had a mischievous streak a mile wide when she put her mind to it, but there was no way she'd do something like this to her daughters!
Daughters, who like their mothers, were currently frozen at the sight of Andi and Lady Alice in bed with each other. A development that had Katie shooting Wendy a panicked look in fear of the potential fury that the two Charities might unleash at the sight of the father of their children being in a compromising position with another woman.
"My ladies, greetings." The ever reliable Ida said from the door to Andi's bedroom, offering the four goddesses a polite bow, prompting Katie and Wendy to follow suit. "Would you please exit the room? My lady is exhausted and needs her sleep."
"Of course, Ida." Lady Pannychis agreed as she did as Ida requested and began walking out of Andi's room, leading Young Mistress Xenýchtis out with her.
"Yes, Andi, does look tired." Lady Antheia agreed, guiding Young Mistress Pikralída out as she followed after her sister.
At Ida so easily getting the goddesses' agreement, Wendy exchanged an impressed look with Katie. Truly Ida was a miracle worker!
Following behind the four goddesses, Katie was the last one out of Andi's bedroom and had Brick use a pair of his pseudopods to close the door behind them. As she did, Ida spoke up. "My ladies, I can explain my lady's actions."
"Oh, there's no need for any explanations." Lady Antheia said with a dismissive wave.
"Yes," Lady Pannychis said with a nod. "We don't mind that Andi has taken on a new lover."
"Yeah." Young Mistress Pikralídai said in agreement as well.
"So long as Mum is happy, we're happy for her too." Young Mistress Xenýcht added.
"I think there has been a misconception here, my ladies." Ida tried to explain.
"Like I said, Ida, we don't need any explanations." Lady Antheia said with a grin. "We only dropped by to have Pikralída and Xenýchtis spend some time with Andi but since she is indisposed-"
"We'll bring them over to visit at another time." Lady Pannychis continued.
"My ladies-" Ida began but not waiting for her to say anything, the four goddesses teleported away before she could say anything substantive.
A state of affairs that had Ida letting out a frustrated sigh.
"Um, Ida, is this gonna be a problem?"
"I doubt it, Wendy." Ida said with a shake of her head. "Andi will probably just have to deal with some gossip about her love life for a while."
"That shouldn't be too much of an issue." Katie said with a shrug. "Andi is usually very able to ignore bad gossip directed her way, so it should be fine, right?"
"I hope that's the case."
"I'm sure it'll be." Wendy said with a hesitant nod. "Hopefully."
A couple days after the embarrassing incident of being caught in bed with Alice by Pannychis, Antheia and their daughters, Andi was in her home office doing paperwork with Ida, Katie and Wendy when she felt a godly presence knocking politely against her palace's wards. A god whose visit caused her to look up in surprise.
Why is Hephaestus, of all gods, dropping by? Andi couldn't help but think even as she sent a burst of welcome in reply to the forge god's knock. Sending back a burst of thanks, he teleported into her office in a shimmer of light whilst offering her a smile.
"Hello, Hephaestus. What brought you by for a visit?" She asked as she put aside some reports on the activities of the Gigantes' movements that had been submitted by her Aurae. She could review them later. Right now, she had to give her older brother the attention that he was due as a member of the Olympian Council.
Though even if he did not hold such an esteemed position, Hephaestus would still have grabbed her attention. He just had that kind of presence. It was hard not to when he was a huge, muscular but deformed lump of a man with shoulders at different heights that made him always seems to be leaning and a huge, bulging, misshapen head and his leg in a creaking steel brace, bushy eyebrows, and a wild, smoldering and disheveled brown beard from which sparks shot out from time to time. With an appearance like that, how could he not catch the eye of everyone around him wherever he went?
"Andromeda." He nodded curtly. "I need to talk to you."
"Alright." Andi agreed and looked to her lieutenants. "Ladies, go take a break. I have a meeting to have with my brother."
"Yes, my lady." "Okay!" "See you soon." The three replied and left the room.
Summoning some tea and scones along with a plush chair on the other side of her desk, she offered her brother a seat. As he sat down, she poured some tea for the two of them and got things going by asking her fellow god, "So what's going on?"
Taking a cup of the offered tea, the smith god took a sip and said. "I had the strangest encounter recently. A movement of Wizards advocating for the expansion of nuclear power."
"Huh, that took off faster than I thought." Andi admitted in surprise, putting down the scone she had in her hand in her shock. "I expected that it would take at least a few years to really get going."
"If a goddess is giving them the idea? They'll do it to please you. Usually they're so slow to change on their own otherwise." The smith god shrugged as he drank some tea. "Well, between this movement and the Technodjinn, who are pro-nuclear, I'm expecting a massive increase in support for nuclear power in the coming decades. So good job on that, Sister."
Smiling at things going her way, Andi replied. "Maybe that will increase funding to fusion research and the mortals will finally crack it."
"Yes, we can only hope." Hephasetus expressed with a happy look on his face.
"Is there anything else I can do for you, Hephaestus?" Andi asked as she took a few nibbles of her scone and took a sip of tea.
"Yes, but it's more of a question."
"Really? Fire away then."
"Heh, I've heard from your fellow MGS (Minor Goddess Society) members that you and the Technodjinn that you are living with lately are pretty close."
"Alice?" Andi smiled and nodded. "Yeah, we're pretty close."
The smith god smirked at her, "And how close would that be?"
Andi rolled her eyes at that, already knowing what this was about. "Look, Alice and I are like divine besties. We aren't lovers or anything you are implying."
The god of fire chuckled at this as he rubbed his bearded chin. "A number of the MGS will be disappointed to hear that. They were hoping their intuition was correct. On the other hand, some might be pleased, knowing you are still available."
"I do have a boyfriend, you know." Andi dryly commented.
"Andromeda, mortal lovers don't count."
"Well it matters to me." The young goddess huffed in disagreement.
The older god shrugged uncaringly. "Do you think your suitors would agree with that?"
Andi just sank into her plush seat, letting out a sigh that sent a small breeze into the room at how exasperated she was from the comment.
Hephaestus chuckled once more at her expense, making her glare at him.
"Alright, you've had your laugh. Let's change the subject." She said, sipping more of her tea petulantly.
The smith god relented and asked, "Have you heard the latest development in Hera's mad plan to reunite Camp Half-Blood and Camp Jupiter?"
"No? Not really? How is it going?" She asked, honestly intrigued.
"Apparently she is about to set things up for the leaders of both Camps to swap places."
A frown grew on Andi's face and she waved her hand. "That sounds like some B-movie plot. It's ridiculous and doomed to fail. Did she really kidnap both their leaders just for that?"
Yet, I have to make sure it doesn't fail! As hairbrain as Hera's plan is, reuniting the Camps is a good idea. I'll make sure at least that succeeds if I can help it.
But to do that, she would need to know more.
"Exactly, but Hera's always been overly ambitious when she gets an idea in her head." The god harrumphed.
"I see, can you tell me more about what else she might have in store?"
Done and done! Thanks to Nameless as always!
Andi is doing Andi things as a goddess, dealing with worshippers and the like. And as a wild goddess going pro-nuclear was an interesting choice. Her talk with Heph puts it into good perspective and hopefully her efforts will accelerate the study of fusion in the decades to come.
Nameless: I am sure some readers might disagree with Andi's take on Human influence on nature. If you do, let me reiterate that as stated in the chapter that she is one god of nature and reflects only one view on the matter with other gods reflecting others. In Andi's case, hers is a combination of the idea that life will go on even after the Anthropocene extinction, so the wild, as a whole, doesn't really care and a pro-human point of view as seen by how she recognizes that for better or worse, nuclear point is the most green energy source we possess especially in 2010 when the story is set (when the science wasn't ready, which arguably is still true even if it's getting there). Now, some might argue that this is a departure from her predecessor, Pan? Definitely. But Andi is a different person, which is why we gave her different views. But I would argue that the differences were not as great as most would think. After all, please note that in canon Pan allowed himself to die and handed the world over to Humanity. Back to the previous point, to illustrate how the nature gods would have different views, if we ever have Andi meet another nature god then we will likely have them discuss their different views on nature.
Also, has anyone noticed that the Gigantes are super weak? Like, it's no joke how weak they are? The only thing they've got going for them is their kill condition which mama Gaea granted them and then their meta-defense against their selected god. Yet once they face off against a different match-up… it really does nothing for them. Or at least not much. So yeah, holy hell they are underwhelming from a meta perspective. Anyway, enough with those losers! Andi spending more time with her new bestie in Alice is always a good thing. Katie being aggressive about Andi's new friendship is also hilarious, but hey, can't exactly blame her!
Nameless: No, you can't. As she keeps reminding everyone who would listen, Alice did kill her.
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