
The Very True Tale of Alex Johnson

Brokes, Pennsylvania, Volume 1

Jay Jackson

Published by Jay Jackson, 2018.
This is a work of fiction. Similarities to real people, places, or events are entirely coincidental.

THE VERY TRUE TALE OF ALEX JOHNSON

**First edition. August 31, 2018.**

Copyright (C) 2018 Jay Jackson.

ISBN: 978-1386133971

Written by Jay Jackson.

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

# Table of Contents

Title Page

Copyright Page

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Sign up for Jay Jackson's Mailing List

About the Author

#

To all the people who didn't care, thank the gods I didn't pay attention.

To all the people who did care (and my cat), you're great, I like you a ton and thank you so much for sticking with me.

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# Chapter One

Is this on- Oh, hey! You came!

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I came.

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That's- that's really great. I honestly wasn't sure if you would. Ha, so, great!

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Uh huh, well, you promised it'd be interesting so. Let's hear it. Start from the top.

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Right, okay, great. Um, so it all started around the last week of my winter break. That Monday. It was... wild.

I was walking down the street back to my apartment building. It was about two in the morning, maybe earlier, maybe later. I'm not sure to be honest. Sometimes I couldn't sleep, like something was itching at me to get moving, to get somewhere, so I'd just get up, tell my dad or my mom that I was going for a jog and just walk around our neighborhood until my head cleared or time lost so much meaning I got unnerved and went home or it got too cold to stay out.

Lately it'd be happening a lot. And it itched at my head that things were going to happen, that something was in motion. I didn't know what, of course. I just, ya know, boiled it down to my anxiety having a breakdown of its own. But walking outside, just talking a few minutes in the dark and the cool outdoors soothed that punching feeling.

We live a few minutes away from the main city but it can be wonderfully quiet. The dull hum of the noises echoing right out of the city center rolling through the air, reminding you that things are alive even if the sidewalks are bare. Sort of like the opening to a coming-of-age movie, ya know? And it's calm around midnight, or two, maybe, five so I've never really feared walking about by myself. Not that Brokes makes me fear walking around in general, anyway.

Of course, this was late December so I was bundled up and trying to figure out how not to get my face to freeze when the winds shifted course and blasted me right in the face. I ducked into a bus stop and waited for the winds to die down.

Against the sky cascaded thousands of stars. If it weren't for the fact that I was dying in the cold, I'd probably would've appreciated them. Maybe even recited a few myths about them in my head just to prove I could remember them. Auriga and his Chariot.[1] The celestial bear hunt.[2] The seven Rishis.[3]

Any of them.

I've always- I've always loved the constellation stories. And the creation of the world, but mostly the constellations. It's, like, we all saw something mystifying, something gorgeous and wanted to know why they were there, why they shined for us. And the stars have always been there. And we've always stared at them.

It's a comforting thought in a way.

Something unable to change.

When the wind died down, I ducked out of the bus stop and hustled down the road again, deciding to forgo the leisure-ness of my walk to, instead, not be cold.

I swear my body wasn't created for the climate of the city I lived in.

When the building's brick and mortar came into view, I hustled a little faster to the front door, feeling not unlike a plump, slightly toasted marshmallow. I wrestled my keys from my outer pockets. My fingers froze as they hit the chilled air. Shivering, I stumbled up the steps. My fingers slipped. The keys fell clattering to the ground. A cool burst of wind set them sliding off to the side and into the bushes that lined the staircase and walls.

Groaning, I walked to the edge of the steps and squatted down. "Stupid wind," I muttered like a cranky old woman. "Too cold for this."

Patting the soft cold earth, I tried to utilize my non-existent night vision the best I could and then wondered for the billionth time why I never brought my phone with me on my walks. Or any source of light really.

I titled a little to the side. The glow off the streetlamp shimmered off a small tool of metal in the bushes. Victorious I reached down and snagged it. A loud burst echoed into the night. I jerked and spun my head to the source of the sound, heart beating inside my chest so fast I was pretty sure I was going to kill myself by self-induced heart attack. The streetlight had vanished. I relaxed. Another burnt or burst bulb. I exhaled slowly, trying to still myself before I stood up. As I did, a slither of volatile fear curdled down my spine anyway.

Slowly, I turned around, fingers clenched around my keys. Just opposite me, standing behind the other bushes, stood a tall figure. The light gone, I couldn't tell what it was. Just that its eyes, a deep glowing red, stared into me and I was afraid.

Against my better judgement, I squeezed my eyes shut. Just a hallucination. I got them sometimes. Weird creatures. Red eyes watching me. It was usually because of a lack of sleep or my anxiety feeding off my environment and chronic uneasiness and pushing on me some bullshit from a horror movie or a nightmare.

Just had to close my eyes, breathe and when I opened them they'd be gone. Always worked.

So, I swallowed thickly and opened my eyes.

The image was gone.

My heart wouldn't stop hammering though. It never really does.

It- It felt familiar. Always. Like I was supposed to know what it was. Like I did know what it was. Like it was real. I hated that.

But, my therapist, Dr. Colver, said that that was normal. It worked off paranoia or something and with paranoia, things that aren't real can still feel that way. So, I adjusted.

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Out of curiosity, how long has this been going on?

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The first hallucination kind of sprouted when I was six, going seven. Right before I met my friends, Jackson and Kali. I used to get these weird feelings of people watching me. A few times I looked behind myself and saw things, red eyes and sharp teeth and some kind of horrible amalgamation of a bird and man standing next to it. My first thought, being six and all, was that the gods had come down to watch me for some reason[4] but then I, uh, realized that Egyptian gods don't appear in the form of both. They're depicted that way because it represents either one of their forms but for the most part they don't show up as a person with an animal head. Just a person or an animal.

It's a duality thing.

Naturally, once I remembered that, the red eyes and sharp teeth of the figure beside it suddenly terrified me a whole lot more.

After that, I started looking out for more of them, worried, scared. Was happily informed multiple times that it wasn't real, there was no need to stress, got put on some anxiety medication when I was ten and then some better ones when I was twelve.

The monsters started showing up a little less after that.

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That's good, I guess.

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Yeah, I'm grateful for it.

Once my heart had stopped trying to hammer its way out of my chest, or at least chilled a bit, I walked over to the front door and unlocked it. My next-door-neighbor, Grayson, greeted me at the front desk. He doesn't sleep much so when an opening came for a night shift, he applied.

"Hey, Gray," I chirped, bounding towards the elevator.

He smiled at me, soft. "Alex, how was your walk?"

"Good." I grinned around the image of the eyes. "It was good." I gestured loosely to the cups around his desk and the small hot chocolate press in the corner. "How goes the hot chocolate perfecting?"

"I think," he said, pushing a couple cups with awkward scrawls of writing on the side, "I'm narrowing in on it."

"That's great." I took the cups. "I'll give this to my dad."

"Wonderful," he said. He patted my arm before turning back to the front door and watching the road.

For a moment, I watched him. Ever since I was a kid, there were times I swore he vanished from sight, or at least let the light flicker through him. I asked him about it but he always said magic skipped his generation so-

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Wait, what?

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Oh, right, you don't know.

See, Brokes is really cool in that a lot of the people who live here have some splattering of magic ability. I know Katelynn, my friend Nick's adopted little sister, can see the future. Any future, we think, we don't know for sure, she just smiles blithely at us every time we ask, but that's her thing. And we're pretty confident that it's any of them.

Then there's my family. My mom and my dad's sides of the family all have some degree of magic ability. Though, my parents always tell me that it skipped them. I don't know why they're lying to me about that because every time I ask they get evasive and my dad laughs uncontrollably then runs away so I know they're lying but, it's whatever I guess.

There's a school of kids run by the Knight Foundation that helps them. There's another school, just outside the edge of the city that teaches kids too. I don't really know what they do. It's always been one of those places that just were off limits and anyone you know who you know goes there never really talks about it.

But then again, maybe it's because none of us really ask.

I always figured, whatever it was, was something really important. Like, I dunno, keeping the city safe or something.

So yeah, that's a thing. With us.

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You're serious.

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Yeah. Why would I lie about it?

It's not like it's a secret just for us. We don't hide it. People just assume it's a magic trick when they see it. Or come up with their own excuse as to why it happens. But if you've lived here long enough, you just accept it. Unless you're my cousin Joe and you're so oblivious you don't even realize anything is happening or have the unfortunate timing and never actually see anything so you don't have any actual proof except for the fact that you can do cool shit.

And those people that try to prove something is real always steer clear of Brokes. I don't know why. Maybe they fear a mass population of magic or maybe they've decided it's not possible for so many people to be like this that they've already written us off. But of course, there's always those few that come in, videotape things and then yell about it on the internet after a few weeks, talking about conspiracies or area fifty-one.

I've watched a few of the videos.

They're really funny. If not, mildly concerning.

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Wow.

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Yeah. Like I said, there's no need to lie. This is the truth. It's always been the truth.

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Well, okay then.

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Okay.

So ever since I was a kid, I thought Grayson could turn invisible. But whenever I asked him about it, he always said it passed over him, his sister, his mother and his son. Granted, I was still convinced about it at this point. There was no way he couldn't be invisible because I'd seen him vanish in front of me and then come back the moment I blinked. I'd seen light refract through his body as he turned slightly non-corporal.

Of course, my dad didn't believe me and whenever I mentioned it, Jackson would just laugh and tell me I was dreaming because Grayson is too uncool to be able to turn invisible but I know it's real because I know I've seen it and one day I will see it again and prove everyone wrong.

When he didn't shift this time, I gathered up my wits and walked over to the elevator, went up a few floors and got off at my stop. My apartment was at the very end of the hallway. I switched keys, unlocked the door and shuffled my way, careful not to spill the hot chocolate.

Due to a minor error in calculations of the land allotted for building, my apartment and the ones below and above it are stupid small. It was cut in half and then rearranged awkwardly to fit in all the requirements demanded for by the landlord. A kitchen, one bath, one bedroom and a living room.

You open into the kitchen. It's about the size of a hallway with half a foot added in for width. Lining up to the center of the kitchen is one doorway. The only doorway. It leads to the bathroom, which has two doors that lead to my bedroom, which was supposed to be the living room, and my parents' bedroom. Mine's on the right as you walk in and theirs is the left.

We put a curtain across to block any possible sightings and there's a small radio we keep near the sink. In order to stop anyone from knowing what's going on, it's always on, playing soft jazz from the thirties or loud heavy metal because the radio is broken and only gets one station and the two people who work that station have very different opinions about what counts as music.

The rent is cheap so the people who live in these apartments tend to be college students still studying or are newly graduated. My parents just like living small. And also, weren't really expecting to have kids until they'd already gotten settled inside and then it was just kind of a "oh, well, just one kid then" type thing.

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Why wouldn't you just cut a doorway out of one of the bedrooms?

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Because that's where our oven lives.

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Oh.

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Yeah, it's not the best. But it's home. And I like it. It's where my family is.

The first day I walked through the door as their kid, all my things were already there and I started crying. I was five and a half and they'd finally gotten me. A year and I was theirs. Solely. Wholly. I'd lived there for, probably, eight months, but it felt like forever as a foster kid. Forever not knowing if I was going to stay or just be a wrong fit like some of the other kids that would wind up back with Carlita.

But I got to stay on my first try. I got to stay with the nice people that wanted to keep me and wanted me as their kid, their real kid, not just foster, but real. Theirs.

It's the clearest memory I have from my childhood aside from the first time I met Nick.

It's the best memory I have from my childhood.

And it feels the same, every single time. I walk through the front door and I just know that this is where my family lives. This is where I live.

It's comforting to be able to come back to a place where you know you're wanted.

Carlita was great but she was sixty-three years old when she took me in as a semi-fresh baby just bordering on the edge of toddler years with a nervous aversion to people and a penchant for almost daily horrific nightmares. Sixty-three years old with three other kids she was taking care of and a weary look to her face all the time. She wanted us to find a place to be because she knew she wasn't it and she didn't want to be.

But she was a good person and she cared for us until we found someone who could care for us just a little more.

And that's my parents. Sure, we fight sometimes. I mean, what family doesn't? But it's rarely ever serious and at the end of the day, I can't really go to bed angry because... they wanted me. They picked me out of a thousand better options and they kept me through the nightmares and the tantrums, even when they didn't have to. They could've just handed me back to the foster care agents, back to Carlita, apologized strenuously and left to find a better fit but no.

They kept me. And then they adopted me.

I can't really pretend that doesn't mean anything because it means the world.

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What do they do?

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Ah, they teach. Mom's a professor at the university. She teaches religious studies and mythology and whatnot. Dad teaches Greco-Roman history at Cornor's High and occasionally does some summer courses at the community college in history or Latin.

They both really love teaching and my mom's been fantastic running me through myths and stories since I was a kid. She gets kind of winded teaching kids though. Something about too much energy and preferring the deadened students she gets coming into her two thousand level courses because they're so tired they rarely talk around her so her need to smack one of them is significantly lowered, I dunno. She likes most of her students though. Not as much as Dad, of course. He loves people. Babies, toddlers, pre-teens, angsty teenagers who steal his lunch for three weeks until they ultimately get guilted into paying him back in secret for whatever reason, college kids...

All people.

It's probably why Grayson likes him so much.

"Al, my child!" Dad chirped, flipping an omelet. "How was your walk?"

I stared at him then snorted. Dropping the hot chocolates onto the counter, I tugged my coat off and onto the rack on the back of the door. "Isn't it a bit early to be making breakfast?"

"Never too early!" he said, smiling wide at me.

"Lies," Mom muttered from her hub at her laptop, squinting viciously at whatever was on the screen.

Dropping the full cup of hot chocolate beside Dad, I squirmed where I stood. "You guys know you don't have to stay up when I go out, right?"

Dad rolled his eyes. "Anna, our child thinks we're overly protective of him."

Mom flickered her eyes at us. "Despicable. How dare you, sweetheart."

"Exactly," Dad said. "How dare you." He flipped the omelet on the plate. "We were just- just celebrating life!"

I looked at him dryly. "Celebrating life?"

"Yes," he said easy. "The Romans did so every once in a while. Laid tribute in eggs at four in the morning to the Parcae[5] in celebration of our wonderful lives and asking them gently to not cut our strings too early."

Mom snorted and Dad stuck his tongue at her. I smiled and checked my phone. It was four, or almost anyway. I rubbed my eyes. Gods, I hadn't even known I'd been out that long. Rubbing my hands together, I leaned back against the counter. "You guys been up long?"

The line in Dad's back tightened and Mom's eyes shot down to her screen, ghosted. "Not long," she said loftily. Her tone touched on a lie. A soft one, but a lie nonetheless.

I relaxed anyway.

"You staying up?" Dad asked. He poured another omelet onto another plate. "Or going back to sleep until noon?"

"Is that a dig?" I laughed. "Because I remember you sleeping all throughout the first half of summer last year."

"I was recovering from surgery," he grumbled, swatting at me with the spatula. Flecks of warm oil splattered on my arm. Luckily, it didn't sting. "You're just a lazy teen."

I grinned and shifted towards the bathroom door. "Nah, Nick finally flew in this morning so I promised I'd come hang for a bit and then Jackson wants us to go see a movie later with Kals."

"Busy bee," Mom murmured. I ducked down and kissed the top of her head. She squeezed my hand and tugged me closer so she could kiss my cheek. She released my hand, letting me drift away. "Try to get some rest later."

"I will," I promised.

Drifting through the bathroom door, I cut through the side and flopped out onto my bed. Technically it's a fold-out couch but it's soft and comfortable and I can sleep on either version to be honest. Kicking off my shoes, I rolled onto my back, digging out my phone again. A billion messages from Nick were plastered at the top, still unread. Relaxing into my spot, I tapped them.

5:03pm: At airport

6:09pm: Flight's here

6:11pm: On plane

6:32pm: Still on damn plane just take off

6:52pm: Flight attendant is dick

12:39am: Home

12:47am: Dad late

1:19am: Home home Mutant bake me a cake.

1:20am: Thanks for card

I grinned at that. Np. How was the flight?

I scrunched up real tight in my spot. Nick shot up online almost immediately, like normal. They[6] didn't sleep much and when they did, it was too lightly.

Dull, they typed back. Why u up

Couldn't sleep. Why u up?

Jack up. A picture of a half-eaten bright green cake posted to the chat followed by Also cake.

I snorted. Katie gonna be pissed u all that w/o her. I winced. *eat all

Nick's face posted to the chat, their mouth open with their tongue out slimed with green icing and chewed chocolate cake chunks. My fucking cake quickly followed.

Rude. I rolled onto my side. Still want me come over later?

Fuck yeah. A brief pause slipped by. No aids. Tired of them.

Np.

They vanished back offline, no doubt devouring the rest of their cake in peace. Well, Katelynn was smart. And also, prophetic[7] so if she didn't see this coming and make another one for all of them to share after dinner, then she probably was a clone of Katelynn and not the real deal.

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Wait. Aids?

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Oh, yeah, hearing aids. Nick's deaf. Shortly after some personal family stuff happened[8], Nick's dad sent them to go live with their grandmother in Japan for a while. She didn't like talking to a child who couldn't understand her apparently, so she put Nick's small tiny three-year old body under surgery without their parents' permission and now they have cochlear implants they rarely use.

She's not in Nick's life anymore.

We mostly talk using ASL[9], though sometimes Nick has them on and we just chat with our voices.

It's not like they hate them. They just don't see the point of them. Like, sure, I mean, Nick finds the aids useful when dealing with non-signing people but, ya know, in Brokes because it's taught from such a young age and it's a requirement for a lot of customer-oriented jobs, you'll rarely find anyone who doesn't know the alphabet at the least. And if you can fingerspell[10], you're basically on the right track.

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That's nice.

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Yep.

My phone buzzed in my grip. I blinked and flipped to the group chat where Jackson had put down a message. He'd change the title to "The Boys Are Back". I rolled my eyes and skimmed down to his message at the bottom.

CC machine broke. Movies @ A's. No qs.

Can't do, boo. Going over Nick's.

Movies @ N's. No qs.

Flickering online, Nick added quick, Fine then vanished again.

I paused then wrote, No BBM.

??????

It's dreary.

Jackson shot back an angry emoticon followed by all the crying emojis available and then prayer hands. Then, finally, 12-12, dnt b l8.

I sent back a thumbs-up then clicked out of the chat, putting my phone off to the side and staring up at the dark expanse of ceiling above me. Steady, my thoughts trickled down into a pool. Last week of winter break. Despite having just got in, Nick would be flying back to their boarding school out in California in a week. Still had homework to finish off. Kali wanted us all to go ice skating at some point before school started. I needed to start hitting up places for summer work again.

Everything seemed so few in number and yet so impossible to complete. I rolled onto my side, squeezing my eyes shut.

A loud scream burst into my head. The glint of something sharp flashed.

I sat up and exhaled shakily.

Ah. Hadn't thought of that in a while.

I squeezed my knees and breathed. There were a lot of nightmares I had as a kid that had long since faded out into thoughts that lingered solely at the back of my mind but these were the ones that terrified me the most because, despite being so fragmented, they felt like a memory. Nothing clear, just quick shots, like something stained to my mind.

Standing up, I paced around my room, shaking off my nerves.

I never knew what was happening in that one. I remembered the first time I dreamt of it. Some man shouting followed by a bloodcurling scream and a flash of sharp metal twisting before my eyes. I'd woken up in a hot flash, confident I was going to die, and refused to let anyone come near me no matter how much I wanted to be held and comforted.

Eventually Carlita had me spend the night in her bedroom while she took up residence on the couch but instead of sleeping on the bed like a sane child, I crawled under the bed, scrunched up until I was too small to be seen and went to sleep like that.

I did that a lot when I was four.

I have absolutely no fucking clue what I was hiding from or why I thought under the bed was a smart idea given my complete belief of the monsters that lived there but, ya know, I was four. I'm probably really shouldn't question the concepts a four year old comes up with because, let's face it, I don't even think they know what they're talking about.

When my nerves had settled just a bit, I relaxed and sat back down. Then stood back up. I still need to move, needed to run. The weird itch at the back of my head had scampered back in. It urged me to go.

I didn't know where.

So I just shoved open the window and exhaled sharply into the brisk night, wondering why I had to be going crazy now. There were a lot of things I needed to do. My paranoia sharpening itself to spear me over and over again was not a good thing for me right now and yet it was happening anyway.

My head hung sourly out of the window, just barely though, in case the window fell back down, I could jerk back quickly. My hands tightened over the sill. The winter air was cold and frozen and almost hurt but not really but enough for me to swallow thickly and think too much of the prickles that were blooming under the skin of my face and how they'd hurt later, how they'd burn and ache and I'd be stuck crying through the ache of it all like a fool.

Shifting back, I lifted my hands up to the edge of the window and sighed slowly. Just random bouts of paranoia coupled with crippling algophobia[11]. Nothing to stress over.

When I looked up, the devil stared back at me.

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What?

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Yeah.

I screamed, shoved myself back so fast the window dislodged and slammed down. It hit the sill with a bleeding crack, a sharp edge bursting at the edge of the glass panes. My hands burned in fake pain as a thousand scenarios crashed through my brain about "what if your hand had still been there?" and images of the window smashing into them flashed like the postlude to an epilepsy warning.

And still the devil was staring at me, looking like a fucking deer in headlights as it hung from the next wall over, just out of the way of my neighbor's window.

The door slammed open. The echo set a flash of nerves crawling up my spine like a thousand ants. Pretends of pain cursed through my bones once, twice then stopped as I shot my eyes over to Dad, a loud warning in my head echoing at the sight of him.

The warning vanished as he looked at me, concerned, worried, scared. "What's wrong?" he snapped.

I shook my head, swallowing thick around my thoughts. As I glanced back out the window, the devil was gone. "Nothing."

He stepped over, shaking his head. "Then why are you squeezing your hands so tight?"

Dad pried apart my fingers and rubbed my hands in between his palms. The action was soothing but nerves still bounded around my throat. "I just- I just- I just thought I saw something?"

Mom stepped. "Saw what, Al?"

"I- I-" Laughter bubbled out of my mouth like a psychotic chatter. "I don't even-" I exhaled shaky as Dad switched to my other hand. The other fell to my side. My breathing dropped to a pause while I struggled to regain my senses. Finally, I mumbled, "The devil?"

Amused concern glinted in her eyes. "The devil?" she repeated, dry.

"Yeah. Horns. Red eyes." I rubbed my jaw, tired. "No tail though."

"You been seeing the devil a lot?" Mom asked, her voice wary but soft.

Still feeling about a thousand nerves pulsing through my skin, I shrugged. "First time. Promise."

She smiled, tight, concerned, but stepped over and kissed the top of my head. "You sure?"

I nodded loosely. "You know I hate lying."

"Yeah, well, you are around that age where it becomes popular," Dad teased, squeezing my wrist.

"I inherited your bad taste in hair styles and inability to rebel against my family." I sank into his chest as he tugged me back into an awkward hug. "I swear on your face that I haven't seen the devil physically before this."

He sighed against the back of my neck. "I don't know, Al. I think becoming a man was pretty rebellious[12]." He dropped his voice to a whisper. "They didn't approve of your mom too much either."

"Because she's black or a lesbian[13]? You've never clarified that," I said.

Dad shrugged as Mom rolled her eyes, pushing back my hair until it stuck up in the way she preferred. "Both," she said, tapping my nose. "Definitely both." She grabbed Dad's hand and pulled him away. Before he went begrudgingly to her side, he kissed the top of my head and squeezed my shoulders gently. "You should get some sleep."

Shallowly, I exhaled. "I will."

She brushed her fingertips over my cheek. "You want me to make you something?"

I shook my head, watching Dad as he left the room, probably to make me something anyway. "Honestly, Mom, I'm fine."

She frowned. "There's something wrong, isn't there?" I swallowed thickly. She patted my cheek. "Tell me. Otherwise, I'll get your dad to make you a fuckton of tea."

Snorting, I settled down on the edge of my couch and she sat down with me. For a moment, I stayed quiet, not sure how to explain it. "I feel like something- something's going to happen," I started. Tension lit up my arm and I pressed on it, anxiety flaring. "That I need to be somewhere. And do something. Otherwise." I frowned. "Otherwise everything is going to fail."

"What do you mean?"

"I don't know." I dropped my head to my hands. "I don't know. I just keep waking up with the same feeling of everything going so fast and I won't be able to get there in time."

She rubbed my back. "Get where?"

I froze as the word sounded in my head. Home. Like a thundering scream yet somehow too silent in my head. Home. I needed to get home.

But I was already home.

I shook my head. "I don't know." I scrunched my legs to my chest and squeezed my eyes shut. "I don't know where."

She pulled me into her side. "You talk to Dr. Colver about this or is it new?"

"Kind of new?" I started. "But also not? I dunno. Every time I remind myself to, I always-" I paused then shook my head. "Something else happens. Like the devil showing up outside my window. Or realizing I fucked my English exam and panicking because I might not get to be a junior next year." At her concerned look, I shook my head. "I will, of course. Mr. Yun let me retake it. I'm fine."

Relaxed, she pulled her hand to her lap. "If you need more sessions, that's fine, you know that. If you need more time, you just have to ask."

"I don't need more sessions or time. I mean, I feel like I can manage it just fine with what I've got and adding on more makes me feel like I'd need to do more, ya know?" She said nothing and made no notion that she understood what I meant but her eyes stayed warm and careful and I sighed, pushing my chin against my knees. "I just wanna stop feeling like this." I closed my eyes. "I think it's making the anxiety worse."

Nodding slowly, she stood up. "You take your meds?"

"Yep." I gestured loosely to my calendar. "Even put it down."

She walked over to my calendar and eyed it carefully, dragging her finger across the dots I pushed in with the same pen every day. "It's not bad if you do need more time and you can always cancel or cut them short if you need to," she said. "But I won't push it. Just let me know about the monsters."

"They're not real."

She cut her eyes at me, hard and sharp. "They are to you." She turned away. "That's all that matters."

I smiled gently as she stroked her finger over the spines of my books. "You guys worry too much."

"I worry the same amount I always have," she said. "Even if you were completely stable-" She tugged out a book on Egyptian mythology. "-I'd still worry." She flipped it open. "Bes?[14]"

"Good things. Protector." I rubbed my jaw. "Not him though. He's, ya know."

"Small?" she asked, smirking.

I rolled my eyes. "No," I muttered. "If you keep insulting them, they're gonna smite you."

She snorted, flipping through the book. "I think the gods have more important things than murdering me for making factual statements." She clamped it shut and grinned wide. "I keep them alive."

Laughing, I stretched back and watched as she shoved my book back in line with the rest. Everyone says it but it doesn't matter. My mom is the best mom to ever live. She fears nothing. She keeps me calm. She makes decent French toast.

"Alright, I'm stumped," she sighed. She plucked the Christmas gift Kali gave me of her namesake[15] off the shelf and looked it over. "How we feeling today?"

"Womanly," I said, reaching out for the plush figure. She tossed it to me. I caught it and gently rubbed the felt tongue between my fingertips. Just looking at the toy filled me with a quiet sense of calm, like Kali - my friend, not the goddess - was sitting beside me, talking to me in her low, low voice.

I pushed the doll's hair back, smoothing it down from where it tufted it up. "I'm sorry for scaring you, by the way."

She shook her head. "Don't apologize for that."

"Still wanna keep me?" I teased, brushing a stray hunk of dust from one of the skulls.

She sighed deeply and pushed my feet over onto the cushions, dumping my blanket onto my legs. "Your dad wanted two things," she started, tucking the blanket around my legs. "A mixed race child because we're mixed race." She rolled her eyes and I grinned. "And a blonde because he thought it'd be funny since neither one of us are blonde and you've scored all of that for him. Now, I didn't have any parameters and I still wound up with a child-" She settled next to me. "-who is everything I could've ever wanted from a child.

"You're my kid, alright? I'm always going to want to keep you. No matter how wired your mind gets sometimes." She squeezed my hand. "Now go to sleep. I'll call the others. Tell them you all have to hang out here because apparently Satan is trying to sex you and we can't have that." I choked, shoving at her. Despite that, she grinned and kissed the top of my head. "Be nice. The gods are watching."

"I know, I know." I cuddled Plush Kali close to my chest. "Night, Mom."

"Goodnight Alex," she said, turning off the light as she exited the room. The door eased shut behind her and I buried myself into the warmth of my blanket, thick and heavy and orienting.

I was loved.

I was safe.

There were no monsters.

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# Chapter Two

Seven hours later and I was showered, fully dressed and sprawled out on my bed as Nick hooked the TV up to my outlet. Jackson was squatting behind it, fiddling with plugs connecting to the mini DVD player while Kali eyed the options of movies available.

"Where is Sucker Punch?"

Jackson groaned. "Fuck, Kals, no. We're not watching D-rate movies."

Eyes sharp, she looked him down and he relented back to his squatting. I grinned and sat up. "Think it's down in storage. You want me to get it?"

She held up one finger, still rooting through the movies laid out before her, searching for something either insanely good she'd shush us every time anyone made a noise or so bad she'd laugh through the whole film and point out all inaccuracies.

Kali is amazing. She said she was named after the goddess because, despite not being religious, her family wanted her to grow up strong or something and it worked really well. She's the only person in our entire school who's never lost at dodgeball. Not even when she gets distracted by me hiding under the bleachers because the substitute doesn't understand that I'm not supposed to play.

--------

Because of the pain thing?

--------

Yeah. And she's fantastic with that too. Always on my defense and offense, protecting me. I don't think I've ever worried about getting hurt with her around.

She does get pissed because I'm not so good at English. As, you know, a subject and I am constantly disappointing her with my poor grades, something she has never relented on. Ever. Since we met.

At least Jackson, however obsessed with my lack of a love life he may be, is a bit more chill when it comes to my academic failings.

Jackson is one of those people where you either know right away that you'll like him or you know that he's gonna be that person you avoid for three years only to uncomfortably meet him on an elevator when he's covered in paint and wearing plastic vampire teeth.

Luckily, I'm in the former, though there have been a disturbing amount of encounters with the latter.

--------

Wow.

--------

Yeah. Jackson is... special. He's an acquired taste of a person and he knows it and fully utilizes that to his advantage. The only person who really keeps him level is Kali and that's because we all admirably fear her. But Jackson is great.

He's from Egypt and he moved here when he was five. Like Kali's parents, his parents travel a lot so I haven't actually met them but he loves them a lot and I know he misses them when they're gone. It's one of the reasons I think he hangs out over my place so much.

He was Kali's friend first. They knew each other through their parents apparently, I never got the full story, so when I met them they were already familiar with each other in the way that I was already familiar with Nick. And then our little groups joined into one slightly larger group. And we've been like that for the last eight years.

Kali stretched and sighed low. "It is not here." She flicked a case with her finger and scowled deep. "I do not like these."

Grabbing my keys off the pin on my wall, I scooted up to my feet. "I'll go see if it's downstairs. If not, then I probably left it at Nick's."

Jackson groaned, his face illuminated by the shine of the TV as it sluck on. Pleased, Nick ducked their head back, eying me as I moved to the door. They shook their index finger side-to-side quick before rolling both index fingers over one another. Where go?

I pressed my palms together, my left hand pointing sideways as my right stood up, and shifted my right hand side to side before I pointed down. Movie downstairs. I pointed at Kali then dragged my hands like claws facing upwards to my chest before I finger-spelled the rest, ending with a quick jab from my right hand fingertips to my left hand palm. She want S-U-C-K-E-R P-U-N-C-H again.

Nodding, Nick made a circle with their hand then slid their thumb to the crook of their middle finger, their pinkie and ring finger pulling down to the palm. Ok.

I pulled open the door and darted out through the bathroom and kitchen. The door clicked shut behind me. Without thinking, I shoved my hand to my pockets, feeling my keys jangle against my thigh as they hung from my fist. I caught the elevator on its way down, slipping into it alone.

In the back of my mind, the urge to move, to run, curdled thick. I shook it off, exiting the elevator towards the basement. The doors were already open. Fiddling with the keys for my storage units, I walked in.

"Alex!"

I blinked and looked over at Ms. Hern, the woman who lived above me. She grinned at me from her unit. Stopping at my storage unit, I waved low. "Hey, Ms. Hern. How's it going?"

She leaned against her box. "Quite well." Her smile grew wider. "I just found the thing I was looking for."

Unlocking the first box, I said, "That's great." I rifled through the first drawer of DVDs, nagging Sucker Punch from the top. Pushing the drawer shut, I locked the unit back up and turned back to the doorway and Ms. Hern.

She stared at me from where she blocked the exit

I swallowed thick. "Uh, well, I just found my thing so." I took a step forward and she didn't move. Warning bells broke out in my head, high and urgent and screeching. I took a step back. "What- what were you looking for?"

"I think you know, Warrior," she breathed, her voice suddenly breathy and high.

"Uh-" Frost stretched down from where she leaned and over the floor, creeping up on me. "Is everything alright?"

"Everything is perfect now," she whispered.

The ice shot up from the ground, jagged. I jerked back, flailing out of the way. The basement was an enclosed space with only one exit and she was blocking it.

I was completely fucked.

And I didn't even know why.

"Uh, Ms. Hern?" I started, backing up into the storage units. "Did I do something to upset you? Because if I did, I totally didn't mean to."

She giggled, the same high and nerve-wracking tone. "Oh, dear boy-"

"Not a boy[16]."

"-you just don't get it, do you?" She stalked towards me, ice spreading fast across the ground towards me. I shifted back, trying to inch my way away from it. "Julia Hern is dead."

The panic paused in my throat. What?

She raised her hand, ice glistening from her fingertips. "And so are you."

Ice shot out at me, railing towards me at top speed. Panic shot to the top of my head as I jerked back, going nowhere. It cut off right before my eyes, an inch too close as Grayson appeared out of nowhere, snatching it with his bare hand.

It broke, shattering into pieces.

Ms. Hern's eyes widened. "How-"

"Like this," Dad said from the doorway. He raised his palm. "Now."

Wailing screeches echoed all around us as the room suddenly became enveloped in a pool of fog. As I held close to the storage units pressing up against my back, faces peered out from the fog, all screaming and hollering loud. The fog converged on Ms. Hern. She jerked back, now a blurry form in the fog. Within it all, I could hear her screaming my name.

"Alright then!" Dad chirped. Grayson grabbed my arm and yanked me away from the units. "Time to flee."

I stumbled against Dad. "What the fuck-"

Dad grabbed my arm and yanked me along towards the door that led up to the lobby, right across from the elevator. "No time to explain!" he said quickly, breathing hard as he shoved the door open. "We must flee. We must run! We must-" He froze. "Shit, where's your mom?"

"She- she went to the store," I said. My thoughts tripped over themselves. "I don't- I don't- what just-"

Dad grabbed my jaw. "Alex. I swear, I will explain. But later. Because now we have to go or we will die."

"Okay, okay, okay," I breathed shallowly. He dropped his hand, shoving open the top door. "Wait, what?"

"No time!" he shouted, gesturing at me rapidly. I followed his motions, meeting him at the top. "Grayson, they won't hold her forever. I need-" A bursting sound followed by Ms. Hern's high shout. Dad paled and grabbed me. "Stall her!" he yelled back at Grayson, who nodded and vanished, just as the door blew open, shattering off from its hinges.

Ms. Hern stood in the vacant doorway, her face bloodied and eyes pissed.

Before she could do anything, a swirling mist shoved against her, sending her flying down the stairs just as Dad pushed me out of the building. He pointed to the parking lot a few blocks away. "Get to the car."

"What about you?" I asked.

"I'll be fine," he said. "I used to do this for a living." He grabbed my face and kissed the top of my head. "If I'm not back by the time your mom gets there, tell her to go without me, okay?"

"Go where?" I yelled as he darted back into the building. I stood there on the steps, panic settling into my toes. I needed to run, I needed to bolt, escape, escape.

My eyes cut to the parking lot where Dad kept the car we rarely ever used but only owned because it was his baby. My feet moved without my mind catching up. By the time I realized where I was going, what I was doing, I was halfway to the parking lot.

I slowed to a stand.

This was insane.

Ms. Hern just tried to- tried to-

Holy fuck, she just tried to kill me.

My blood ran cold. Kali. Jackson. Nick.

They were still in there. Dad was in there! I didn't know where Mom was, except the store, a vague descriptor. And she could've returned in the seconds I was too busy shuffling it to the parking lot for a reason I wasn't even aware of.

Why was she trying to kill me? What did I do? Did I not say good morning one day? I tried to spend my entire life being polite but this seemed just a tad bit excessive for a missed "Good morning". Maybe I offended her cat. Cats were a bit suspicious of me all the time, I don't know why, but Ms. Hern's never seemed to hate me to my face.

Maybe Hector changed his mind.

Oh, Zeus[17], I was being attacked because of a cat.

This was the worst.

I bent over, breathing hard. My thoughts were reorienting themselves in a thousand different ways, all bad, bad, bad, and at the speed of light. My head felt like it was gonna burst and if it didn't explode, my heart surely was.

A hand snagged my elbow. I jerked up, whipping around and stumbling backwards. Mom stared at me. "Alex?" Her eyes narrowed as she took me in, a plastic bag drooping towards the ground in her hand. "What are you doing out here?"

"There was- And Ms. Hern!" I threw my arms up into the air. "Tried to kill me! There was ice everywhere and I didn't know, and I don't know. And Dad-" I keeled over again. "Dad."

Mom grabbed my shoulder. "Alex, speak slower. Smaller words."

I nodded, eying her. "I went downstairs. To get a movie. Then Ms. Hern tried to kill me. Then Grayson showed up. Then Dad showed up and told me to go the car and my friends-" I gasped, a collective image of Jackson, Kali and Nick spiraling to the forefront of my brain. "They're still inside and I don't know what's happening and I'm so scared and I don't understand, I don't understand, it doesn't make sense, what did I do?" I leaned into wall of a bodega, gasping. Tears pricked the edges of my eyes. "What did I do? I don't know."

"Alex, Alex, listen to me right now." Mom cupped my face with one hand. "I need you to take steady breaths okay. I need you to-"

Our building exploded.

I jerked, staring up and behind her as smoke fumed out the windows of the fifth floor, glass shattering to the sidewalk. People screamed and jolted away. Through the doors of the lobby, tenants and visitors were rushing outside, shouting names.

My blood ran cold.

My-

My-

My home.

Mom's hand fell from her face and for a moment, all the life in her seemed to vanish as she wilted in front me. Then she whirled on, face stern like it was that time when we all thought I was deathly allergic to walnuts and one of the kids in my class tried to get me to eat one to see what would happen so she came in for a meeting with my principal and the other kid's parents and I knew at that very moment she was about to give them hell.

"We have to go."

I stared at her then gestured wildly at the building. "But- DAD!"

"He's fine!"

"HE IS A MARSHMALLOW!"

"With a stone center!" she shot back, which was a fucking lie. "Now get to the damn car!"

I stared at her for a hot second then grabbed my hair. "YOU CAN'T DRIVE!"

She grabbed my arm, gently, ever so gently for a woman so pissed, and growled, "I don't need to drive."

We made it to the parking lot where Dad kept the car he bought when he first got his license. It was, by all accounts, a Frankenstein vehicle. It was older than he was. The doors were from two different models of different cars. The back left wheel was literally taken from a car my dad found abandoned on the side of road as he was driving to Brokes from his town in Illinois after he moved out. Pretty sure the engine had died and been replaced like seventeen times.

For the life of me, I have no idea how he ever managed to get it to start in the first place.

Mom pulled at the handle, swore when it was locked and pressed both hands flat against the window. The door clicked open and I stared at her.

"No questions," she huffed throwing open my door and pushing me roughly inside. She yanked her own door open and slid over.

"What the fuck is happening?" I asked because nothing was making sense!

"Language," she snapped, rooting through door pockets, through the glove box. "Charles," she groaned.

Like clockwork, Dad appeared out of nowhere. "Okay, so," he started, throwing open the door and diving into the driver's seat, "I got rid of it because I didn't think we'd need it."

He shoved the car key into ignition and turned. The car sputtered weakly then promptly died.

"Charles!" Mom moaned. "Are you kidding me? Why do we even keep this thing then?"

"Oh, Anna Banana," Dad said, ignoring the quick scathing look she sent him. "Everything has a life. Even if it doesn't seem that way." He pressed his hand flat of the dashboard and hummed low under his breath. "Wake up, me hearties, wake up, wake up, wake up."

"Dad, I think the car is dead. It's gone. It's time to move on." I grabbed the back of his chair and leaned in between both of them. "Also time to explain why things are happening that happening because I'm panicking."

"Uh huh," Dad said vaguely. The car turned on and I stared at the dashboard. "Alright, she's awake!"

"How?"

"Magic, baby!" he chirped, too excited. He started backing out of the parking lot. "Now, to explain-" Something thudded behind us. Dad adjusted the mirror and exhaled deeply. "We are going to die."

"What?" I spun around, trying to see what was happening now but couldn't until the upper part of the parking lot literally began to tear off. "What the fuck. WHAT THE FUCK."

"Drive, drive," Mom ordered as Dad gunned the engine and peeled out of parking lot just before the roof crushed into the ground, destroying so many other cars with it. She spun around her seat and grabbed my jaw. "Alex, look at me. Look at- look at me." I did, eyes wide. My heart hammered in my chest. "Thank you," she breathed. "Take a deep breath. Everything's going to be fine."

Dad swerved left, peeling hard around the corner. Cars in front of us squealed to stop, drivers shouting at him, at us, then screaming loud at whatever was pounding away behind us.

"Everything's going to be fine," Mom repeated. Her eyes were unphased, body stupidly calm, and I watched her carefully.

She'd never lied to me before.

"What's going on?" I whispered.

She swallowed thickly and looked at Dad, who spared her a single glance, before shifting back to the road, growling at the engine sputtered. She looked back to me and shifted more comfortably, her arm splayed over the headrest.

"Remember when we took you in? And you met my family?" I nodded rapidly. Her eyes flickered out the back window, steeling hard, angry, then back down to me. "You asked me if I was like them and I said I wasn't. And you asked me if I was lying and I said no and then you asked about Dad and I said he wasn't either."

"You lied," I said flatly.

"It was a necessary lie," she explained, gesturing loosely. "See, we are Warriors. Different classifications but same essential prowess. And you-" She pointed at me with her free hand. "-are a Warrior. Not genetically, like your father and I, but chosen."

"That makes no sense." My feel steeled hard against the floor as I gripped my seatbelt while Dad made a hard turn around another corner and another corner right after, eyes flashing to mirror and back to the road too much for my tastes.

The thuds and screams increased.

"Do you know how many times I've tried to levitate the remote to me when I was too lazy to get up and get it myself? I think it would've worked if I had magic! Which goes to prove that I don't."

"It's special," she said, undoing her seatbelt. She threw it off and it snapped to the lock, the sound jarring. "You're special."

"I'm not- what- what are you doing?" She threw open the door. I jerked up and she snapped her wrist at me. I fell back, pushed up against the backseat by hands I couldn't see, like I was walled in.

She looked down at Dad. "Don't let him die."

Then she jumped out of the car, rolling past my window as we sped by her.

My heart fell into my stomach and I nearly vomited. The walls keeping me back collapsed and I jerked up, spun around to see her, still in the road as a gigantic being towered hundreds of feet above her. And then we turned another corner and she vanished.

"MOM!"

"Alex, I need you to calm down," Dad said.

"Calm down?" I shouted. "CALM DOWN? She just- And she- WE NEED TO GO BACK FOR HER!"

"I can't do that," he said, gunning the engine.

"SHE IS YOUR WIFE!"

"I KNOW!" he yelled. His voice cracked, entire body trembling as everything blurred past us, cars honking horns and the city turning into sheer greenery as we stretched up towards the large expanse of forest that bordered part of the city edge. "You don't think I know that? I MARRIED HER."

His hands tightened over the wheel. "There are three things in life that I love. You, your mother and premium sushi for under ten dollars. I've lost one, I might be losing the other so I am not losing you." He shook his head. "But she's made of concrete and iron, okay? I've seen her fistfight a fucking lion without fear. She's gonna be fine." He glanced over his shoulder, eyes baring into mine. "I swear."

I stared at him. Then hissed, "She fought a lion?"

"Technically, it was shapeshifter," Dad muttered. "But ya know, it was turned so I think it counts."

"Oh my god." I tried to back up, my legs kicking the ground, bouncing off the chair in front of me. There was nowhere to escape, nowhere to run, nowhere to go. "Oh gods, Ebisu[18] Almighty, Lord Thor[19], please I'm begging."

"Alex, Al, calm down. It's gonna be fine." He exhaled slowly. "Everything is gonna be A-Okay. I promise."

I sank down in my seat, struggling to keep from questioning that. How did he know? How did he know anything was going to be okay? My building just blew up. I didn't know where my friends were. They were probably dead.

Oh, good gods below, they were probably dead. Like my mom. Squashed beneath a gigantic foot.

I sank lower in my seat. "What exactly is trying to kill me? Ms. H- Ms. Hern, that wasn't her. Was it?"

Dad shook his head. "No, Al, it wasn't. That was a, uh, Dreamkeeper. We call it that because it likes to immerse its victims in sleep and nightmares before devouring their souls then their bodies. It, um, it takes over the body of someone else to catch them alone before it transforms."

"And when it leaves the body?"

He was quiet for a slow second then exhaled sharply. "It steals the life of whoever it possesses, Alex. That's how it stays alive. Joanne is dead."

In my stomach, my heart exploded. "She-" I breathed slowly. "Ms. Hern, Ms. Hern, who gave us free ice sometimes? She's- she's-" I squeezed my eyes closed. "Because of me?"

"It's not your fault, Alex," Dad said quickly. "Don't you dare think that."

"But it's- it's after me, right? So." My breaths escaped me, whimpering. "It's gotta be, it's gotta be my fault. Because it wants to kill me. And it wouldn't have, have, have gone after her and-"

"Alex, no." His voice was sharp, final. "It doesn't matter. It was not your fault."

I titled my head back and tried to reorient myself. Ms. Hern. Ms. Hern, who'd be nothing but pleasant if not quirky and odd at times. She gave free ice out all across the neighbourhood when it got hot. Made it snow a couple times in dead July, just because the kids in the building asked her to.

She was dead.

Gone.

Hello, Mrs. Morrigu[20], I know we haven't talked much since Gramps passed, I thought, aside from general prayers, but if you and your other death pals could just be nice and wonderful and give me some kind of sign at, ya know, any point in the day that she's okay. She's doing fine. I shivered in my seat, eyes burning. That she's making it snow for some kids who died too soon too, that'd be great. Thank you. Still shaking, I exhaled softly, trying to keep from sobbing outright. And please, please, don't take my mom.

"We're almost there, buddy!" Dad chirped.

My eyes snapped open and I looked at where we were headed. "Dad, we're not supposed to go there."

"Well, I mean, I'm not," he crazy-laughed, "but we're going!"

I stared at him then shook my head. "Dad! That's the city forest! Where Elaine goes! We're not supposed to go inside there!"

"Normal Brokens[21], Al. They're not supposed to," he corrected, all matter-of-fact like it wasn't common knowledge that you don't go into this part of the trees.

--------

What's wrong with this part of the trees?

--------

Nothing really. I mean there's a border of sour lilies, this native species to Brokes, and its just general knowledge that you don't cross into any border of sour lilies because when you do, you pass over into unknown and bad territory, where magic burns brighter and monsters lie in wait to eat you.

And, yes, that is pretty much stories that you tell kids to make sure they don't go missing in the trees but, a) we were being chased by a monster that apparently wanted to eat me so I completely believed it from that moment on forever into the now and also b) it was known that the only people who could cross through and survive were people like Katie. Or my asshole cousin Elaine.

Or, evidently, my parents.

"I'M A NORMAL BROKEN," I yelled. I gestured rapidly at him. "I dunno what you are! But I'm not that! I have no magic prowess whatsoever! IF I DID, I'D BE PASSING ENGLISH."

He frowned. "Wait, you said you were passing. What do you mean? You're not passing English?

"THIS IS NOT THE TIME!"

He gunned it for a small dirt path between a barrel of trees that I didn't think our car would even fit through. "ARE YOU PASSING OR NOT?"

"I AM FAILING MILDLY! IT'S A SOLID D PLUS!" I shouted, baring against the backseat. "STOP THE FUCKING CAR!"

"I CAN'T BELIEVE YOU'RE FAILING ENGLISH! YOU SPEAK ELEVEN[22] LANGUAGES!" he yelled as we crossed over the patch of sour lilies that sprung up from the dirt path. The flowers didn't look remotely disturbed, still standing high and mighty on their patch as we floored it up the hill.

I stared out the back window at the break of sour lilies then spun on him, screaming, "YOU CROSSED THE BORDER!"

"I SAID WE WERE GOING TO!"

"I THOUGHT YOU WERE TRYING TO KEEP ME ALIVE?"

"I AM!"

"I DON'T WANT TO DIE IN A FOREST!" I threw my hands out at him. "I WANNA DIE IN A HOSPITAL BED OF OLD AGE SURROUNDED BY FRIENDS AND LOVED ONES WITH AN EASY PASSING AND NO PAIN! WE'VE BEEN THROUGH THIS!"

Dad's voice started, loud, authoritative, but nothing but a sharp swear fell out as he swerved to the side, cutting off as a hand smashed right where we would've been. The fist withdrew from the ground. A deep dent in the earth remained.

I stared at it.

"Alex," Dad whispered. "Don't look it in the eye."

"What?"

"Don't. Look it in the eye." He slowly undid his seatbelt, moving the strap quietly to the side. "Take off your belt."

I did, slow and quiet. My fingers shook, my arm shook, my entire body was trembling and I was all too aware that someone was watching me.

"Okay," Dad breathed. "Now just call for someone. Call for Kali."

"What?" I stared at him. "She's not going to hear me!"

"Alex." Something thudded the ground around us, the world going dark as the sun was blocked from the sky. "I need you. To call. For Kali. Right now."

I gasped shallowly. "Does this mean Mom is dead?"

"Alex," Dad repeated, "Call-"

A face loomed at us from the front window and his voice fell quiet. I looked from the sharp teeth down to the bright, bright eyes. Then I fell forward, everything going dark.

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# Chapter Three

I've never really had nightmares.

I mean, I've had them but not as frequently as one would expect for a kid who'd been told murder stories as bedtime stories. Granted, that's probably why but still. My mom has always been a graphic storyteller, you'd think something in there would've freak me out enough.

But, I dunno, I guess I've always been blessed with months of peaceful slumber. It'd been a year and a half since my last nightmare, me plummeting off the edge of a skyscraper with a thousand knives cutting through my skin at the same time, only to be swallowed whole by giant demon and digested slowly.

Somehow, this one was worse than that.

I was in my bedroom but nothing was there. Emptied out and the windows wide open, letting in the December air. At my waist curdled thick liquid that spread all across the floor. The moment I shifted, the stench of blood, rust and acrid, burned around me. It was warm.

Why was it warm?

I was sleeping.

I knew I was sleeping, knew I was dreaming. Hyperaware of the fact. It felt too obvious. Too there. Dad's words echoed inside my head, something about nightmares, about being eaten alive. Part of me wanted to stay where I was standing, wanted to keep still, stay safe. But something outside my head urged me to move.

I looked to my left, towards the bathroom door. It was wide open. Kali's doll of her namesake sat in the doorway. Slowly it floated out of my view.

I didn't want it to leave me. Didn't want her to go.

Trudging through the blood, I paused at the doorway. The bathroom light was on, shining bright and burning. Not for my eyes, I thought. The doll was floating over the bathtub, just out of reached. It's embroidered red eyes watched me. Reaching for it, wanting it, I took a step forward and dropped.

The blood consumed me, swallowing me. My foot hit the bottom, hit the ground, and I pressed down then surged up.

When my head resurfaced, I coughed, kicking my legs and looking around. Liquid kept drinking into my eyes. The room I was in no longer looked like my bathroom, too dim, too dark, too big. Kali's doll was gone. The door to my bedroom vanished. The darkness went on and on for miles.

I was alone.

This is a dream, I thought. I'm asleep. I'm asleep. The blood slipped over my mouth. I kicked harder, trying hard to stay above the surface. Wake up, Alex. Wake up.

"What are you?"

I looked around. "Hello?"

The voice hummed, the trill high. Ms. Hern's face flashed before my eyes.

"You're not like the others," it mused, swimming around my head. "There's something wrong with you."

The blood inched up my face as I grew weak under its pressure, unable to kick any harder. Pressure built up in my lower back, right at the base of my spine. Something was digging its way out of me. I sobbed, trying not to feel it.

"I can't kill you here, can I?"

I choked, spitting out blood and its murky tang. The taste stained my tongue, bitter. It encroached over my face. A force wrapped around my wrists and ankles. Tugged down, I struggled against it, trying to remain surfaced, able to breathe.

"Shame," the voice mused, suddenly louder as my head yanked under the surface. Glowing white eyes peeled against the back of my lids, multiplying rapidly in my mind. I was suffocated just by the feel of them. A hand wrapped around my chest, holding me in a tight, tight grip. My eyes snapped open. A large array of teeth grinned back at me. "I was looking forward to this."

My eyes snapped open again, the world flooding into colour and sound and the hard, hard feel of someone against my chest.

Couldn't kill me?

I wasn't going to complain about that.

Still feeling sluggish and wasted, I breathed in the rich scent of lavender. Slurred, my voice slid out of my mouth with a heavy, "Jashshon?"

Jackson's voice cleared through my ears like water. "Thank fuck."

I buried my face into his neck. "Was goin' on?"

"Be quiet," he grumbled, weaving through a bunch of trees like it was nothing.

"I thought you were dead," I mumbled. I looked up at the sky, watching it flutter through the patches between leaves. Kali's doll flashed through my face. It's eyes. I frowned. "Kali's a god, isn't she?"

He didn't say anything but breathed heavily as he ran and tapped my leg twice.

I let out a loose moan. "Are you a god too?"

He stilled behind a tree. "Yes."

I groaned. "Is Nick a god?" I frowned. "Goddex[23]?"

"Alex, if Nick was a god, we'd all be dead." He hustled forward, squatting behind a bush. My feet brushed the ground. "They can't have ultimate power."

"Thas fair," I mumbled, drooping against him. "I'm so tired."

"No, no, no." He patted my face rapidly. "Stay awake, stay awake." He shifted me until I slid off of him and grabbed my face. "Alex, wake the fuck up."

"Jackson." I pulled his hand off. "You need a mint."

"I will slap you."

I rubbed my face. "Liar."

He eyed me over and then pointed over the brush of leaves. "You see that building?"

I sat up and looked over. Just ahead of us, a few hundreds of feet away sat a large and wide building. It was painted white, pristine, and almost looked like a school. Some children, blurred but their voices evident in how they yelled at one another, milled about. "Kind of."

"Great." Jackson grabbed my hand. "We're gonna run to it really fast."

"Why?"

"There's a barrier. Once we cross it, it'll keep us safe."

I squinted at him then looked behind us. A sinking feeling plunged into my stomach. "Are my parents dead?"

"What? No." He shook his head. "I mean, your mom's arm was broken last I checked but she still punched me for not getting to you so I think she's okay and your dad pulled out a bunch of dead dogs so-" He cut himself off and squeezed my hand. "It doesn't matter. They're fine. And they told me to get you over there. Count of three, okay?"

"Wait!" I pulled on him, my mind clearing somewhat as the sluggish exhaustion eased from my veins "Where's Kali? Nick?" My heart pounded. "Is Nick dead?"

"Kali dropped them off somewhere safe. You're supposed to call them when you're okay. Which you might not be until we cross that fucking barrier. Now-" He pulled me up to a stand. "Let's go!"

We ran, mostly me getting dragged quickly by Jackson because being overweight and unathletic means I don't run very fast. We cleared the bushes, cleared the trees, broke out into the open. The sun beat against us. The kids' playing ceased as they watched us bolt towards them. Shadows dipped over us, inching past my head. Jackson snatched a glance behind us and swore.

A monstrous snarl ripped through the air, shattering through my core.

The kids backed up and then-

Jackson yanked me to a stop. Breathing hard, I looked at him as he pounded against an invisible wall. "OPEN THE GATE!"

"Lena said to turn it on," one kid yelled, crossing his arms. He frowned at Jackson. "Who are you?"

"I am Jackson Hadad, second god of love." He shook my arm. "This is my Warrior! NOW OPEN THE DAMN GATE!"

"Well, I'm Ron!" the kid shouted. "Warrior of Magic and I don't trust you!"

"Yeah!" huffed the little girl beside him. "What if you're secretly a monster and you just want to eat us? Where's your card?"

"First of all," Jackson started, shoving his hand into his pants, "there are probably way better tasting children then you numbnuts and secondly!" He growled low. "Where is it, where is it, where- HAHA! He pulled out a purple card, pressing it up against the barrier. "My card! Open the gate!"

The little girl shuffled forward. Another roar ripped through the air. Jackson's foot began tapping out a steady beat, triple time. Slowly I glanced back towards the trees. The Dreamkeeper's head lumbered through the trees. It yelled out, angry, as something hit it and swiped down a pack of trees in one fell swoop.

And arcing over its head was my second bestest best friend of all time.

Kali.

An actual fucking goddess.

"Oh my gods, that's Kali."

"Yeah, she looks real cool," Jackson muttered, voice bordering on desperate as the little girl inspected his card.

Kali swiped at the monster once more, sending it falling back into the trees. Like the impact was nothing, she hit the ground and looked over at us. "What are you doing?" she called out, voice clear but tiny over the distance.

"TRYING TO GET THESE DICKHEADS TO LISTEN TO ME," Jackson yelled back.

The little girl scowled deeply at him then glanced around him to look at Kali. Her eyes light up, knowing, understanding, and she started running back towards the building, shouting something in Hindi.

"Kali needs to teach me that already."

Jackson shoved his card into his pocket. "You already know too much!"

"You still need to teach me Arabic," I grumbled, backing up into the barrier, which wasn't turning off. The monster rose slowly.

"No way," Jackson muttered, slapping at the barrier in rapid succession. His slappings grew faster as the monster stood to a full stand. "You and Nick have Japanese. Me and Kali have this. HURRY IT UP, SMALL FRIES!"

"It's so big," I said. "Why is it so big? You know, I always imagined monsters would be a lot smaller."

"Well, some are," Jackson said. He slid in front of me, arms out. "You're gonna be fine, you're gonna be fine."

"I want my mom. And my dad."

Jackson snorted. "God, I want your dad too."

"I'm about to die," I said, backing up into the barrier until there was no more I could push, "and you're making a sex joke about my dad, I hate you."

Ahead of us, Kali flew backwards, crashing into the barrier. She groaned, shaking her head rapidly.

"Kals?"

She glanced over at me then gave me a crooked thumbs-up and threw a knife at the monster. "I am fine."

"You just- I mean-" I gestured loosely. "Shouldn't, shouldn't you be a bit blacker? With arms? Like the doll."

She frowned then pinched the bridge of her nose. A slew of Hindi dropped from her mouth.

Jackson stared at her. "How did you forget?"

"I have not done that in a long time!" she snapped, voice tense and ticked like it tended to fall when she was embarrassed. Her form shimmered, the air burning around her. "Do not bring it up again."

Jackson snorted. "I'm definitely bringing it up." He looked at me. "Stay. Don't move until the wall comes down. Then go inside and get Layla."

"Who's-" He ran off, blurring alongside Kali. "-Layla?"

The monster snarled. It stood huge above us, paler than pale, nearly sheet white, and bare, naked. It still had Ms. Hern's face, had her body too I guessed, but her eyes were wrong, glowing white. They fell on me. Exhaustion dropped over me so suddenly before vanishing, seeping out quick and leaving me just as tired. Sharp teeth formed a tight grin as it stomped towards me.

Behind me the kids' shouted at one another to get inside, not to look at its eyes, scattering backwards.

But it wasn't focused on them.

"You're such a strange case," it snarled, the same voice from my dream. Trilled high. "I so badly wanted to kill you. Your head-" It swatted Jackson to the left and barely even noticed as Kali, true to form, dug a deep and deeper cut into its side. "-is such a dangerous place."

I already knew that.

I think I figured it out when my head concocted a thousand different ways I could be injured just by putting on a jacket.

The monster grinned even wider and then stumbled forward, something slamming into its back. My eyes snapped down, between its legs. Mom stood, several hundred feet away near the trees. One arm was outstretched, the other hung uselessly at her side.

Yet still she stormed forward, shouting obscenities I couldn't quite hear but could get just from the pitch of her tone. And rushing past the trees, far out of view of the monster, who'd turned on Mom, Dad was racing at me.

The barrier opened up and I crashed to my butt.

Get inside, I thought. Get up, get up, get up.

I didn't get up. Instead, I stared in horror as the Dreamkeeper hefted up its fist and brought it down over Mom's head.

No.

"NO!" I shouted.

It jerked, stumbling as the earth rumbled under us and Dad fell to his face, halfway across the field and in clear sight. I didn't pause, didn't even think, just shot to my feet and swarmed towards him. He pushed himself up and grabbed my arm.

His face was covered in grime, in dirt. A small gash on his cheek, the blood congealed. His breathing brushed heavy but he was otherwise fine. With both hands, he grabbed my cheeks, eyes raving over my face, my body, checking me over then he exhaled sharp, kissed the top of my head.

"Stay behind me," he whispered, pushing me behind him.

Slowly we began backing up as the Dreamkeeper swirled on us. "There you are," it said, almost happy.

Dad kept his face low, one snaking round his back. "Get it small," he muttered. "Anna bobanana, love of my life, get it small, get it small, get it small."

"Wha- what is she doing?" I asked, my eyes darting from Mom to Kali to the monster to Jackson getting swatted through the air like a bug.

"Magic," Dad said.

I squashed against his back, hyperfocused on Mom. "What?"

"They heal even as they die. If she gets it small, I can destroy the heart before it heals up the wounds."

I nodded rapidly. Then the words clicked. "You're gonna kill it? With what?"

"Only if Mom doesn't get there first," Dad muttered. "And I have weapons. Shit, duck."

"Wha-"

He reached around and shoved my head down, flashing his free hand out. A wave of wind rippled over my skin, people screaming and faces blurring over my skin. Ghostly fingertips slid over my cheek, dreary eyes gaping wide after me as they sailed towards the fist coming down at us.

The ghosts, spirits, whatever, stopped the fist, pushing back in a moaning pile. Dad dropped his hand, and for a moment, I took that a sign that we'd lost, his energy had depleted too quickly and we were good as dead, headed off to the Underworld together but the ghost pile remained and Mom shouted, spinning her staff and blasting the Dreamkeeper with a single shot to the back. It trembled under the shock and roared.

The sound shocked through my bones, rippling through my chest, almost thudding into my heart so hard I thought it was going to burst from the feeling alone.

The ghosts dissipated as the anger carried its fist through but it shrank down rapidly, the fist hitting just in front of us instead of on us. Dad panted heavily, his arm looking behind him. His fingers fluttered, like he was trying to grasp something.

"Come on," he hissed

The Dreamkeeper, about six feet now and more pissed than it'd been seconds before, stormed towards us, so fast that whatever blast Mom sent at it, missed and scorched the ground too many feet behind it.

She yelled, chasing after it, too slow, too slow, and Dad was shaking now, his hand tickling my stomach as he backed up into me, almost seeming to try and be taller, hide me from evident view.

My heart froze in the break of my throat and I choked on air, terror clawing its way effortlessly into my skin and shooting cold sparks down my bones.

The Dreamkeeper packed the ground a few feet away, ghosts gliding off it, too slow to catch it, too slow to stop it, and Dad jerked, shooting forward with nothing.

No, I thought. The word echoed far too thunderous in my head. No.

Mom yelled.

Save him.

I dropped to my knees. My stomach collapse inside of me, every sinking feeling weighing me down like a rock.

Please.

A white sword ripped from the earth in front of him, almost transparent until he grabbed it. The Dreamkeeper's eyes widened and it tried to stop but it couldn't.

Its momentum pushed it forward, just as Dad arced the sword through the air and sliced its head clean off. Without a second to breathe, he pulled back and stabbed it in the heart.

I watched my neighbor fall down dead.

Mom caught him in a tight hug grabbing the face as she shook. Then her eyes caught sight of me and she rushed towards me.

Ms. Hern's head lolled to a still.

My neck throbbed at the sight. Images of cut necks, people choking on their own blood, pounded through my head. Worse thoughts followed. Suffering.

What if you kept suffering?

Mom grabbed my face, forced me to look away. "Alex," she whispered. "Don't. Stop. Stop looking."

"I can't- I can't stop thinking," I said, shaking in her hands. My chest pained, my throat in agony. A sob slid from my mouth. "Mom, it hurts."

"It's not happening to you," she whispered. She pressed her forehead to mine. "Listen to my voice, Alex. Listen." She cleared her throat. "One, lily lily. Two, lily lily. Three, lily lily. Count with me."

I trembled but counted with her. "Four, lily lily. Five, lily lily. Six, lily lily. Seven-"

"Anna!" a sharp southern voice called out.

Mom's voice cut off. We both looked over. A small Korean woman stood front and center in a tight crowd. Mom pulled me up to a stand, let me lean my weight heavy into her side. She pushed my face away as I spotted her arm, awkwardly held tight to her side.

I shivered, trying to push back thoughts about my arm snapping in half. The bone clearing straight through my skin.

My stomach churned violently.

"Layla!" Mom chirped, all fake pleasant like how she was around people that she didn't completely care for. "So sorry for the commotion."

"Hey, Layls!" Dad said, waving rapidly as he fell to my other side. He hooked an arm around my shoulders, keeping close and safe. "Heard you made principal a few years ago! Congrats!"

Layla didn't look at Dad. Instead her eyes carted from Mom to me. "This is him?"

Dad's grip tightened. "No."

Finally, she looked at Dad. "Ka-" Her voice cut and she shook her head. "Charles." Her eyes fell to the sword held loose in his hand. "How-"

"Dunno." Dad grinned down at me, stroking my back. "Must've remembered all my hard work, I guess."

For a moment, her face moved from mild contempt to appreciative calm. Then she cut her gaze to a pretty girl beside her. "Lena, can you-"

Lena nodded and walked forward quickly. She took the sword from Dad's hands. She didn't sheathe it or anything, just bounced back to the small crowd and held it tight in her hands. Before she did though, she caught my eyes in a soft gaze and smiled gently.

When she was back with the crowd, Layla looked at us again. Then she finally relaxed. "Someone clean that up," she said gesturing to the dead body. "And you three-"

"Five!" Jackson yelled somewhere behind the crowd. Kali echoed him, hidden from my view too.

Layla sighed. "You five can come with me to the infirmary."

** ** **

In the infirmary, we were given a private section in the back. Mom kissed my cheek and disappeared to another cot with some other doctor to set her arm while a nice girl, Alice, tried to keep me from passing out or falling into shock.

She was Canadian, from Toronto, she'd explained as the doctor left her with me. Transferred from her school out in Toronto to here when she was eleven because the medic program was better here and she liked the idea of graduating with a certificate from the get-go. She was a student nurse, my age, but skilled enough to give me a quick check-up.

She smiled softly, pulling back the curtain while I tugged off the blood pressure machine. "It's a little high," she said, "but that makes sense." She scribbled something down on her clipboard before stepping out ever so slight to talk to Dad. "I'm going to do a quick calm push, okay?"

Dad winced. "That seems excessive."

"Don't stress," she said. "I've done it before. Has he had it done before?"

"No," Dad said simply as he stepped into the small space and rubbed my back soothingly. "This would be the first time."

"Okay, so-" She turned to me and gestured loosely outwards. "I'm going to do a calm push. It's going to make you somewhat tired but it'll ease the stress."

I stared at her. "Are- are you a healer or something? Warrior of health?"

She snorted. "No, no, I'm a demigod. My dad is Apollo[24]."

"Oh," I said faintly. "That's cool." I leaned into Dad's side. "Everything is so confusing. Are you secretly a demigod?"

"Nah," Dad said. He squeezed my hand reassuringly. "You'll be fine."

"You done this?"

"A couple times," he admitted. "Mostly when I was younger. It doesn't hurt. Just tires you out a bit. Which is fine." He pushed back my hair. "After all this I think you need a nap."

I exhaled sharply. Nerves stayed bundled up tight in my body. "Okay."

Alice smiled wider, gentle and calm. She spread her hands over my chest and gave a slow push. Heat burst through her hand through my shirt to her hand. It washed into me like molasses. The world slowed down, all things sliding past me slow.

Every beat of my heart magnified in my head.

Then it snapped and I sagged into Dad, breathing shallowly. Alice stepped back.

"How do you feel?"

I pressed my hand to my stomach, eyes fluttering. Warm calm cursed through my veins. Sluggish weary kept me from responding right away but finally I managed out a hoarse, "Okay."

She nodded. "That's good. You don't feel like you're going to puke or anything, do you?"

I shook my head.

She bounces on the heels of her feet. "Great! Okay, um, I'm just gonna hand this in." She waved the clipboard. "But otherwise, you're all good. I'm gonna let in your friends now."

"My friend," I echoed. I closed my eyes. "My friends who are gods."

Alice rocked back on her feet, her smile turned awkward and flustered. Dad waved her off, and, grateful, she ducked out, pulling the curtain shut.

I splayed my hands over my knees. "Okay. Explain."

Dad cleared his throat. The band-aid on his face creased. "Well, um, okay, so. Gods are totally real. Uh, I am a Warrior of Death. Your mom is a Warrior of Magic. Uh, Katelynn is actually what we call a hybrid so mutant was pretty close. Uh-"

"Wait, wait, slow down." I pushed back, sitting up straight. "Gods are real. I already knew that." I winced. "I mean I didn't know-know, but I believed pretty stringently, so that doesn't matter. But you said." I licked my lips. "What exactly is a Warrior?"

"Uh, okay." He rubbed the back of my hand with his thumb, slow soft strokes. "We don't know how it began. It carries through DNA but there are some who are chosen, like you, but the people who chose the first of us, we don't know. We've asked the gods but they don't know." He shrugged. "That or they're lying and just won't tell us.

"But basically, a Warrior is someone who fights to keep things real. And in return, what we keep real, allows us to utilize it."

"So you keep... death real, and in return you get to, get to use it." I paused before saying flatly, "Death."

"Yep."

"That doesn't sound very cool."

He made a flippant gesture. "Well, it's all in how you use it."

"Uh huh." I leaned back. "So Mom would be pretty important then? Because she apparently keeps magic as being a thing which, ya know-" I waved my hands uselessly for a second, trying to find the words. "-lets you be a thing."

"You know, you're the first person who I didn't have to explain that to." He ruffled my hair, grinning wide. "You're a goddamn genius, you know that? Aside from this English thing that we are definitely talking about later."

I groaned into his shoulder. "So then what was I chosen to be? Like life or something?"

He went tense. "Um, well-"

Not fully paying attention to him, I rubbed my jaw. "And why didn't you guys just tell me? I mean if it's important enough that you almost die then shouldn't it have been considered important to just let me know? Did you not know until now?"

"No, we knew," he said slowly. "But, uh, they asked us not to tell you. Just in case something happened."

I swiveled to face him fully. "Like what?"

The curtain drew back sharply before he could respond. Mom's face beamed back me, her arm hung loose in a sling. Behind her, Kali shoved Jackson out of the way before slipping past Mom to grab me roughly. She gave me a once over and then relaxed, stepping away so Mom could sling her good arm around me and pull me in tight hug.

She brushed back my hair. "How are you?"

"I got a calm push, or something, so my panic is being withheld from me right now." I pressed my face to her collarbone. "Postponed for a later date."

She snorted, running her hand over my back. "You're fine," she promised. She bumped Dad's leg with her hip. "How much?"

Dad shifted. "Of the push or..."

She gave him a look.

He leaned back and exhaled sharply, drawing away. "Just the beginning. Getting to his stuff when you all came in."

"I really don't want to have stuff," I muttered.

"Mm." Mom took both my hands before smiling soft, a little sad. "Remember the first time you slept the night?"

"Explicitly," I said. "Dad burned the pizza and we spent the night at a hotel because the smell was so bad."

She snorted and Dad huffed, embarrassed. "And I did a little prayer after we ordered some food as a joke and you asked me who I was talking to?"

I nodded. "Yeah. And you explained. And I asked if I could do one too because it sounded nice to talk to everyone."

"It was very nice," Kali said quickly. She smiled. "We all highly appreciate you."

I flushed. Gods were talking about me. Okay then. "Ah, thanks?" I shook my head, turned back to Mom. "And then I asked why so many and you said some didn't have enough love and deserved it."

"Right!" Mom rocked back on her heels. "Because they deserve comfort." She cleared her throat. "See, Al, when a god is not believed in, they fade, grow weak. They have links to this world that keep them stationed here and as long as they have those links, they remain... alive.

"But then they realized something special. When we knew of all of them, even if not by name, they became stronger. Just knowing the forgotten existed helped so after a few years of deliberation, they came to an idea that as there were Warriors to keep the material and immaterial real, what if there was one to do the same for them?"

I blinked at her then laughed before turning to Kali and thinking of someone in control of her and all her power. "That seems dangerous."

"Which is why there's only one," Jackson said. He leaned into Kali's said. "And it's you."

My hands dropped right out of Mom's just as my stomach twisted over. The calm spell or whatever kept me from screaming but the effects of needing to, of wanting to, felt all too rampant in my chest.

"What."

Jackson hopped backwards awkwardly, refusing to meet my face. "You are... our... Warrior."

"Warrior of the Gods," Dad clarified, sounding too calm.

Way too calm for the situation.

This very insane situation.

I nodded. Then croaked weakly again, "What."

Mom cleared her throat. "See, as you know because I've told you, a lot of them don't have people anymore. Because Christians[25] and/or white people were very rude about it[26] and made a lot of people stop believing in their own gods and forced them to believe in theirs. So they, being the gods, decided instead of passing off their own energy to one another so-" She threw her hand into the air, as though randomly grabbing a name from the stillness. "-Kukulcan[27] isn't suffering in pain that day from being forgotten, what if they passed all their energy into a small being who could keep them alive instead of relying on mementos and believers? That way their power is naturally condensed and spread equally."

"That," I started, "is the dumbest thing-"

"Alex," Dad said, voice all warning.

"It is!" I threw my hands out at Kali. "You have millions of followers and you decided to pass on your life to me?"

"It was in the best interest of my friends." Kali's voice was stern, solid. She stood up tall and eyed me, her whole body a caution sign. "I was there when they were strong and I was there when the same men came and made them weak. I was there when their culture was destroyed and had to suffer through my own people's livelihood becoming wrecked in the same way. I agreed to whatever made them strong again, whatever made them lively. I care deeply for my companions, Alex. You, of all people, should be highly aware of that."

I swallowed thickly. "And, so, it- it works then?"

"In a sense," she amended. "I am stronger than the forgotten, simply because I am believed in much more and the forgotten..." She faded then sighed, sad. "They are not without their occasional failings but it easier to spend many days in good health rather than all days suffering in poor because you have no one to call your name and the things that tied you to this world are desecrated and misnamed." Her eyes flickered to the ground. "Misunderstood."

I sank into the cot, thinking about that. I had believed in the gods my entire life. I knew at least, like, ninety percent of them, probably, and could probably name about fifty percent without having to pause for a long time or refer back to a book.

In the past, I'd focused on those who I didn't think were believed in any more. Or at least those whose such small populations were overran, their beliefs destroyed to become a fit to Christianity. I thought they might appreciate it more. Being remembered after so long, even if I remembered them a little bit wrong.

Apparently, I was right.

Fiddling with my fingers, I bit my lip. "Do they- do they like me?"

"Very much," Kali said, smiling low.

Even though that confirmation felt a bit odd, because how could I be important to gods, I relaxed. "Okay then. I just-" The words faltered in my mouth and I breathed sharply. "I just- I don't want- it-" Breath escaped me in a quick burst. "It just kinda sounds like slavery, ya know. Um, because, if I have control over something and I can do what I need to do with it and it's, ya know, a person that's alive, that don't sound too good."

"It's not slavery," Mom said quickly. "Gods, no, they have limitations, don't worry. They would have to."

"Yeah, we're not dumb," Jackson said. Kali swatted his arm.

"Okay but what if I make a joke and it's taken as truth and next thing I know, it's all going south and I am the worst person ever and I end up going down in history as another bad white guy, which is impossible because I'm mixed but you know how history. It lies. It lies a lot." I patted my knees. "Like a disturbing amount. And it's always forgetting to mention things. Like the fact that my original thing was a joke and also I'm not white."

Jackson nodded slowly then turned to Dad. "Calm thinga?"

"Yeah."

"Okay." Jackson turned back to me. "We know how you are, Al. First of all. Second, once again, they're not idiots. I mean-" He gestured loosely. "For the most part. Everyone's done something stupid. Like real stupid, not morally cruel. But yeah. That's why we got involved in your life. To keep you safe when we could and to make sure that the way the rules worked around you were accurate."

I stared at him. "So you didn't want to get to know me because of my Pokemon collection?"

He shook his head, face morose. Kali shifted awkwardly. "I quite enjoyed the show," she noted, weakly.

"Oh my gods."

Dad tipped back his head. "Okay, okay, back to the topic at hand everybody." He looked at me. "How do you feel about this?"

"Well, I mean I'm guessing this is a thing I'm not allowed to give up," I said. "So it doesn't really matter how I feel. But-" I shot my hands out at Kali. "-if I can give it up and, like, pass it on to someone else, I would like to do that. Can I do that? I want to do that."

She sucked in a sharp breath of air and oh so visibly winced. I sagged, sliding off the cot into a slow messy pile of human misery.

"Why?" I rolled onto my back. "Just- why?"

"You had a good energy," she said.

"Wow, you guys were so off base with that," I said, covering my face. "This is so weird." Dropping my hands to my side, I asked, "Is that why I wasn't supposed to know? In case of, like, evilness?"

"Uh, yeah," Dad said slowly. "Something like that."

The words hit my ear wrong, not a full truth, not a full lie, but I ignored it and sat up. My hands clenched tight to my palm before relaxing back out. I breathed and eyed the lines of my skin.

"So." I looked at Jackson. "You're a god?"

He exhaled slowly, the air escaping him like air out of a tire. He sank down into the ground, legs crossed over each other. "In short, yes. But to, uh, explain. There are two classifications of gods. Uh, first gods and second gods. I'm a second, which pretty much means I came after all the stories and don't really count. So my powers are-" he paused, cocking his head to the side. "-limited."

A thousand more questions flooded my mind but before I could ask any of them, before I could even decide what to start with, Mom caught the back of my head in a light touch. "Al, this can all be explained later. Right now, you need some rest, okay?"

Slowly, I exhaled, nodding as I stood. "Right. Okay. Let's go home." I brushed back my hair and smiled ruefully at the ground. "How am I gonna explain this to Nick?"

"Right," Dad said, his voice careful. "About that..."

I glanced up at him, concerned. "I can't tell them?"

"No, you can tell them," he said. "It's just, um." He glanced over at Mom, eyes pleading.

She bit her lip and didn't meet my face. "You, uh, you can't come home with us."

A chill curled down my spine. "What?"

Kali stiffened then grab Jackson and yanked him out of the space. Behind the curtain I heard him grumble in anger but I couldn't focus on it, couldn't focus on how nice it was she knew to give us privacy.

I could only focus on this.

"You're giving me back?" I asked. The words didn't even sound right in my mouth and when I heard them, I knew I was wrong but my stomach still churned at the thought, the possibility.

Mom's eyes snapped to mine, brown and horrified. "No!" she said quickly. She laughed brokenly. "Alex, no! Oh." She pressed her hand to my face then pulled me in tight. "You just have to stay here. It's safer."

I rubbed the back of my head. "Right. I just- this is weird and you got hurt. And- and it was my fault so I didn't- I didn't know if you wanted. Not to- to-"

"Al, there is literally nothing you can do or be that would make us want you any less," Dad said. He smoothed his hand over my back. "And we've been hurt in way worse ways, okay? This isn't new. Besides, we already knew, remember?"

I nodded. "Right." I rubbed my face. "Right. So what is this place then?"

Mom stepped back. "School," she said dryly. I snorted. "We both came here, your father accidentally-"

"Paperwork mix-up," he clarified in a stage-whisper.

"It's safe. You learn to protect yourself. They have more borders than I could maintain myself so no more worries about unfortunate monsters again." She leaned into the wall. "You'll be okay."

Brushing over my hand over the smooth material on the cot, I asked, "Do I get to come home for the summer? Or is it, like, I gotta stay here until I graduate type deal?"

"Up to you," Dad said. "Summer housing is available to any current students. Of which you'll be by tomorrow evening. But if you want to come home, we would very much want you to."

"I very much want to," I said.

Mom sighed. "Well, you can't. Besides, I knew the Warrior before you," she said. She wrinkled her nose. "A lot of accidental explosions I don't think our apartment could withstand."

"The apartment didn't blow up?" I asked, excitement chasing through me.

Mom paused. Dad froze. Then his eyes widened. "Oh fuck, I forgot about that."

"You were there!" Mom snapped. "How could you forget that!"

"I was preoccupied with the concern for my child," he shot back. He pressed his hand to his mouth and stood there, thinking. Then he dropped his hand, gesturing awkwardly before sighing deeply. "Well, shit."

"We don't have a place to live," Mom said.

"Your mom's?"

"No, Gramma moved in with Cassidy," she said. She leaned back. "Didn't we have damage protection?"

"Anna, you know damn well that was revoked when we were kicked out," Dad said. He pinched the bridge of his nose. "Oh Hades[28]."

"When you were what?" I said because my dad was kicked out of one place his whole life and that was the ladies only club on Bartun Street. Because, ya know. He's not a lady.

"Nothing," Mom brushed off. Before I could question her anyway, she pulled me to her. "Let's get you to your room. You need to sleep."

"It's the middle of the day," I muttered but I let her pull me from the space.

The infirmary was just as empty as it'd been when we first arrived. Alice waved lightly as she shed her coat and hung it up, hopping through the doorway. I waved back, scanning the room for my friends.

Jackson and Kali were talking low, quick Arabic. They went quiet when they saw me. Mom sighed and squeezed my arm gently.

"Okay, well, uh, we'll send some things over tomorrow," she said.

Alarm lit up in the back of my head. "You have to leave now?"

"Little bit," she said. She brushed back my hair and kissed the top of my head. As she pulled back she turned to my friends. "If he dies or is grievously injured, immortality won't stop me from killing you violently," she assured them.

Jack's face went sick and he edged behind Kali who nodded.

"Understood," she said. "However, I would like to note that we have kept him perfectly safe thus far."

Jackson ducked his head out from behind her hair. "Yeah, this time was a fluke. A one-off."

Dad exhaled deeply. "Please try to keep it that way." He pulled me in a deep hug, trembling. I buried my face in his shoulder and squeezed back. "Stay safe. Be good," he murmured into my hair. "We'll see you soon." One last squeeze. "Love you to the moon."

"And back," I echoed.

Dad pulled away and I struggled not to follow. Safe. They were safe. They had always been safe. Comfortable. Warm.

My family, my family, my family, my family.

Jackson grabbed my hand. "Come on. Bedtime."

I exhaled sharply, too calm to cry but feeling slow weariness ache its way up through my muscles. "Okay, okay."

One final wave to my parents standing in front me and ignoring the call of the doctor behind them, just watching me leave. Kali pushed open the door, chill air coursing through the open doorway and freezing us all.

In a second, it was like time was slowing down. Every step towards the exit seemed to weigh too heavy, every thud and touch slow and there, evident. So many eyes on me. Baring deep.

There were so many questions I had. So many things I wanted to ask, to say, to whisper, to cry.

But I couldn't.

So I walked, slow and steady, and left behind everything that I used to know. Everything that was familiar.

And pretended the screaming in my head wasn't mine.

|  |

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# Chapter Four

The infirmary was connected to the main building by a small walkway that split into two sections, leading to different doors. The walkway's walls were glass, showing the beautiful scenery around us, with wide windows on every other pane. Kali flicked one hand out and the windows fell shut.

The sound shattered through my head. I jerked into her. She sent an apologetic look, swinging her arm over my shoulders as the three of us walked down the way.

"Tour now or later?" Jackson asked as we drew close to the cut.

"Later," Kali said. She pulled me closer to her, tugging me down the second split. With her free hand, she pointed to the door we were moving towards. "These are the dormitories."

I frowned. "Am I bunking out on someone's bed?"

"Nah," Jackson chirped, swinging our arms. "Warriors of the Gods have their own room here." He gestured loosely with his other hand. "Brokes is where the connection between the mortal realm and the gods lies so having your own space here made sense."

"Really?"

He grinned wide. "Yep!"

"I will show you the doorway at another time," Kali said. She pulled off of me and yanked the door open, ushering us through. "It is not difficult to use."

"That's cool, I guess," I said. I leaned back into her side. "Is it a combined place?"

She wrapped her arm around me again. "Yes and no," she said. "There is the Heavens and there is the Underworld. However, as it is necessary, we still have our own versions we can place ourselves in."

"Yeah," Jackson said, ducking around a group of kids that split between us, caught in the midst of an argument. "Both spaces have their own, like, castle and designated rooms within it. You walk in one room and you wind up in whatever space it's meant for. And of course there's still other ways to get to each individual space, it's just faster to use the castle."

"Is this too much?" Kali asked, pushing her hair out of her eyes.

"No, I'm just... processing, I guess," I stepped out from under her arm, leaning against the stairwell. "It's a lot. But not too much."

Jackson nodded. "It took me a while to get it too. Don't stress."

I nodded, pressing my hand flat to the top of my head, a way of centering myself in the moment. Exhaling slowly, I eyed him over. "You're really a god?"

"Yes," he groaned. "Why do you keep asking?"

"I dunno," I said flatly. "Must have something to do with the fact that I've seen you completely moronic and walk into so many doors. It's hard to view your friend as a god when you've seen him choke on a french fry three times in a row."

He rolled his eyes. "That has nothing to do with anything. Poseidon[29] trips when walking at least ninety percent of the time." He scowled. "But not when he runs. It's really weird."

My face scrunched up, the thought of Jackson, of all people, knowing my gods. The same gods he scoffed at until I threw a milkshake in his face and told him to stop being a dick about it. And now it turned out, he was one.

What the hell even is the world?

"How did you even become a god?"

"Birth," he said.

I blinked. "Oh." I held up a hand. "Let me guess. Bast[30] and... Shoot, Horus[31]? Cat and bird." I grinned "Sounds like that would create something confusing like a Jackson."

He didn't smile back. "No." His voice turned tight. "Aphrodite[32] and Yue-Lao[33]."

We took a step up the staircase. "They're not Egyptian though."

Kali's arm, relooped over my shoulders, went tense and when I glanced at her, her eyes were warning me away from the topic.

"It's... a long story, Al," Jackson said weakly. "But my name is Jackson Hadad and I was born in Suez and I am Egyptian. None of that was a lie. Just left out the part about being a god of extremely gay love."

"Okay, well-" I took his hand again. "-you can tell me about it whenever."

I gave him a light squeeze. Relief relaxed over his face and we broached the top of the staircase easy. It was a quick walk down the hallway, rooms on one side. Some were quiet and other had soft exhales of vices and laughter and music.

Christmas break, I figured. Most people had likely gone home. Others stayed, maybe for safety reasons or because they saw no point to go home or because, like Nick, they were teams on that had matches over the break.

Nick.

Nick, Nick, Nick.

I still needed to call them, tell them I was fine, ask them their side of what happened, maybe get them to ask if my parents could bum their couch for a while.

And Katelynn. Katie. Our prophetic mutant.

A hybrid.

We stilled in front of a blue door. Like all the other doors, it had a small cork board on it but unlike the others, the corkboard was empty, save for a small key hanging off a pushpin.

I took it off and unlocked the door. The door stuck as I pushed it open, giving it a little upwards tug to pull it over the flooring, all while asking, "What's a hybrid?"

Jackson tripped coming in. "What?"

Concerned, I watched him. "Dad said Katie was a hybrid."

"Oh, well, um, hmm." Jackson turned to Kali. "Kals?"

She looked alarmed that he was directing the question to her and glowered at him, annoyed. Turning to me, she brushed back her hair. "A hybrid is what is created when a Demon and a Human have... relations. Many in Brokes who have powers are hybrids."

"And you say Demon like any old demon or a something different? I'm guessing something different."

She nodded. "Demons are a species similar to Humans. We don't know where they came from specifically but we began to know of them in the early moments when we came to learn and accept each other's mutual existences. They are..." She trailed off, eyes growing darker. "Dangerous."

"What do you mean?"

"Pretty sure they eat people," Jackson said flatly. "And they hate you guys. And not just any Warrior. You, the Warrior of the Gods, specifically. They have found and kidnapped and tortured your past people-"

"Predecessors," Kali cut in with a weary glance at Jackson.

"-for as long as we've had them."

My stomach twisted. "Oh."

"That hasn't happened in a long time though," he reassured me quickly. "It's just-"

"A concern."

Kali nodded. "They were fine in the beginning. We lived in peace. Once we decided on maintaining our own Warrior to keep ourselves in good health and to mitigate disputes, they turned. We do not know why. We questioned them. They did not care to answer."

"Well, no," Jackson said. I glanced over at him. "I mean they did, didn't they? Ranj said they did."

Who's that? I wondered as Kali said, "It was not a sufficient answer. It explained nothing."

"What did they say?" I asked.

Kali pursed her lips. After a couple seconds, she ran her tongue over her teeth and said, "We were told to. They could not name this person who said that they must. They could not give us a reasonable explanation. The ones who chose to answer simply insisted that someone was telling them that they had to do so. We questioned one another, we questioned other Warriors. Anyone we thought may have some sway on them, we interrogated but there was no one.

"We asked one more time and the answer was different," she said. "They stated that they wanted to. If we did not have believers, then we deserved to suffer."

I swallowed thickly. "That's harsh." I rubbed my arms and sat down on the bed. "So did they die out or..."

"No, they are still around," Kali said. "None of them will come to harm you. We will protect you."

I nodded slowly. "You kill them when you find them. Don't you?" They didn't answer but the tight silence was enough. My stomach turned and a quiet question slipped through my head. "Did my parents-"

"No," Kali said just as Jackson said, "Kind of."

They shot each other annoyed looks then Jackson pushed back his hair. "Okay, so, yes and no. Yes, they were there sometimes. Most Warriors deal with it, come along and pitch in their own help because, uh, Demons tend to notice when gods are around, but no, they didn't actually kill anyone. Most Warriors don't. They just locate them and then send us." At my stare, he rubbed his wrist. "I haven't either."

"How do- how do you check though?" I rubbed my hand over my knees, annoyed at the calm that still pressing in my veins. "I mean, you said they look like people, right? So?"

"It-" Kali rubbed her jaw and sighed. "After this, no more questions. You do need to rest." I nodded and waited for her to continue. "They are similar to Humans, yes, but they have additional features that you do not."

"Tails," Jackson said. He flicked out a second finger. "Horns sometimes, wings-"

"Wings? Like angel wings?"

He shrugged. "Yeah, but they're the same people."

"The heart is on the opposite side as well," Kali said. "They also have three kidneys, which we thought was strange."

Jackson laughed, settling down beside. "Honestly, it's almost as if someone went, tried to make a regular person but forgot the recipe and added too much stuff." I snorted and leaned into his side. He leaned heavy into mine. "They also burn in the sun."

I frowned. "Wait, like vampires?"

"Yes," Kali said. "Also, I do believe I said no more questions." She threw a pair of pajama bottoms at me. "It is time to sleep."

"I'm not even tired," I lied as I tugged off my pants, shoving Jackson's face as he leered down towards my crotch.

I wasn't fully tired, feeling settled. But it was there, in the back of my mind and low in my bones and muscles. I mean, either way I knew I had to be. The fade of pounding adrenaline tended to drain my strength with it, make me far too weary.

Kali ruffled through the drawers of the dresser nearby before pulling out some worn white sheets and throwing them at Jackson's head. He made a muffled noise of protest before peeling them off and making up the bed.

And while he did, I wondered what the long story was.

For as long as I'd known him, Jackson had loved his parents, his family, every single bit of who he was and how he was raised, immensely. Every time he mentioned them, off hand or in depth, his voice was riddled with love and happiness.

And yet now his voice was turned sour and bitter, like it'd been when I asked him why he stopped practicing Islam[34] and he said, "Allah[35] didn't give me a reason to keep believing."

A billion questions brewed on the tip of my tongue but I held them back. The subject was touchy now.

No sense burning bridges.

He smoothed out the creases and then flopped onto it, rolling into the wall and moaning. I folded my pants over and flickered through my phone. A bunch of messages from Nick, two from Katelynn informing me that I needed to answer Nick.

One from Elaine that said congratulations followed by a barfing emoji.

I scowled. How in the fresh hell did she get my number?

12:02pm: UR DAD SCREAMING

12:12pm: R U DED

12:13pm: ANSWER ME

12:17pm: ur dad say safe but u not answer al answer or i will kill

12:22pm: what happened no one tell me nothing

12:23pm: kals is goddess

12:24pm: jack say he a god but i think he lie

12:31pm: everyone leave me. i try go with but they vanish

12:32pm: r u safe

12:45pm: al answer

12:51pm: alex

12:53pm: alex!!!

1:21pm: mutant say you safe. u safe?

1:23pm: i know where u r. mutant tell me. i s2g i will come there. u answer me now or i will kill

1:25pm: im kill u

1:29pm: al

1:34pm: al

1:34pm: al

1:35pm: al

1:35pm: al

Then the knife emoji followed for another three minutes followed by my name for six and then silence. I hit the chat and laid down beside Jackson. I safe. Am magic now. I don't like.

i will fuck up for u where punch to

Jackson snorted and nudged my arm. I nudged him back. gods. can punch kali i guess

kali kisses only. jackson punch There was a brief pause, then they went on, ill punch jackson tell him square up

I exhaled shallowly. There we go. A bit of normalcy again. Nick, my rock, my steady unchanging rock. Hold tight in a storm and they'd keep me safe, no question about it. Nothing phased them.

Probably why they won so many games.

I have to sleep now, I typed. Kali say so.

The typing symbol came up. Then it vanished. Then it came back up and stayed there for two minutes. I waited, counting down every second and then, Ok.

I exhaled, felt my heart snap. Okay. Blank. Too short for how long they'd been typing. Too short for me.

Explain in morning, I wrote quickly, adding a quick Luv u.

A beat passed and then Love u too.

I relaxed and passed my phone over to Kali who dropped it on the dresser. She snapped her fingers and the blinds drew shut. Light still peeked through but I ignored it, shifting onto my side and burying my face in her shoulder. She dragged her fingers over my back, soothing, always soothing.

In my head, I did a summary of everything happened.

A monster in Ms. Hern's body attacked me. Grayson, who, now that I thought about it, was probably dead and that was the reason for the occasional non-corporeal issues, showed up. My dad showed up. I went to the car. Mom showed up. We left. Mom left. Made it to the trees. Almost died. Was told I couldn't be killed in my dreams by a monster. Woke up on Jackson. Got to the school. Almost died again. Dad. Mom. Kali. Healing. Words. Nick. Bed.

And the devil.

The devil I saw that morning. The devil with the horns.

Horns.

My blood ran cold.

No tail. Just horns. Red eyes. In the dark. In the dark watching me.

Had it been a hallucination? Is that why Mom looked concerned, Dad looked worried because it was something dangerous? Were the other hallucinations or real? Were they gods secretly watching me or monsters that Jackson and Kali quickly disposed of on a quick "hey I see someone I know, be right back" escapade?

Was I not crazy after all?

And if I wasn't, did that mean the nightmares, the nightmares that I'd brushed off as nightmares my entire life, refused to accept as a possible real memory, refused to acknowledge as maybe something that happened when I was too young to remember fully, despite how long it lasted, feeling real and realer every time I thought of it, did that mean it was real?

I drew closer into Kali's hold.

Was that why I was always afraid? Because someone tried to kill me and the memory lasted deep? But of course that pegged the questions.

When? Why?

** ** **

When I woke up, the light was gone. Jackson's entire left leg had somehow wormed its way between mine and his hand was touching my face. Kali was in the same position she'd been when I'd fallen asleep, on her back and stiff as a rod.

I pushed Jackson's hand off my face and moved my hand off her stomach, sitting up and feeling jitters curdled their way up my spine. The calm push had faded, leaving me anxious and scared and puke-y. My phone flashed red, notifications pulsing their way, waiting to be seen.

Crawling down to the end of the bed, I slid off in a slow pile onto the ground then shifted my way to the dresser. Six in the morning. I dropped my head and looked through the notifications. Sales for Candy Crush, notification that someone liked a photo on Insta, a reminder that school was starting in two weeks, a reminder to start working on applications for summer work and three texts.

I swiped them all away then went to the texts. All three were from my dad.

9:03pm: You still asleep, Al?

9:24pm: Okay, I get it. Calm push takes a lot out of a man. Or woman. Or enby.[36]

9:25pm: Everything's okay on our end. We lucked out. Guess because you are you, our damage protection came back.

That prefaced the shaky video of two people in front of him, Mom watching from the side with her arms crossed.

"So what are you doing? For clarity," Dad asked.

The person closest to him turned and said, "We are effectively reversing the effects of the explosion prior to when it happened by bubbling it in time and merging it with our current time. It's tricky stuff." They pointed to Dad. "Don't try this at home."

I snorted and watched as the two of them held up their hands to my broken building, illuminated by the streetlights. The rubble on the ground shook then, as light pink bubble formed over it, began slowly rising. Each piece seemed to have its own direction, as though going back to where it came from. Which I guess it was. The people making it happen groaned, their bodies trembling.

"Normally, there's more of them," Dad said. He didn't explain why there wasn't now.

Then Mom stepped in. She held her hand out and dragged her staff out from it. She sent the camera a look, patented as "I am Mom and I am the bestest" then turned to stand in line. She said no fancy words, just raised the staff and slammed the end of it to the ground.

A pink burst expelled from the crystal at the top, hitting against the bubble. The rubble and damaged reversed itself faster and in seconds, it was over.

"See, I gave them a burst of my own power," she said, breathing a little hard as she walked over to the camera. She vanished off screen. "And it enabled them to place more effort into making it go faster."

In front, the two began mumbling fast words I couldn't grab. The bubble bloomed brighter until it melted. And when it was gone, seeped fully into the ground, the building stayed intact.

Dad whooped loud and the two waved, one thanking Mom for the help. The video froze, finished, and I sank deep into the floor.

So it's all fixed then? Everything were it needs to be? I scowled. *where

I laid down on the hardwood floor, placing my phone screen down on my stomach.

So.

Warrior of the Gods.

Keeper of their lives. Enabler of their power. Apparent mitigator of disputes.

Me.

Alex Scott Johnson.

The enby who was only one missed paper from failing English fully and couldn't spell to save his life.

Me.

Warrior of the Gods.

Two out of three of my friends were gods. My parents were magic. I was magic, in a way. Katelynn was part Demon, a species that wanted to devour me and tear me to shreds and other general badness that ended up with me dying violently, which, ya know, didn't sound right for someone who laughed at my terrible jokes and smiled so happily all the time and called me her other big sister[37].

Honestly, it all sounded like a really, really bad joke.

Katelynn, half of an evil species? Impossible. Jackson, a god? He once punched himself accidentally. My parents, Warriors? Okay maybe my mom but even that was a stretch, and Dad once made a goodbye video to his breasts.

Did that sound like the doings of an all-powerful magical beings to you?

Kali? Okay, sure. I could see her as being, well, herself. She was regal enough for it. It made sense.

But also didn't.

Because what actual goddess would come down to earth to be my friend? Me, the kid who cried himself into a panic attack a bunch of times and was stupendously bad at a class to which the language it was based in was one I'd grown up speaking.

And what god looked down at me and thought, "Yeah, let's make this chubby kid the surveyor of our power."

It didn't sound right.

I stood up and looked at the two of them, still conked out on my bed. Jackson's breathing was heavy but lulled. Kali was basically a corpse.

Jackson and Kali.

Kali and Jackson.

Great and powerful gods.

I rubbed my face, weary, and slowly slunk out of my room. Tugging the door shut, it clicked quietly behind me. No noise echoed from inside. I relaxed and turned around.

The dull feel of magic wrestled around me. I was used to it in low quantities. Around Katie, around Mom's family, around pretty much anywhere in Brokes. Here there was so much.

It made me want to run.

The urge to flee wriggled into my stomach like a worm, twisting and turning me into a nervous shake.

I walked down the stairs and tried to remember where the exit was. Just needed to go on a walk, brush through some trees, feel the air and not feel constricted.

I stopped at the end of the stairs.

I was going to throw up.

A door creaked. Behind me, Lena, the girl who'd taken Dad's sword, was slipping inside. She didn't notice me right away, busy on creeping backwards, making no sound. When she turned, she jerked, eyes widening.

At the sight of her, relief slid through me, bright and lightweight. She gave a half-hearted wave that I returned in kind.

"Hi. Lena, right?" I asked, sticking my hand out.

She grinned and took it. "Yeah. Nice to meet you." As we dropped each other's hands, I noticed dirt extending over my palm. "Oh crap," she swore. She rubbed her hands on her pants, laughing awkwardly. "Sorry, I was outside."

"Planting flowers in the moonlight?" I laughed.

She snorted, rolling her eyes. She pushed her curls behind her ears, drawing back the twists from where they fell in her face. "No, I couldn't sleep so I went out to, ya know-" Her eyes glittered the tone of her joke. "-commune with the dead."

I choked on a short laugh but grinned. "So you're like my dad? A Warrior of Death?"

"The dead, actually," she corrected.

I frowned. "What's the difference?"

"Uh, not much." She rubbed her wrist, eyes flickering up as she thought. "It's more the dead is where you start and death is when you get approved by an Underworld god. It's a very big honor. Doesn't always happen."

My dad? Approved by a god?

Wow.

Pride bloomed in my chest. "So it's just a technical term."

"Kind of," she said. "It started when they needed more help moving souls from here to there and then processes got streamlined so that faded but if you get it, then basically it means they trust you." She grinned. "Makes sense he would have it. You know. Because of you."

I laughed. "That's fair."

She nodded. "The, uh, the sword I took is one of the perks too. So, um, thank him for me?" Her smile fell shy. "I always wanted to hold one."

"Uh, yeah," I said. "Definitely."

Silence perforated between us, easy but awkward. She was really pretty. Dark skin and beautiful brown eyes. They stayed trained on me.

My stomach twisted and I brushed back my hair, trying to figure out something to say, to ask because I didn't want to stop. And judging by how she lingered, watching me, I had a feeling she didn't want to either. "So, uh, is that something you're working towards or..."

"Kind of but there really isn't anything I can do, specifically," she said, relaxing. "Kind of just have to wait and hope and-" She laughed short, gesturing behind her. "-practice."

"Maybe I can put in a good word for you," I offered. Her eyes widened, amused. Ah crap, I was caught. Flustered, I tried to backtrack. "No, I mean, you seem really nice. And- and pretty but like- shit, wait."

I covered my face.

And this is why I left letters in their locker.

She laughed, her head cocked to the side. "You're, uh-" She cleared her throat, standing up straight and refusing to look at me. "You're pretty too."

"Oh." I paused, then, "Thanks."

"Yeah." She nodded slowly. "I, well, I'd like to- if you want, maybe to-"

"Yes," I said quickly. She laughed and her smile was so wide I thought her face was going to break.

"You don't even know what I was going to ask," she said. She bumped my arm with her hand. "What if it wasn't a date?"

"Then I'd never be impatient again," I said.

She snorted, then began playing with her hair. "So, um, I guess we can- do you have a phone?"

I dug mine out of my pocket and turned it on. She took it, plugged in her number and grinned wide again. Butterflies aflutter in my stomach, I smiled and pocketed it back.

"Don't worry," she assured with a tease in her tone. "I'm not doing this for a status upgrade."

"I did not think that at all," I stressed. I rubbed the back of my neck. "Man, I can't even imagine that."

"Still processing it?"

"Yeah, it's-" I brandished my hands. "It's a lot to take in."

"Yeah, I can imagine," she said. "I feel like living here should make it easier but somehow makes it harder, ya know. Not that I never knew. I've always known."

"Yeah, it's still weird," I said. Laughing short, I gestured loosely to here. "Are you from Brokes?"

She nodded eagerly. "Yeah, I-"

"Lena!"

We both jerked, both trying to move away and somehow colliding with one another. I swore and she sent me an apologetic glance, rubbing where she'd accidentally hit my side a bit too hard. Pain fluttered, too much for the pressure of the hit, but I swallowed around the way it curled into my skin and grimaced instead of screaming.

"Sorry," she breathed. She turned to the voice. "Hey, Layla."

Layla walked towards us, quick and steady. "You should be in bed."

"I just woke up," I said just as Lena chorused, "Alice was snoring."

Layla's eyes flickered over us, training on me for a moment before softening as they rested on Lena. "I bought you those headphones for a reason," she said.

Lena exhaled. "About that..."

"What now?"

Lena rubbed the back of her neck. "I gave them to Ben, for, uh, focus? And then he used them in a project so they cannot be used for human consumption outside of what he's welded them to."

"Lena..." Layla breathed sharply.

"Yeah, yeah, I know, waste of tools," Lena muttered. "I'm making him pay me back for them."

Layla rolled her eyes, sighed deeply then patted her arm. "Go back to bed, dear."

Exhaling sharply, Lena nodded, bumping my arm as a goodbye and began jogging down the hallway. We watched her go, a choking feeling crawling up my throat the farther and farther she walked.

Finally, Layla cleared her throat. "I imagine your parents explained everything?"

"Pretty much," I said loosely. I rocked back on my heels. "The important things, I guess."

Her eyes snapped to me. Needles pinged up my arm at her gaze, trained, focused. "That's good. You should head back as well."

"Uh, oh, um-" I swiveled around. Every part of me did not want to go back to that room. "I was actually looked for a vending machine. Or kitchen. I haven't eaten since yesterday morning." I swallowed thickly. "Hungry."

Not a lie, I reassured myself quietly as the pang hit my chest. I hadn't eaten since yesterday morning. I was hungry.

It just wasn't why I left.

Her eyes looked me over before she sighed and rubbed both hands together. "Every twenty or so feet there are restrooms and vending machines. The kitchen opens at seven thirty during the, eight on weekends and nine during the holidays." She fluttered her fingertips at her side. Sparks bloomed from them. "I'll show you where. Come."

Obediently, I followed on her heels as she wove me through the dormitory towards the cafeteria. It wasn't difficult to locate and I mapped our way steady in my head. Straight, turn, turn, turn, straight, end of the hall.

"I've arranged two students to show you around in the morning." She stopped sharply and looked me in dead the eye. "Lena is not one of them."

I resisted the urge to flush at her name.

I don't think I was successful.

"Cool," I said. I wrung my wrists behind myself. "Cool. Thank you, Mrs...."

"Pend." She ran a hand through her hair before tapping the door. A blue holographic keypad popped up. "I prefer Layla. And it's Ms."

"Okay. Understood," I said.

She hit numbers on the pad. "Clean up after yourself. Don't bother the staff when they come in to set up." She swiped the pad away and the blue faded and melted into her palm.

"Um, what," I started as the doors pushed open, "what exactly are you?"

She paused, looked me over in quick confusion then pity, as though remembering that I didn't grow up with all of this and couldn't figure it out just from looking at her.

"Magic," she said.

I brightened up. "Like my mom?"

A weary look passed over her face. "Yes." She brandished her hand out. Another blue hologram popped from her palm, three people back-to-back in a circle. "There are three specialties. Offensive, defensive and neutral. I specialize in neutral magic." The person closest to me held out their hand, sparks and colours flying from it. "It requires no outside concentration of power. Everything is internal, made from the mind. It is what powers this school."

The people circled until the one dressed in heavy armor stood at the front. "Defensive magic is what powers the boundary. It draws energy from the world around it. It can be dangerous to use," she said, as the air around the person sizzled as the shield they'd generated grew brighter and bigger. "Doing so in close quarters can drain others of their own power and energy, rarely killing them but often incapacitating them."

The neutral magic person dropped to their knees as the air around the defensive kept burning. "So they use things to concentrate where they draw energy from. Amulets and such." The third person, assumedly offensive, threw a golden rock at them. It sank through the person and glued tight to their chest. The first person stopped choking.

The circle spun until the offensive person was at the front. "Offensive magic is volatile but most useful in large battles. They concentrate their energy through wands or staffs, much like in films." The person pulled a staff from their palm. "They do so in case something backfires, it won't implode them, just the object. It requires the most discipline as the energy it takes to realize an offensive attack can quickly drain everything a person has."

"That's my mom?" I said. "She had a staff."

The hologram vanished with a quick clench of her fist. "No," she said shortly. "Well, yes. Anna, she did all three."

I blinked. "Is that normal?"

Layla swallowed thickly. "No, no, learning a specialization requires a lot of focus, concentration. We learn the basics of all and pick which one feels most comfortable to learn into. But it's been attempted before. She was just the first to pass all three exams."

"On the first try?"

Layla squinted at me. "Ever."

Yeah, that sounded about right. I mean, she took a full load of summer courses for two years in a row so she could graduate early, somehow mashed her Master's into a semester and a half because the material was too easy and then said she did her PhD because she was bored.

Of course she'd try out for all three and pass.

Despite never having sewn in her life, she took an advanced sewing class when I was eight because, after spending the first two weeks looking up all the techniques her teacher said they'd be covering in the beginner's class, she mastered ninety percent of them and got decent enough at the remaining ten percent over a three day weekend. And even in the advanced class she finished and got her certificate halfway through the allotted time period because she kept learning everything days in advance because she was bored of waiting to move on to the next topic.

My mom is the definition of having absolutely no chill.

Jesus.

Yeah. So hearing this didn't surprise me much. Of course she did. It would've been more shocking if she hadn't. Like finding out she couldn't drive because I really thought of all the people in the world my mom, who seemingly wants to know everything, would know how to do that.

I was wrong.

"That sounds accurate," I said. I rubbed the back of my neck. "She's not one for small levels of stimulation."

"I know," Layla said dryly. "She refused to be talked out of it."

In the back of my mind, logic dictated that Layla looked to be around my parents' age, clearly knew them from Dad's familiar tone from the day before and yet the question still came out, "Did you guys know each other?"

Layla stared at me like I was an idiot. Which, you know, fair. "Yes."

"Cool beans. And thank you for letting me in." I stuck out my hand. "Oh, thanks, too, for the damage protection thing."

Her eyes a bit lost, she shook my hand slow but firm. "You're welcome," she said delayed. Dropping my hand, she turned back towards the doors. "Good night." She paused, glancing over to the windows that peeked the rise of dawn. "Or rather good morning."

"Good morning," I echoed faintly as she vanished through the doorway. A relieved feeling best through my stomach like a cold wash of water. I relaxed into the tile flooring. "Good morning."

** ** **

A couple hours later, breakfast was open. I'd spent the morning in the cafeteria. I'd made myself two sandwiches, cleaned up thoroughly then sat patiently at one of the tables, eating, trying to go over everything and assessing together a long list of questions.

Mostly I just screwed around on my phone passing through fourteen levels of cookie jam.

"And my fifteenth victory," I mumbled, swiping down and watching my final target check itself off, "goes to Tūmatauenga[38]."

To my left, a ripe apple plopped onto my plate. Just right from thin air. I stared at it, thinking something along the lines of "the fuck?" and "how in the fresh hell?"

And then it hit me. Food cultivation. Right.

"Um." I took the apple. "Thanks?" A banana plodded down in front for me then an orange and then a bowl of olives. My cheeks burned. "Okay, this really isn't necessary."

A couple of the early risers that had bolted in the moment the doors unlocked glanced over at me. I gave a short wave and lined up my fruits, not really sure what else I was supposed to do here.

Food from the actual gods.

I was more used to the other way around, in which I threw food on a fire and hoped they got the message that it was an offering, though to be honest I still never fully understood how burnt food is considered an offering and I still don't. Mom explained it like a bunch of times but it's never really made sense.

Poking the bowl of olives, which I didn't like and wasn't sure if I was expected to eat it, I wondered if this was some weird kind of offering to me. That or a show of impression, like "Haha, he picked me and just to show I'm paying attention I'm giving him stuff, you guys didn't do that so you suck".

I pressed my hands together and pointed at the food. "To eat or no?"

Nothing.

I pinched the bridge of my nose. "This is confusing."

"What is?" I jerked as Lena grinned at me. Putting her plate down beside me, she nodded to the olives. "Where'd you get those?"

"Uh."

So I've been in here since you left and I've been jokingly but also lowkey seriously dedicating my wins on cookie jam to war gods because victory in battle? And apparently, they were listening and the last guy I said could have my win gave me an apple so now the rest of them gave me fruit and I don't know if it's in thanks or to show off or like a bribe and I don't know if I can eat it or not but also hoping no because I don't like olives and I don't want to offend probably Athena by not eating it but also I really don't want to eat it.

"The gods?"

She snorted and sat down. "Fancy." she reached across my chest, tapping the bowl of olives. "Can I?"

"Yeah!" I pushed them towards her, smiling. "Go nuts." Internally, I was thinking, Please don't explode, please don't explode, please don't explode.

She grinned back and dumped a handful onto her plate, cutting them up and mixing them into her scrambled eggs.

She took a bite and didn't explode.

I relaxed.

"You been in here this whole time?"

I nodded and spread my hands over my knees. "Was your roommate still snoring?"

"If she wasn't, I'd've thought she was dead."

I snorted. "I'd've?"

She rolled her eyes and scrunched up into herself. "Okay, Layla's from, like, Texas, okay? All of that is her fault."

Daughter? I paused. Children don't tend to call their parents by their first name. Step? Or maybe adoption.

I bit my lip, debating, then asked, "Is Layla your mom?"

She smiled wryly and started, "Well-"

"Lena!"

Both our heads snapped up. Alice bounded towards us. She settled down at the table. "Hey, hey." She grinned wide. "Hello, Alex."

Lena threw an olive at her and ducked her head behind her arm. I glanced between them, lost.

"Um, hi."

Alice spun a piece of egg onto her fork. "How'd you sleep? The calm push ease you through it?"

"Uh, yeah." I pushed her the banana. "Thanks."

"No prob, Bob," she chirped, accepting the banana. "You looked like you were gonna vomit. Or pass out. Seemed necessary."

"Probably would've done both," I said. "It was... a very weird day."

"I dunno," she said. "I think every day in Brokes is weird."

"Weird for a local, Al," Lena teased. She bumped my thigh with her knee. "When you're used to it, this is weird."

Alice shrugged. With her fork, she waved in a circle. "Oh, my brother is supposed to give you the grand tour."

"Where is he?" Lena asked, leaning back and scanning the room. "He's normally here by now."

"If he's not perched outside the workshop, crying for Ben," Alice muttered darkly. "Of all the stereotypes to hate..."

Lena laughed, coughing over her eggs. Alarmed, I raised my hand, not knowing if this was a "hit the back to dislodge the food" situation. She waved me off, pounding her chest with her fist. A tall blonde boy dropped his bag down beside Alice.

"You done?" he asked, thick accent over a dry tone.

She flipped him off and swallowed down her water. Alice pointed from him to me.

"Peter, Alex," she said.

Peter held his hand out as he sat down beside her. "Hi."

Smiling low, I took his hand, shook it firm. "Nice to meet you."

He nodded back and withdrew his hand. "I'm supposed to be your guide today, along with Fish. If he ever leaves the workshop."

"Fish?"

Alice rubbed her jaw. "He likes to swim. And his name is Daniel Daniel Daniels." She smiled soft, almost apologetic. "Fish is better."

"Way better," Fish echoed, crawling onto the seat with a plate of bacon. He squinted at me. "Are you the kid Lena wants to fuck into a wall?" He turned to Alice. "Or is that someone else?"

Lena dropped her face into the table, shaking. I froze up, not sure what to do with that information.

Completely having forgotten his original question, Fish didn't seem to notice, rubbing his face against Alice's hair. "Why doesn't Ben love me?" he whined.

"Because you knock his shit over and almost explode things," Pete said, pushing Fish's face away from Alice.

"The more important question," Alice started, voice loud, annoyed, "is why you don't love our mother?" She pushed his plate over to Lena and gave him the orange. "This is why she said don't bother coming home for Hanukkah."

"I thought that was because she wanted to vacation without us?" Fish said, slyly trying to pull the plate of bacon back to him with a fork.

Alice slapped his hand. "Fish!"

"I want bacon," he moaned. He sank out of the seat, under the table. "Why do I have to listen to a book? I'm not Peter."

Pressing her hands together right and pushing them against her mouth, Alice closed her eyes and breathed deeply. Below Fish shouted, "Ow!"

He crawled past my legs and squashed himself between me and Lena and snatched up his bacon before Alice could steal it away again. Lena twisted her head ever so slightly, her eyes narrowed.

Very slowly she lifted her hand behind him and slapped the back of his head. He choked on his bacon, jerking forward and she stole his plate, gave him a pointed look before standing up and walking towards the trash.

He didn't notice at first, too busy whining low like a dog and rubbing the back of his head, until she'd passed several tables. Then he jerked to a rough stand.

Alice didn't even look at him, peeling back the rest of her banana. "Sit. Down."

Her voice radiated levels of authority that I'd never even heard. Fish glanced rapidly between her and Lena, eyes miserable, desperate and pleading, low whines I'd only ever heard from dogs and little kids not allowed outside.

Finally he gave up, slouching back into the seat and draping his whole body into the table.

"Good dog," Peter said, filling a napkin with eggs and pushing it Fish's way.

I snorted, watching Lena hover at the trashcan, her focus on Fish as she ate the rest of his bacon and nodded at some kid talking to her. I turned back to Fish. "So Apollo's your dad?" I looked to Alice. "You guys ever meet him?"

Fish shot up so suddenly my heart fell into a flying panic, danger alarms echoing. Slow and steady he turned to me and said, in the clearest voice he'd used since I met him minutes ago, "Apollo's not my dad."

"Oh." I glanced between him and Alice, struggling to wrap my head around their nearly identical features. "Sorry, I thought you were twins."

"We are," Alice said. "It's-" She bit her lip. "Heteropaternal superfecundation. It's when two different sperm fertilize two separate eggs. So you end up with different dads."

"Like with animals?"

She nodded. "It's rare with people just because we don't really have very long opens for fertilization and also don't release many eggs, right? But yeah. Gods have their sort of born appearance, I guess? And then sometimes, well-" She laughed. "-a lot of the time, it's just throw on a set of genes and walk around.

"So he looked like Fish's dad down to a T and Mom was apparently very drunk and not paying that much attention because she was just excited to see him and-" She screwed up her face. "-stuff happened and then Tata't[39] came back the next day and stuff happened and cut to, nine months later, my dad, who didn't even know she got pregnant, was playing doctor when she was giving birth and did his mental countdown and then Tata't walked in. And suddenly he got why Mom was so... receptive."

Fish scrunched up his face. "Ugh."

I nodded slowly. "So it was unintentional?"

"Yeah," Alice said slowly. "I mean, you could think nah but like, apparently he flipped out and my dad's not that great a liar. I've seen him try. Think has something to do with the truth[40] thing."

Fish rolled his eyes. "So to clarify-" He pointed at Alice. "Weird white guy." He pointed to himself. "Beautiful Mi'kmaq[41] man."

"But-" I looked at Alice. "If Apollo looked-"

Fish pushed his finger to my mouth, silencing me. "Still a weird white guy."

"He's not weird," Alice grumbled. "You're weird."

"Racist," he said, jabbing at her.

She rolled her eyes at him and chewed loudly on her banana. He scowled and peeled his orange angrily, shredding into the fruit itself and whining low as juice pulsed around his fingers. Peter flicked something on his phone, barely sparing a glance at Fish's peril.

"Dumbass," he said plainly and Fish stuck his tongue out at him then swiveled his head around.

"Where's Mary?"

"Asleep, probably," Alice said. "She was up at like one o'clock texting me about different coffee brands." Peter frowned and turned to stare at Alice in confusion. She closed her eyes and shook her head. "I don't even know," she said before he could ask or say anything. "I wake up to them and I'm so confused."

"Your girlfriend's a weirdo," Fish said.

"At least I'm not dating a dog," Peter said.

"Ben is not a dog!"

"I know," Peter said, voice dry. "I was talking about you."

I frowned, not quite getting that while Fish threw an orange peel at him and began chattering off angry words that Peter ignored. I shifted a bit to the side to gain some distance from the loudness and glanced around the room. Lena was stacking her plate on the edge of a counter, among a bunch of other dirty plates and cups. Around her, other kids were chattering, gesturing loosely towards our table.

Embarrassed heat flustered up in my stomach.

I swallowed around my nerves and glanced over at Fish. "What's, uh, what's with the dog jokes?"

His voice cut off and he glanced over at me. Then Alice. Then me. Then Alice once more. Who let out an exasperated exhale and cracked her knuckles.

"He's a werewolf," she said and her voice was small, quiet, her eyes not looking at mine.

"Oh." I nodded vaguely, not totally sure how was I was really supposed to respond to this. "Interesting."

She glanced up, finally looking at me. Emotions I couldn't process passed over her face before blending into a cool collective calm. "They told you about hybrids, right?" she tested.

"Yeah. Apparently, my friend Nick's sister is one." I gestured loosely. "She sees the future."

"That's what happened when Hybrids take after the more... human side. The Demon side breaks out into monsters," Fish said. "Like me. Or vampires. Or shapeshifters. A whole variety. I got it from my dad so Alice-" And he cut his eyes at her. "-doesn't have it."

"I'm too beautiful to turn into a massive beast of furry contraptions," she said.

I pressed my hands together. "Okay, so, you're here because you're a demigod and you're here-" I pointed to Fish. "-because you're a werewolf."

"Warrior," he corrected. "Of Water." He winced, his lip twitching up. "Werewolves aren't exactly-"

The entrance door slammed open. "ALEX!" Jackson hollered. He pointed at some startled child, no more than eight if I had to hazard a guess, and shouted, "WHAT DID YOU DO WITH HIM, YOU TINY HEATHEN?"

The tiny heathen in question stared up at him in horror, their tray tumbling out of their shaking hands to floor.

"Useless!" Jackson snapped, scanning the room before pointing crazily towards our table. "WHERE THE FUCK-"

"Jackson!" I yelled. I waved around. "Children!"

"FUCK THE CHILDREN!"

Kali, breathing hard and careening into the room, slapped the back of his head before grabbing the back of his shirt and dragging him towards us. "Where did you go," she demanded as soon as she got within a foot of the table. "Why were you not there when we awoke?"

"I couldn't sleep so I've been in here for, like, three hours," I said. I rubbed my eyes. "Sorry, I just-"

"It is fine," she said briskly. She pushed Jackson into the table. "You still should have-" Her eyes stilled on Fish, who was squinting up at her. "-left a note," she finished lamely, staring at him. A slow dawn came across her eyes. "I have met you."

"You're gonna have to be a lot more specific," Fish said. The tone of his voice did not match the disdain in his eyes. "I met a lot of gods at my hearing."

Hearing? I frowned, wanting to question it but before I could, Jackson was careening towards me. He grabbed my face and gently hissed, "Leave a damn note."

I patted the back of his hand. "Got it, Jack." He pulled away. "I'm fine, if that helps."

"Fine?" He pointed roughly at Peter, nearly smacking Alice in the face. "You're sitting with a Norwegian."

Kali closed her eyes, her fingers twitching like she needed to just pinch the bridge of her nose to stop herself from slapping him. I stared at him.

And then all his angry rants about Norway being stupid made sense.

"Do you not like Norse gods?" I asked. "Is that what that's been this whole time?"

"Yes," he hissed. "Now explain why you've betrayed me and all that I stand for?"

"Wha-" I looked at Peter. "You're a god?"

Peter stared at him, blank, then said with a quiet shake of his head, "No." He jabbed his thumb over at Alice. "Same as her. Saga[42]."

"Yeah, that makes way more sense." I looked back at Jackson and spread my hands over the table. "He is not a god."

Jackson laughed sourly. "I don't care. Norway is dumb and the Norse can go off themselves in their stupid Ikea stores."

"That's Sweden!"

"I don't care!" He stood up roughly, nearly clocking Kali in the chin with his head. He pointed at Peter with both hands. Peter who looked as increasingly confused as I'd felt my entire life about Jackson's weird hatred of Norway. "Die."

"Jack!"

"What?"

"You can't just tell people to die. It's rude," I said slowly, like he was a toddler because let's face it. A normal grown person would know better than that.

He spluttered. "Mutant says it all the time!"

"Because you eat her sandwiches, jackass!" I pointed at Peter. "He hasn't eaten your sandwiches!"

"I don't want to eat his sandwiches," Peter said, shaking his head.

"No one is eating anyone's sandwiches," Kali said, voice clear and final. She cut her eyes, narrowed and annoyed, to the back of Jackson's head. "Sit down."

He grumbled but plonked down beside Alice. Kali ran a hand through her hair, flustered and no doubt a second away from rubbing her temples weary. Well, at least he wasn't half naked ruining a children's play on Christmas.

That had been a weird day.

She slipped around the table and settled down near me, her head ducked and voice low. "You are alright?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," I said. I squeezed her thigh reassuringly. "Annoyed at certain people but fine nonetheless."

She nodded and wrapped her arm around my waist, pulling me in to press her head to mine. I breathed her in. My calm, calm Kali.

If Nick was a rock in a storm, Kali was the sanctuary discovered after.

And Jackson?

Pft. Jackson's the idiot who dragged you out into the storm.

But, ya know, sometimes, he's the person holding onto you when it hits, the reassurance that everything's going to be fine.

"So I made a list of questions," I said, pulling back and opening up my notes on my phone. "First, why? Second-" I looked at her. "-why?"

"Is third why too?" Jackson asks, not at all subtly throwing orange peels at Peter's face.

"No, third is "the fuck"," I said, scanning down to where I had written in capital letters THE FUCK???

Kali snorted softly and brushed back my hair. "You seemed like a good choice. You seemed like a good choice. You seemed like a good choice."

"Cool cool, fourth question," I started, tapping my screen. "What exactly can I do?"

Kali brushed back her hair, leaning against the table. "If you call, we will come." Well that explained Dad's whole "call your friends" thing yesterday. "If you require it, we assist in fighting."

Revulsion tumbled through me. That sounded so bad. Making someone fight for me. Making anyone do anything for me. It was different if I were to ask for the assist and it was provided but I guess in this case asking was sort of like when your parents ask you to do something. It stops being a question when you have the authority.

"It's not that bad, Al," Jackson said quick. "There are limitations. Can't ask us to give you ultimate power. Can't use us in a war unless it's already ongoing and/or you did not start it."

"So if I wanted to declare war on, say-" I looked over and spotted the small bowl of olives. "-olives, then-"

A smattering of a sea breeze blew past my face, smelling of salt water and fish. Alice's eyes narrowed in confusion.

"-or the ocean," I continued and breeze fell sadly past my cheek, a slight sting of resentment that I barely felt. But like look! I am not playing favourites. Except for Kali. And even that's conditional. "Then you guys couldn't interfere."

He snapped his fingers happily. "Exactly."

I leaned against the table, pressing my hands together. "Okay, uh-" I sent a quick glance to my phone, which had gone black. I pressed the power button. Nothing. I went back to squinting vaguely at Jackson's neck over the top of my fingertips. "Um, what- hmm."

"Go back to listing his stuff," Alice said, nudging Jackson. He sent her a quick look and she just stared at him, unphased.

I snapped my fingers. "Oh! Yeah, let's discuss this second thing because I don't fully get that."

"It's very simple. I suck." He smacked the table. "Norwegians suck worse though so it's fine."

Peter's eyes narrowed and he shook his head. "I'm sorry, did we kill someone you cared about or imprison your country or something?"

Jackson threw another orange peel at his face and ignored him. Peter sent confused looks to us and I shrugged hopelessly while Kali made a vague gesture with her hand and a noncommittal noise of "I stopped caring about this issue a while ago so I cannot and refuse to go back to it on the principal of I might actually physically choke him to death because of it".

You name a lot of her noises?

Just the specific ones. And Nick named that one.

It comes up a lot with Jack.

"Jackson, you do not suck," Kali said easily. He scowled and sank into his arms, shoving an orange slice into his mouth. "It is very easy to understand. Seconds are-"

"Without stories, yeah, I got that," I cut in. For a brief moment, Fish jerked, eyes wide, and the buzz in my head made a quiet reminder that "oh, buddy girl, you just cut off a goddess" but I pushed it to the side, focused on this. "But like, specifically, how do they play into me or whatever because now I have to remember so many more names and I'd like to make sure I really need to learn them because I am so tired, Kali." I rubbed my jaw. "Do you know how many there of you? And I don't mean in general, I mean you." I gestured jerkily towards her.

"Thirty-three million[43]," she said, eyes blank.

I went still. Then dragged my hands down my face. "THERE ARE THIRTY-THREE MILLION?"

Alarmed, a few people glanced over but I was too busy focusing on the fact I'd only memorized three hundred of them.

"Mom said there was only three hundred! I only memorized three hundred. Noooo." I sank into the table. "I'm a terrible person, I've forgotten so many people. They must be so offended. Oh my gods." I pressed my hands to my face. "They must be so mad at me."

"No, they under-"

"I memorized everyone else. I know everyone else and I forgot them," I whispered. My heart began pounding double time, offended for them and angry at me and on the breaks and edge of panic. "I forgot so many. But I can't remember that many anyway."

"Alex-"

"But I still took the effort to learn everyone from everywhere else so they must be thinking I didn't even bother, but I didn't know." I grabbed Kali's arm. and hissed, voice beyond desperate. "They know I didn't know, right?"

She pressed her hand to her mouth and shook her head. "The number is new," she stressed. "It is not even completely correct. It is meant to direct to the infiniteness of the universe[44]." She patted my hand soothingly. "You know this. I remember because you have said such before."

"Yeah, but someone believes in them," I stressed, "which means they're real. And need to be respected. Therefore, memorized and got their name written down on glossy paper in fancy calligraphy I still suck at."

She pursed her lips before pulling her hand back and cupping my chin. "Alex. No."

"Yes."

"No."

"Yes."

"Wait," Alice cut in. "What do you mean you memorized everyone else?"

"It means he's a very dumb pagan," Jackson explained, which is how he's explained it in the past to which I either make vague gesture and go, "What he said" or roll my eyes and explain.

I went with the latter this time. "Ignore him. I am not a dumb pagan, I am a respectful pagan, which means, I like all the people. And therefore I learned all the people."

"And by all you mean, like, all... Hindu gods?"

"No, all of them. Like in general."

She stared at me then glanced at Peter. "Do you understand?"

"I mean I hear the words," he said slowly. "But it's not connecting in my head." He pressed his hand flat to the table. "So you mean you know all the gods. That exist. Like. Mine. And Alice's."

"Yes!"

He drew back and stared. Alice nodded slowly. "Okay, so I know I shouldn't be asking because it's rude and I know that I don't like it when people ask me but, ya know-" She waved her hand in a wide circle, mouth falling open and shut as she struggled to punt out her question. Finally she drew back and pressed her hands together then pointed at Fish who looked over at me and said, "Why?"

"Seemed like the nice thing to do," I said patiently. "Also my mom and her family did it first so it's their fault."

"Yeah, but even they don't go to the lengths you do, Al," Jackson said, rubbing his forehead. "It's like, cool I know the fifty main people, now let me move on to the next group."

"I just don't want people to be forgotten," I said.

"Oh. My. God," Alice whispered.

Peter shook his head. "Wow. You were a perfect selection."

"Yes, he was," Kali said happily, raising a finger and silencing Jackson before he could retort something rude. "We got very lucky."

"Still think you could've gone better," I muttered, squirming in my seat. Someone less panicky maybe. Who was actually good at their main language. And didn't freak out because they couldn't remember a number of gods that no normal human person could ever memorize ever and that they knew "technically" didn't count.

Kali shook head. "Perfect," she repeated, kissing the side of my head. "Do not argue."

I laughed into her hold and rubbed my jaw. "Alright."

"Shit, Pete, you gotta show him the room because fuck that's gonna be a lot," Alice said, patting Peter's arm.

"What room?" I asked.

Peter grinned low, eying me over the rim of his glasses. "It's basically like a mini temple or church or whatever for kids who can't get the time to go out and attend a session or who want to pay respects to their parents. You walk in and it naturally accumulates shrines or statues or whatever you need for whatever you got to do."

I stood up. "Yes, let's go." I gestured rapidly. "Now, please, thank you."

He snorted and stood up with Fish. Kali looked at him. Her stance was cautious as she stood slow and steady. "You are coming?"

Fists balled, Fish straightened up, eyes flashing defensive. "Layla said it would be okay."

She nodded slowly, eyes cautious, but threw her arm around my shoulders and pulled me in close as we followed Peter out of the cafeteria. I made a mental note, filed it away in IMPORTANTS and hoped I wouldn't forget to ask what the issue between Fish and Kali was. Jackson didn't seem too bothered by him but his body tensed and he shifted too close as Fish drew past us to catch up with Peter.

It didn't make much sense. At least not in the moment.

** ** **

As we collected inside the dorm lounge, Peter stretched, pushing his phone into his pocket. "Okay, so, these are the dorms as you know. This is the main lounge. That's the door to the caf. If you bring anything down here and leave it, someone will assume its broken, take it and turn it into an art project so don't do that."

"ONE TIME, SOLBERG," a scrawny girl sprawled out on the couch at the end of the lounge yelled.

Peter rolled his eyes, an edge of a smile curling up. "Seriously don't though. At the end of the week, janitors throw out anything that's lying around."

Fish shoved through the doors, holding them open as we filed out. "Floors are coed," he said, jogging up to us and walking backwards. "Dorms are not. Bottom floor is for the babies, which is what we call anyone under like ten. Most of them are from Brokes and live off campus so you'll see a lot of them during the weekday. We also have, like, summer and winter camps, hence the kids yesterday."

He paused at the edge of the staircase. "You already have a room, right?"

"Yeah."

"Okay, well, uh, then we're-" He gestured between him and Peter. "-on the third floor, room three oh nine. And Alice is with Lena on the second floor at two thirty-eight. You're on the second floor too, right?" At my nod, he grinned. "Cool, so your floor advisor should be Holly and Cal, I think."

"No, Fish, Cal is our floor advisor," Peter cut in. "Terrik is the other second floor."

"But Terrik lives on the third floor," Fish said. "I smell her there all the time.

"That's because Cal lives on that one and they're dating," Peter huffed, walking past him.

Fish swerved around the edge of the staircase, eyes wide and an excited dog-like jerk to his step. "Terrik and Cal are dating? How do you know that?"

"Because Mary is Cal's roommate, puppy boy," Peter said weary, apologetic looks headed our way, as he pushed open the door to the walkway at the end of the hall.

Fish scowled. "Don't call me that." Then as he stepped out, he swiveled back around, nearly crashing into Peter's chest. "Can we stop by the workshop?"

"It's a tour," Peter said slowly, pushing Fish back. "Why wouldn't we stop by the workshop?"

Fish bounced on the edge of his heels, too excited and grinning wide. Luckily the rest of the tour seemed to level him out as we walked on. They showed me the classrooms and labs and the secret entrances students had crafted to get to certain rooms fast when they were late. A patch of constant dead grass led you directly into the third floor biology room, which Fish demonstrated comfortably but I refused to go near in quiet panic that it would glitch on me from overuse and then I would be trapped in the endless void that you apparently had to pass through to get to your destination.

The library, like the infirmary, was connected to the main buildings through sheltered walkways, massive and painted a soft green. At the front entrance, just above the doors, sat a bust of an owl perched on Athena's shield.

"They change it up every month," Peter said pointing to. "Wisdom gods and such. Last month was my mom."

The words tumbled from me before I could stop them. "Have you met her?"

He nodded patiently, pushing open the library doors. "A few times. She likes to check in, make sure everything's going okay."

Beside him, Fish's face had gone tense but I kept down anymore nosy questions and stepped through. It was well-stocked. Shelves upon shelves of desks. There weren't many kids inside but the few that were older and reading thick manuals as they scribbled down notes. At the beginning of each row of bookcases, stood a skeleton. Peter went up to one, asked for a book and the skeleton straightened up and marched down its row, coming back seconds later with the book in hand. Tucking the book behind him, Peter requested it once more.

The skeleton stepped back down the row, came back and said, "Your request could not be found. Please check with the librarian regarding your request." Then turned inanimate and still once more.

Peter dropped the book on a red cart as I said, "That's actually pretty cool."

Fish tapped the skeleton's head. A hollow thunk sounded. "It's not real by the way. Used to be in the past though. Dunno why they changed it."

"Because Dead Warriors used to assign a specific row to the new kids and then make them fight each other in the middle of the night," Jackson interjected, voice dry. "They changed it shortly after I got deified"

New question, I thought to myself, following Peter as he showed me around the rest of the library. In the back was a small room called the wellness room but Fish called the stress-ness room. It was brightly coloured in excessive neon and too much yellow so, yeah, totally agreed on the stress-ness thing. There was one kids stretched out, taking a nap on the floor, two books spread out around them. Fish pushed open the door just a crack and soft piano music played out.

Beside the stress-ness room was the shrine room as the small plaque beside the door called it. Too excited, I shoved open the door and stepped inside. The room was white and seemingly endless. Then it rippled low and golden, shimmers of statues and shrines to my deities filling the whole room. Fish whistled low, squatting and trying to see where it ended.

It didn't.

I closed my eyes and tried to rearrange it, simplify it down to the current group I was focusing on this, plus Kali because I love her. The room rippled again and the amount shrunk down to Mayan gods and a nice small thing for Kali. Jackson made a low noise, squeezing gently my hand and I added in a small thing covered in lavender and the portrait of his current love, Idris Elba, cut at the waist.

We meandered back out to the second set of classrooms, directly attached to the library. It was similar to the last one, larger though, but regular classrooms hosted inside with the same set-up and look like any other school I'd been to. The front led to the entrance of the building as a whole, the one we'd been trying to reach yesterday. The offices of the administrators were located there. It curved around to the first class building but was cut from it by small walkways that lead out from each floor.

When I asked why it just wasn't kept attached to the same building, Peter shrugged and said, "Explosions."

Jackson steeled his grip on my hand before I could decide to run away and live in hiding somewhere where explosions weren't acted like they were normal occurrences.

As we left the second class building, Fish stepped outside the walkway to show me where the barrier walls ended, several hundred feet away from the edge of each building. It wasn't difficult to tell though. There was a fuzzy sheen where the barrier cut through the ground.

Brushing snow out of his hair, he grinned wide and ran down the walkway to another building.

"The workshop's in this one," Peter explained.

Of course to get there we had to go through a whole other set of classrooms but these ones were different. For starters, all the desks were stacked to the back, everything spread out. The rooms were larger, more spacious, less items that teachers and students were never going to use and only a few motivational posters.

Fish gestured widely to the room we were examining. "So this is the practical classes. Where we learn about how to stay alive and do minor practices."

"Connects to the gym," Peter cut in, gesturing us to double doors down the hallway. He pointed to an adjacent set of doors. "That's the workshop." He grabbed Fish's shirt collar and yanked him back into the gym. "Let's look at this first, puppy boy."

Fish scowled at the nickname but slipped inside.

The gym was empty. It looked nothing like the gyms at my other schools, save for the rock climbing wall which I hadn't seen since grade school and definitely had not been that complex. On one side were a few sets of large boxing rings. On the opposite side, closed off by a glass wall, stood a mini archery range it looked like. In the middle were laid out mats, someone's sword still plodded on top. At the sight of the sharp iron, my skin crawled and I took a nervous step backwards.

In the back of my head, I saw it. Clear and brighter than ever. Arcing towards me. A gem encrusted on helm glinted.

Someone was screaming.

"Alex?"

I blinked, snapping out of it. Kali was eying me, concerned. I swallowed thickly and shook my head. "Sorry, I just-" I pointed forward, uselessly. "The sword freaked me out for a second."

"Swo-" Fish cut off and swore violently, running forward to grab it.

Peter adjusted his glasses. "Is it-"

"Of course!" Fish yelled, picking it up. "Fucking Sarah!"

Peter waved him off, annoyed. "She's one of the armory guards. She has her own but she always grabs one to practice with and then never puts it away."

I relaxed. "So it's not real?"

"No, it's real," Peter said, too nonchalant. "A lot of monsters are old age so they can't be killed by modern day weapons. Which means everyone, mostly demigods, learn archery or fencing, especially if they can't use or make anything else."

"Oh great," I said flatly. "Enact the people I worship to kill for me or accidentally skewer myself. I don't know which sounds better."

Jackson rolled his eyes. "Enacting us."

"Debatable," I said.

Across the floor, Fish was putting the sword away in a large array of different weapons, sheathing it all the while. Watching him, Peter crossed his arms. "Fish works under the armory guards so if you want to try anything you can just go to him."

Before I could note that I was never trying anything that sharp and huge, Kali cut in. "They allowed him that?"

Peter's voice turned tense, like he was angry but trying not to show it. "He's proven himself enough to be allowed it."

Kali frowned, her body tensing around me. She didn't trust him. Why, why, why?

I bit my tongue and squeezed Jackson's hand. He squeezed back, quick smile, then asked, "The wall looks new."

Fish jogged back to us and grinned. "Yeah, it got changed out the year before I transferred. Alice said the other one was too easy to screw with."

Oh great.

Death by plummeting from a rock climbing wall.

I turned around and immediately walked out. "So the workshop?"

"YES!" Fish chirped, barging past and skirting around me. He waited, somewhat patient, for the rest of us to reach the door, grinning wide. "So this is the workshop. And it's cool and warm and smells like Ben."

He shoved open the door and ran over to a small black boy, hunched over a table.

I assumed he was Ben.

And just like that Fish's attention was gone, too busy bouncing on his heels beside Ben's table. Ben who didn't even seem to notice him there, staring hollowly at some contraption shaped like the Eiffel tower. Peter gestured loosely to him.

"That's Ben," he said. After a beat, he added, "He doesn't really sleep."

"He looks sick," I said.

"Yeah." Peter nodded slowly. "He's not. He just doesn't leave." He walked over and patted Ben's back before gesturing to us. "Ben, this is-" He cut his eyes back to Ben who didn't even seem to notice the pat. "Ben. Ben! Zenebe!"

Ben blinked slowly, his head drawing out of its stillness. He stared at Peter then at us. Then to Fish.

Fish giggled and fluttered his fingertips. "Hey baby."

"How long have you been in here?" Peter snapped.

Ben closed his eyes, sinking into the back of his chair. A thick Nigerian accent slipped from his mouth as he asked, "What time did Lena stop talking about that boy she was going to fuck into the wall?"

"You've been in here for thirteen hours?" Peter asked. He pushed his glasses up his face, rubbing his eyes tired. "What's the point of paying Gil to put you to bed if he doesn't do it?" He pulled Ben out of the chair. "Time for bed, dumbass."

Like a fucking hawk, Ben jerked and snatched up a wrench from nowhere pointing it viciously at Peter's face. "I'm almost done!"

"You've been at this for ten days," Peter said. "And saying this the entire time. Face it, Ben. Robert's won."

"I refuse to be beat by a ten year old."

Fish wrapped his arms around Ben's chest. "I don't think you have a choice right now," he said, crouching low so he nuzzle the side of Ben's neck. "Layla is two more accidental explosions from banning you."

Ben opened his mouth, probably to fight back, but his weary eyes, so spaced and out of it, finally caught sight of us and he frowned. "Who you?"

"This is Alex," Peter said. "The god Warrior?"

Ben squinted at me. "I thought he was taller. And whiter. And old."

I frowned. Was he talking about my dad?

Peter shook his head slowly. "It- No, nevermind, not worth it." He waved loosely to Fish. "Put him in bed."

"I don't need-" Ben started, struggling a lot and wildly for someone who looked on the verge of passing out any second. His skin was darker than Mom's, darker than Elaine and I could still see the black hollowness under his eyes seeping through. "No! My work!"

Fish heaved Ben over his shoulder and grabbed a set of keys from the side of the table.

"Don't leave until he's actually asleep!" Peter reminded him as he back out of the room. Fish gave us a thumbs-up, more focused on trying to stop Ben from kicking him in the stomach. Peter shook his head wearily as they vanished out the door. "Ben's... someone you really have to get used to."

"That's what we say about him," I said, patting Jackson's chest.

Kali choked on a giggle as Jackson scowled, sticking his tongue out at me. Peter nodded slow. "Yeah, I've been able to tell."

"Jagoff," Jackson grumbled.

"Uh huh." Peter took a step back and gestured around the room. "Okay, yeah so this is the workshop. Come in here to build some stuff, fix up your weapon or to put Ben to bed." He pointed to a far corner near the other door. "We got a small arts and crafts section too but most people just go to the art classrooms for that. This is more for people making miniatures of something that's later going to be big, you know?"

He turned back to us and clapped his hands together. "And that's the tour. Questions, queries, complaints?"

I shook my head, drawing close into Kali's side. "No. It was- good."

He smiled light. "Okay then. If you have any later, I'm literally right upstairs."

"Yeah, no, I'm-" I shook my head. "Uh, not a question but just in general, I don't use boy. It's just enby." I breathed shallowly because Peter was not from Brokes and sometimes people not from Brokes didn't get it right away. "I'm not just a boy. So it doesn't work for me."

He nodded. "Got it." He shifted weakly. "Mary, my girlfriend, you'll probably meet her at lunch, she's like that too. Not a girl. Or boy[45]. Just enby. Which makes girlfriend as a preference all the funnier, I think."

I laughed in time with him. "Yeah, it can be weird sometimes, what sounds right and what doesn't don't always line up."

He smiled loose. "Yeah. She complains about that a lot." He pushed up against the door, leading to yet another walkway and waved slight. "Well, I will see you guys later."

I echoed the same, watching the door swing shut behind him. Then I turned around on Kali and Jackson. "Danger."

"Not much."

"An excessive amount," I stressed. The sword flooded back to mind. Arcing towards me. He was yelling.

He was yelling my name.

"Alex!" Jackson snapped his fingers in front of me, rapidly.

Unpleasant trembles shivered down my arms and I shook. "Sorry! I just-"

"What's going on, that's the second time today you spaced on us in the last twenty minutes," he stressed, not angry, just concerned. "Where's your mind going?"

"To the- the danger!" My arms waves rapid in the air. "The danger all around us!"

Not supposed to be here. The feeling choked up in my stomach. Not around them. Somewhere else. Leave. Run. Flee.

She's coming.

I swallowed around the voice that sounded nothing like my own. Panic, hysteria. I was fine. Hallucinating but fine.

"We will keep you safe!" Kali promised. Her eyes were lit up with righteousness. "We will protect you as we have been doing."

"I just- I don't want-" I pressed my hands ot my face and groaned. Screams stayed lodged in my chest, nearly strangling me. I didn't want this.

The feeling was ripe in my chest, long since lingering there but unacknowledged in all the hubbub. But finally broken open, too big to ignore.

I didn't want it.

I swallowed and dropped my arms, eyes closed. "I get that it's a big deal and I know it's important and I want you guys to have someone because I don't want you to be suffering but I just- It shouldn't be me. I cry all the time. I panic too much. I can't fight\- I don't want to!"

"You will be fine," Kali promised. "We are not going to let anything hurt you."

"It's not about me!" I shouted and she drew back because I didn't shout often and rarely, if ever, at her. "It's not about me! It's about you! I'm not strong enough to do my job! I break too easily. All you have to do is pretend that you'll hurt me and I'll cave. So what if someone comes after you? And they catch me off guard and I can't call for you because I don't remember because I'm too scared to think. And all they do is say if I don't cooperate, they'll hit me and suddenly I spill everything and I have to deal with you being hurt because of me."

Kali's eyes were hard, angry, as though annoyed I could ever even think that someone could hurt her. And then they softened, her stance relaxing. She understood. She didn't agree but she understood.

"I cannot die," she said. "It was not written in my stories, Alex. I would never blame you for anything. You are not infinite. I know this. However, I would rather suffer than find you suffering."

"That's not fair," I whispered.

"She's right though." Jackson wrung his wrists. "Seconds can die. We don't have stories keeping us alive. It's difficult to do but possible. Other gods, Warriors, you- they can kill us. And I would rather be skewered and choking on my own blood than see you die, Al. That's just how this works."

"I don't want it to work like that."

"Alex, it's not because I'm a god and you're my Warrior," he said.

"We are your friends," Kali finished for him. "We love you."

Her words stung. I don't know why but they did. Like I didn't deserve to be loved by someone who's life I held in my hands. I didn't want her life in my hands. I didn't want Jackson's life in my hands. And her words stung because she sounded upset, her tone chagrined.

Like she thought I didn't know it.

Like she thought I'd forgotten.

"I know," I said. "I know- I just- I want-" I exhaled softly. "I want to go home."

"I know," Jackson said. "I know how you feel, okay? Probably better than anyone else." He licked his lips and sat down on Ben's chair. Kali waved her hand, two more chairs sliding into place around him. I sat down and waited. "You asked earlier how Seconds work. And it's pretty simple. We're born then placed with a host family to live with. Sometimes they get told, sometimes they don't. It's always the best fit people for the role you're suited to. But we don't find out about what we are until we're thirteen so it doesn't matter. We're basically similar to demigods, but less destructible with limited powers that even if we were aware of, we wouldn't be able to use on purpose.

"So when I was thirteen, I got taken into the Heavens and they judged my actions, my beliefs, anything about me, according to the role I had to play. We do it like this, just in case you turn out bad, as a person or a fit. If you're deemed okay, yay." He shook his fists in the air in mock celebration. "You get to become a fully-fledged god and live where you need to live, do whatcha gotta do. If you're bad or you don't seem like you'd do your job at least halfway decently, then, if you're lucky, your powers are removed, memories of the testing removed and you get dropped back on earth like a hot potato. If you're less lucky then-" He dragged his thumb across his throat quick.

I shifted, uncomfortable with that thought. Uncomfortable with the knowledge that I could kill them.

Uncomfortable with the possibility that I might have to.

"And it was weird and miserable," Jackson went on, quickly, "and I didn't like it. I didn't like being separated from my family and my friends. I didn't like being told I would only be able to see them certain days because I had to learn my duties and learn the rules and learn stuff I wasn't interested in. I didn't want to be a god. I just wanted to grow up, marry Farha who lived next door and was super gay too, kiss some boys while she kissed some girls and basically die in peace.

"But I wasn't going to get that and I'm never going to get what I wanted and I've come to terms with that and changed my goals and you will too because, really," he said, "you don't have much of a choice." I pulled my legs up, miserable. He squeezed around my thigh best he could. "It's not that bad though. Most people would kill for this kind of opportunity."

"When have I ever been most people?" I asked him.

Kali sighed and draped herself over the arms of both our chair, her elbows against the cushion, face in her hands. Her hair fell loose and long over her skin. "You are the best person. That is all you need to be."

I rubbed my ankles. "I just don't know how I'm supposed to do this. I- It feels too late to learn."

"It is never too late to learn," Kali stressed. She pulled back up and rubbed the back of her neck. "I can be, if I wish it to be, with my others. But we chose to be separate because we are separate. I was the last to try. I worried about myself. If I would be okay to interact with others if I did not have them to calm my mind. If I could travel freely as I always had without someone to stop my rage. I learned how to calm. I learned how to be."

"You're also immortal, Kali. It's never too late for someone who can't die," I pointed out.

She rolled her eyes. "Nothing pleases him," she said to Jackson who nodded.

"Yeah, he sucks," he agreed in faux whisper. "We shoulda dropped him before his chubby face made us like this."

I rolled my eyes. "Look my face was not that chubby when I was seven, okay?"

"I was talking about you being three."

"Really?" Kali asked. "I believe I was taken in on physical sight." She smiled teasing. "You were very small."

"Oh my Shiva[46]," I muttered, dropping my legs and deciding to go bury myself in the snow before she could start recounting the baby stories I was glad my parents never could.

She grinned even wider at her husband's name and caught me round the waist, pulling me into her lap. I buried my face in her hair then yanked back.

"Wait, is that why you never hook up with guys?"

"Yes," she said. "I find them attractive but I am already spoken for in that department. However, I have no woman to speak for me so I am free to mingle as I see fit."

"And by mingle she means eating pussy," Jackson cut in, slouching against my back because he can never go long without someone loving him if everyone else is loving on each other.

"Well it is the most important meal of the day," I added.

"What do you know!" He huffed. "You're a virgin!"

"So are you," Kali pointed out.

I choked on a laugh. "Seriously?" I shook my head. "Jackson, please, please tell me you're actually fifteen because if you aren't, I'm not letting you be in charge of my love life anymore. I'll never get the babies I want to have."

He huffed and mumbled something. Kali laughed in my shoulder. He cleared his throat and muffled it a little louder. We leaned in dramatically close and he mumbled it one more time. "M'ninety-one."

"OH MY GODS!"

"It's not that big a deal!" he complained. "I've still done stuff."

"Only with clothes on," Kali told me, in a loud whisper.

I howled, keeling over. "Nick has more experience than you!" I yelled, laughing. "And Nick is ace![47]"

"Oh fuck off, touching Kali's boobs doesn't count," he snapped, whacking my back lightly and scowling, petulant like a child. "Besides, I've done things. I'm just waiting for someone to do all the stuff with."

His tone turned miserable and Kali grew tense underneath me. The humor in the room vanished fast. I shifted.

It was different before.

I knew that there were things they had together that I didn't know about but those things didn't tend stretch decades and didn't seem as rude to ask in the moment. There was no need to fall accidentally in a conversation that stretched a misery of years I wouldn't understand because the ones that did fall back years before I'd ever even been close to conception were never touched. They couldn't be when I didn't know.

That was another reason I didn't want this.

I didn't want to be left in the dark, waiting for an answer I might never get and not knowing the important things that crafted the people I loved together.

But Jackson peeled back, his face wane, and I filed away my questions again, sliding off Kali's lap and draping into Jackson's chest instead. He hugged me around the waist.

"Feel better?"

"Little bit," I relented. "Still don't want it."

"You'll get used to it," he said. "Promise."

** ** **

We went back to my room, where I sprawled out onto the school sheets and sighed deeply into the rough of it. Kali laid down beside me and dropped one of her legs over mine. She pulled her phone from her breast pocket and addressed it then turned and stared at me.

"Yours is dead, yes?"

"Ah, shit, yeah." I rolled onto my back and pulled it from my pockets. Then I sat up. "I don't have my charger."

Kali pressed hers into my chest and stood up. "I will collect your things." She turned on Jackson and slapped her hands together. "Do not go without him."

Then she vanished, too sharp and too sudden. It threw me off balance and I stared at the empty space she'd been in for a few minutes, still reeling from what happened. In my hand, her phone buzzed quick messages from Dad, letting me know they were packing up some stuff for me, tell Alex, he's ignoring me, why is he ignoring me, oh shit, she's here.

Always from nowhere, he whined. Do not miss that, no ma'am.

I snorted and put her phone on the nightstand next to mine. Jackson plopped down next to me and leaned into my side.

"You know," I started softly, "I always thought when I went to go live away for school, my parents would be moving me in."

"Yeah, I know," he sighed. He squeezed my hand, gentle.

"Why are they banned?"

"Dunnno. Probably did something they weren't supposed to," Jackson said easy, not looking at me and dropping my hand fast.

So many touchy subjects, it was driving me insane. I changed topics, switched gears. "Why doesn't Kali like Fish?" When Jackson stayed quiet, I wrung my wrists, frowning. "I know he's a werewolf."

He blinked, turning on me. "You do?" I nodded. "Oh. Well-" He exhaled sharply and leaned back. "Basically, in the past, monsters tended to side with Demons. Which meant people like Fish tended to-"

"Be killed."

He winced. "Yeah. Basically. Then the arguments came out, especially from parents who were Warriors, who knew they had someone to argue to. If you treat people like monsters, they'll act like monsters. We can't take children from their families, and eventually, some leniency was created. This was way before I was born, though," he added quickly. "I mean, one of my friends, his family is based out in the UK now, but he was a vampire and his family was considered okay. We keep tabs on them, on all of them, but so long as they don't step out of line, they're fine.

"Fish's hearing was when he was about eight. Because he bit some girl straight through her leg, there was a meeting called about letting him stay alive and risk hurting people or..." His face turned sour. "...culling the problem before it could grow."

"Jesus.[48]" The tense way he'd turned the moment Jackson and Kali walked in, how he seemed so animated only to turn quiet, still, obedient in their gaze, flooded to my mind. How Alice even became touchy the moment Kali addressed her brother.

She knew what Kali was to him, what a risk it would be to have her around. Was that why she was so pleasant?

Jackson rubbed his hands together. "Yeah, it was gross. I wasn't there but I've been to other ones. The kids, they're so small, and they know even if they don't get it, you can see it, this- this defiance, the fear, and it's-" A sullen drop of breath fell from his mouth, exasperated but not quite a sigh. "-it's ugly to be a part of.

"His mom is a Warrior, very high classed before she retired from it, I think that's the only reason he got to stay. Of course, it wound up that the blame was shifted to his dad so he ran off before anything could happen to him." Jackson rubbed the back of his neck. "I don't know much more than that. Kals was fed up with the whole thing but she, she doesn't hate him," he assured me. "She just knows the risk he poses to you and she worries. I worry."

"I think he has more interest in salivating over his boyfriend than he does in harming me," I muttered, pulling my legs to my chest.

"No doubt," Jackson said. "But still- We don't know."

I looked at my hands, spread over my feet. Soft and uncalloused by time. Fleshy and relatively thin for all that I weighed.

It was hard to see myself as anything that could withstand anything. I knew my limits and they were easy to reach, easy to break if someone wants. I wasn't the kind of person to fight back. Hitting someone hurt me just as much as getting hit and the thought of any violence, enacting it or the subject of it or, gods, even just the existence of it, made my stomach churn and knees shake.

But still, I had power of some kind and they knew. They all knew what I was, what I could do, even when I didn't.

Did they fear me?

Fish didn't seem to think of me as any different. Alice was nice, calm. Peter easygoing. Lena even thought I was attractive.

Was it an act though? To keep one member of their group alive? If I said the word, would Kali snap? Would she wait, fall back and address the situation, address whatever claim I echoed out? Or would she just act on it, whether because of trust or because I was me?

And it made more sense why Fish was so hostile, regarding the concept his dad versus Alice's. He did not want to be associated with someone who stood in a room, debating his death.

I didn't want to be.

When I was younger, some of the stories disgusted me. Rape. Ripping someone's skin off their body because they made such a senseless claim. Punishing someone for being a person when you were a god.

It all seemed so petty. And cruel.

But I figured it was all addressed to the time, to the accepted behaviours. That as things turned and motions shifted and people agreed consecutively that kidnapping was not cool, selling your children was not cool, murdering someone just because they said something you didn't like was not cool, they would grow, be better.

I was wrong.

And now I was associated with something I didn't want to be associated with, an aggressive force which didn't make sense. The worse thing I'd done was be six and slap Elaine for telling me I wasn't really her cousin because we weren't blood related. It was hard to conceptualize being thought of in relation to people so cruel.

At least with Nick, I knew they were good. I knew them. I was their friend, we'd grown up together.

I didn't know the gods, save for Kali and Jackson and even then, what I'd been told might've been a lie, was probably a lie.

Likely fact was, I probably didn't know them at all.

His voice quiet, Jackson leaned against my ear and whispered, "What are you thinking?"

"I want to change things. If I can." I wrapped my arm around his shoulders. "Will you help me?"

Relief entrenched into his face, clear and relaxing. "Of course," he promised. "We both will."

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# Chapter Five

I stepped out of the small bathroom just inside my room and frowned at the display I had perched on top of the first lining of shelves. A gut feeling of where the lavender sprig shaped vaguely like a person came from lingered deep inside and I sent Jackson a quiet look as he smoothed out my sheets from home.

Kali was sitting on top of the desk, screwing a light in the desk lamp. Beside her, the doll. Dropping my towel, I got dressed quick before sliding into the chair at the desk, picking up and examining the toy. The necklace, beads carved into heads, clattered against my fingertips.

"I always did like this necklace," I mused.

She sent me a short grin, putting the lamp down behind her.

She'd gotten back a few minutes after, flitting back and forth and dumping stuff off before helping me put everything away. I packed my clothes up in the closet, redid my mini display and shrine up on the shelf and then decided to take a long shower after putting things away in the bathroom.

Under the heat of the water, I tried not to think about anything. Tried not to focus on the role I played.

Just relaxed under the spray and could almost pretend, if I closed my eyes, that I wasn't home but at Nick's, a foreign place with familiarity edging in its vibes.

I focused on the normal in the place of the abnormal, the new and the strange.

Still needed to pick up a schedule for classes, still needed to find summer work, still needed to go ice skating, still needed to fuck around with Nick before they went back to school, still needed to set a date to date a girl I liked.

Ah fuck.

I still needed to tell Jackson.

He wasn't going to take it well.

See, since I was thirteen Jackson loudly and without my approval decided to make himself head of my love life. I said fine because I didn't have the energy to argue and then realized what a tremendous mistake that was a day later. I guess it's because his whole love god thing goes specifically into gay romance but he only set me up with guys. And not even guys I got along with or ever could deal with long term, though I tried. I really did. I just really cannot understand the value of sports or running or anything to do with sports and running. Or weightlifting.

Which for whatever reason were the main hobbies of everyone he set me up with.

I have no idea why. He honestly should've known better.

Finally I caved, told him I was straight, which was a lie but he didn't know that, and slyly avoided the whole dating debacle for the last year and a quarter.

And now Lena.

Jackson was going to kill me. Or her.

Probably both.

I mean, he took the whole mentions of her screwing me into a wall thing well but the concept that I might, ya know, want her to do that was going to give him an aneurysm.

He really, really wanted me to bi[49]. Insisted it vehemently, which, fair, it's true but I wasn't going to admit to that. I felt bad for lying about it, especially since legit everyone but him knows the truth, but there's only so many times I can go out with people I know from sight I'll never be compatible with.

That bad?

They're nice people, don't get me wrong. But they know and I know that it's not going farther than a nice handshake and the two of us splitting the bill.

And I mention one time, two years ago, going out with Kelly from homeroom and he shouted for so long and so loud and then forced Kali and Nick to come with him as he followed us around like a dumbass.

He was not going to accept this easily.

Finally, I gave up, accepted what I needed to do, patted Kali's knee for strength and turned to Jackson. "Hey, Jack?"

He leaned against the closet door, pillowcase draped across his back like a cape. "Wassup?"

"Um."

Nope.

Can't do this.

"Uh-"

A knock on the saved my ass. I shot up out of the chair and swung the door open. It stuck for a fraction of a second then burst and nearly struck me in the face. A short Hispanic enby stood in front of me, her hair thick and famed over her back.

"Hi!" she said. She stuck her hand out. "I'm Mary. Lena asked me to introduce myself."

"Right!" I took her hand shook it. "Peter's girlfriend. Nice to meet you. I'm Alex."

"I know," she said, grinning low and cheeky and probably resisting the urge to add in Lena's whole sex thing.

I swallowed around the thought, trying to resist the urge to burn. "Right."

She nodded. "Uh, yeah, so she just wanted me to come and introduce myself and, ya know-" She gestured out loose, a short giggle dropping from her lips. "-dissuade any claims certain people may have made about her regarding you."

"I- I don't recall any," I lied, laughing low.

"That's good. She's really pumped you agreed to a date an-"

A crash sounded behind me.

I considered running.

"YOU WHAT?"

"Tell her I'm very excited to go out with her too and we can make plans at lunch," I rushed out just as Jackson let out a stream of swears that had Mary frowning deeply, alarm wide in her eyes.

"Jackson!" Kali chided.

"LEMME GO SO I CAN KILL HER!" Jackson yelled. He hit something, probably the ground, and yelled out in agony.

I didn't bother looking to see why.

"Um, just, warn her that he will be a problem, but I'm working on it," I added.

"Yeah, no, definitely," Mary said. Her face balked as Jackson yelled out again. "Well, nice to- nice to meet you."

"Uh huh," I said because even if that had been true it was gone now.

"Pleasant to meet you as well!" Kali called out.

"YOU FUCKING BETRAYER!"

"I'm just gonna close the door now," I said, pulling back. Mary nodded vaguely, a quiet wave before bounding off as top speed.

The door clicked shut with just a little shove. I dropped my face to the wood, breathing out in deep relief when it didn't hurt because in the moment of dropping I worried a splinter was going to carve through my face.

But it didn't so I was good.

Jackson was on the ground, pinned down by Kali.

Less good.

"You suck," I hissed, pointing vigorously at him.

"You have betrayed me," he whispered, struggling to twist and look at me. "Me and all the things I stand for! Which is not sex with women!"

"She's pretty," I protested. "I don't get why you have to be such a baby about this."

"Because I can't get my credentials if you date a girl!"

"Then go bother, Nick!" I snapped, waving around my arms. "Go make them date, they like guys!"

I mean, I do too but I ain't admitting to that when you're like this, I followed up in my head, sharing a knowing glance at Kali, who smirked loosely.

"And I'm like one hundred percent you're at least bi," Jackson snapped. "I don't know why you won't admit it. Your dad's pan[50], Kali's bi, Nick's pan. Pretty sure Mutant is going to be bi. This friend group is basically all multiples."

"Which gives me the perfect opening for the token straight[51] person," I chirped, because, hah, point.

Kali bit her lip, ducking her head to keep from snorting out or laughing. "He is right."

"We'll get another person," Jackson huffed. He kicked out at her, missing by a mile.

"How?" I asked, sitting on his back. He groaned under my weight. "You don't like people."

He struggled against the two of us, all the while trying to bite out words that didn't come save for in low grunts and jerky vowels. "Look," he snapped at last, "I'll learn to like people."

"Impossible," Kali said, rolling her eyes. "You have never once enjoyed the company of others in all the years I have known you."

"Fuck off," he said. He twisted his head slight, caught my eyes. "You are not allowed to date her."

"Jackson, I already said that you can't be in charge of my love life. You're a ninety year old virgin and I want babies someday."

"Doesn't matter, already filed the paperwork two years ago," he grunted. "You're stuck with me."

I glanced back at Kali. "Is he serious right now?" She nodded. "Fucking- JACKSON!"

He laughed, loud and mocking. "Suck it, Alex! I own your crap love and unless you want me to be low grade and uncertified for another hundred years, you will love a man."

"Oh my gods," I groaned, dropping back against Kali and pressing all my weight into Jackson's spine just to spite him. "I hate you so much. You're the absolute worse. Have fun being uncertified forever."

"Oh come on!"

"I told you that you should not have bet on him," Kali said, releasing his arm from her death hold. "It was not going to end well for you. You are not a good matchmaker."

"I'm amazing!"

"Then how come you have not been successful in your endeavors?" she asked.

"Oh, pfft, easy." I slid off his back and he rolled off from his stomach and hooked his arm around our waists. "Kalen was right there and then he got fucking stuck on Dunkirk and blown up." He rubbed my thigh as I went tense, images of mangled bodies shooting to the forefront of my mind, trembles and pain curling through my back, phantom and not real but feeling harsh and angry.

"If that hadn't happened," he went on, "him and Eddie were going to be set. Then Eddie survived the war and immediately got married to some nice girl out of Wales. So that was a dead end. Then I took my break because of-" He cut off then shook his head. "And then I got cleared for the easiest person and damn Carly, Carly with no experience and a whole fifty years under me, poached him from me. And now I'm on you."

"So what you're getting at here is you've tried exactly three times and you've been alive forever?" I sighed, trying to find something to distract myself around the thought of war, death, so many dead, so many people who didn't come home. "Gods, you're lazy."

He swatted my thigh and squeezed my wrist. "Shouldn't have brought it up."

"Don't stress," I said. "I just need to stop. It's just in my head." I patted his chest vaguely. "You were in the war?"

"Both of us." He jerked his chin towards Kali. "Kali played man for the full of it."

"It was not that bad," she said, voice lofty. "Though I did not care for it. A penis is not as enjoyable as I once thought."

Me and Jackson both gave low grunts of agreement and I ran my hand through my hair, thinking of war. I never wanted to be in a war, didn't like the thought or hearing of it. It was rarely soldiers I thought of. Innocent people, small kids, all the unkind casualties, the ones who didn't want to be involved, didn't intend to be involved-I thought of them.

Terrible nightmares.

"Stop thinking," Kali said, covering my eyes, her palms warm and grounding. "Panic is not a look you wear well."

"I- I just-" I clamped my hands over her wrists and struggled to calm down underneath it all. "Sorry."

"Not your fault, boo," Jackson teased. "Your brain is a hellscape trying to eat you."

I snorted. "That's a bit of an understatement."

"We know," Kali sighed. She brushed a stray piece of hair from her eyes. "We have tried so long to find ways that help you but none of have worked."

Welp, I was disappointing my gods with the generalness of my goddamn anxiety and pitiful panics.

Fucking shit.

I stood up slowly and brushed my hands over my skirt, not really sure what to do now that I had that knowledge, or what to say.

I knew she didn't mean it like "you're a fuckup" but my brain likes to interpret all things like that as a negative until it derives to English class and then it's sort of just starts cackling because, let's be honest, fuck English. It a language that stole other languages and then acts like anyone who doesn't understand the complex grammatical rules that don't even hold up seventy-five percent of the time is an idiot.

No, we're the idiots for following a language that has too many variants.

You're very passionate about this.

It's the only thing I dislike more than Elaine. And Elaine spent our first year as certified family telling me in loud and aggravate detail that a piece of paper does not make me her cousin.

There was that one time we were mostly cool with each other but we don't count that because of the outstanding circumstances that required it to be chill.

She still sucks ass.

Uh huh. Okay, so ignoring all that-

Right, so, um, I brushed my hands off on my skirt, trying to reorient my thoughts. They kept derailing to Jackson and his mystical background that made his face go sad and Kali wilt. I considered asking Kali for verification on certain myths but that seemed weird. I considered throwing myself out the window hut that seemed painful, sending annoying spasms up my back at the thought of crushing impact, and also weird so I decided not to do that.

Our silences were tense sometimes, but rarely palpable. I followed family rules. No one leaves angry, no one shouts. Apologize if you do either.

We argued amongst ourselves, complaints that Jackson was too pushy, complaints about Nick's tendency towards violence or threats, complaints that I let things happen to me without saying anything even if I didn't like it, complaints about Kali being too aggressive when she went about things but again. I followed family rules. And they followed them in kind.

No one shouts because shouting used to terrify me and still upsets my dad. No one leaves angry, resolve issues in the moment before they spread because Mom tended to linger on arguments too long and would grow more and more annoyed with it all.

So yeah there were tense moments when someone was trying to figure out what to say without becoming cruel but they never hurt and made my skin crawl.

Leave. Run.

I shivered at the thoughts and pushed the thought aside. "What time is it?"

Jackson checked his watch. "Noonish?" He squinted at the numbers. "Wait..." He put it to his ear. "I think it's broken."

Kali pinched the bridge of her nose. "You irritate me," she said, flicking his cheek.

He blew her a kiss then continued frowning at his watch while I checked my phone for the time. A number of messages from Nick, an alert that I had an email and it was noonish.

I stretched. "Should we get lunch?"

"Ugh." Jackson rolled over. "People."

Kali rolled her eyes and stood up. "Food sounds excellent."

"Kals, you don't even need to eat," Jackson whined.

"Yes, but I do enjoy it so-" She kicked his thigh. "-get your ass up."

He twisted his face to look at her from the ground. "Okay, but I'm not as big a fan of that as you think."

"How can you know?" I asked, pulling on a jacket. "You're a virgin."

"How long are you gonna hold that over my head?" he grumbled.

"Forever," I said, grinning low. "I'm gonna die and then still be telling people. Hey, you know, Jackson Hadad, my bestest best friend, is a god and he spent ninety years as a virgin, despite acting as the give all authority on love." I paused then glanced at Kali. "Wait, how does that work?"

"I'm a gay love god," Jackson grumbled. "That's how."

"No, not that," I said, waving him off. "I mean, the Underworld. How do you divvy up who goes where? And can I choose? Because I don't really want to go to Valhalla[52]."

Jackson laughed, a short bursting sound that we both ignored because, really Jack? Kali rolled her sleeves up to her elbow and frowned. "We did not show you the door, did we?"

"What door? The heaven door?" I bounced on my heels. "Are you going to show me now? Can we go now? Like now-now?"

She smiled low and slung her arm over my shoulder. "Yes, of course. We'll need to go there to get your sword anyway."

My excitement carried me right through the doorway and it wasn't until we were halfway down the steps that it sunk it.

"Wait, my what-now?"

** ** **

The doorway to the Heavens was actually pretty easy to find. It was in the administrator's office and golden, decorated in low pastel hues and a calm aura. Beside it was another door, dark and nearly gothic. Kali pulled out a key from her breast pocket, twisting into the golden door and pushing it forward. It swung open without any effort, almost eager to be used.

Inside was just a vacant space, bright and warm. I shivered at the touch of it all and nervously touched into it. Jackson gave a little push against my back and I swung back, glaring at him. He stuck out his tongue because we're mature people and then moondanced his way between me and Kali and into the happy void.

"It doesn't hurt," Kali assured me as Jackson vanished completely from view.

"That's what doctors say about shots," I grumbled. "And it still hurts."

"Trust me," she laughed. She wrapped her arm around my shoulders again. "Would you like to go in together?"

I swallowed looking into the void. No matter how calm it felt, no matter how warm, all I could feel was a terror. Not supposed to be here, not mine, not for me, the whispers, the hissing pain of it all.

"Yeah," I said, weakly, sinking into her hold. "Together would be best."

"Okay." She wrapped her arms around my waist and stepped up behind me and slowly began walking us forward.

No.

I shook, swallowing thickly.

Kali would never hurt me. Jackson went in without screaming. It was easy, it was simple.

So why was I so certain it would burn?

We were stopped right against the lining of the doorway, my foot pressed against the wood frame. "Alex?" Kali said, no doubt sending my resistance and being forced to stop from just shoving me in by all that dumb magic I vaguely had.

"Just-" I swallowed around the panic in my chest, in my voice and squeezed my eyes. "Just push me through. Don't stop."

"You are afraid."

"Yeah," I said, pushing back into her. Get away from the magic, get away from it. Run. I squeezed my eyes harder. "But I'm always afraid so just push. It's fine. Probably."

She let out an annoyed sigh into my ear, all heat and unspoken, undirected anger. Then wrapped her arms more firmly around my middle and heaved me up and forward. I twisted in a last minute panic move to escape and fell with her.

She caught me before I could hit the grass.

It didn't hurt.

It just felt wrong.

Jackson was leaning against the frame, stuck in the middle of some field. The door closed behind us, slamming shut and sudden, my entire body revolted and I nearly clocked Kali's face trying to flee from the sound. Imagined pain snuck up my spine.

So loud.

Crushing.

Kali kissed the top of my head, rubbing my arms soothingly. Jackson stepped beside us.

"What took you so long?" He crossed his arms. "Thought you guys abandoned me."

"He was afraid," Kali said and it was clear by her tone, I wasn't supposed to be.

Jackson frowned, furthering that assumption. "Wha- No way. It wants you to go through, Al. That's why it feels so calm. Did you not feel the calm?"

"I felt it," I snapped, frustrated and annoyed with myself. I slipped out of Kali's hold and pressed my hands to my face. "Of course, I felt it. It just- it didn't feel right, okay?"

Kali shook her head. "Explain."

I exhaled sharply. The only people I really told about the need to run far away, the need to flee for whatever's insane reason had been my parents and my therapist. I came close with Nick but elected not to.

It wasn't anything to worry about, just an unease from anxiety, nothing serious.

I looked at the door, closed and imposing.

Probably nothing serious.

"It's nothing," I lied.

Jackson immediately grabbed my arm, not rough, never rough, but jolting. "Don't lie, Al. You asked that of us, you have to follow through too."

I winced. Yeah, I rarely, if ever, have lied about anything actually serious so I'd doubted that asking my friends to be upfront and completely honest with me at all times, unless otherwise necessary, was going to ever bite me in the ass.

"It's nothing," I repeated. "It just- sometimes I feel like I need to be-" I paused, trying to assess the feelings. "I'm not supposed to be here. Sometimes I feel like I'm supposed to be somewhere else, okay?"

"So what was wrong with the door?"

"It just-" I looked at it. The calming aura was still there and I could feel it. It just wasn't working. "It doesn't feel like it's mine."

Kali glanced at Jackson, a quick knowing look, then back to me. Her voice was tense. "How does it feel?"

Wrong. "I don't know," I said. Her stance relaxed and I felt better for lying, even if it stung to do so. "Just not for me? I dunno how to explain."

They both looked out off but calmer. Less nervous. Which of course made me nervous but what was I supposed to do? I'd already been imbued with this weird power. Couldn't exactly give it up without dying first. Couldn't exactly run away from it.

Did it really matter if I couldn't stand the way it felt around me when it was in me, all wrong and bad?

So I held my tongue and locked arms with Jackson, smiling wide. "So where is it?"

Jackson snorted. "Back there."

I turned with him and nearly fell over at the magnitude of this giant castle. It was shimmering, a low hue of gold and pink. As majestic as it was huge, it towered above us, radiating power and heat so strong I didn't know how I miss it in the first place. We were standing in what appeared to be the lawn, now that I actually had time to look around. Fountains and tables spread out wide all over, trees towering beside walkways. Some people passed by, two of them the ones from my dad's video. As they stilled, glancing back at us, I gave a short wave at them.

"So Warriors can come whenever?"

"Uh, no, most of the time they need prior permission," Jackson said. His brows furrowed, face amused. "But those aren't Warriors. They're seconds, like me."

Well, that explained why Layla looked so confused. I drew back. So. Gods rebuilt my home. Not any I knew but, ya know.

Gods.

What the ever-loving fuck was my life?

As they waved over at us, one of them calling out a greeting to Jackson, I blinked rapidly. "Do you know them?"

"Just Eric," he said, waving back. "Dunno who the fucker to his left is. Probably another timey-wimey."

"Jackson," Kali chided.

He shrugged, ignoring her. "It's a vibe. You'll figure it out, if you spend enough time here."

I nodded vaguely, more focused on looking around at this point. The Heavens. Godland. I giggled at the thought. Godland.

It was, wasn't it?

Everything smelled fresh, felt real but impossibly so. The lingering feeling of incorrectness remained, thick and present, but gazing upon the world I'd been partly wishing to see most of my life made it easy to ignore. It was so perfect.

"So it is combined then?"

"Somewhat," Kali said. She took my hand and we began walking up. "We split rooms into respective spaces and you can enter through to the heaven of your desire."

"That's what I always thought!" I said, eagerly shoving through the door to the inside. Kali snorted and caught my arm before I could run off in stupid awe.

It was just so... pretty.

Soft golden pinks and intricate twists around doorways. The whole place was shrouded in quiet calm. The carpet under our feet felt like walking on sand, plush but firm, upright. The curling towered high, the main lobby, I guess, feeling endless, into the sky. Pictures hung stacked on one wall. I stepped close to them, fingers running over the nameplate under it.

Coral Jones. 1971 to 1998.

She was average looking, her eyes narrowed but bright. She was calm, steady.

I looked back down to the dates.

1998.

I was born in 1998.

Taking a step back, I looked up to the other portraits. They were all posed in various ways, some smiling, young and happy, others a little older, more tired.

Warriors.

My predecessors.

Fingers outstretched, wanting to touch, I asked. "They came before me?" Kali nodded quietly, her eyes raking from picture to picture. I glanced back down to Coral. "What happened to her?"

"A mission went wrong," Kali said.

I stepped a little closer. Coral's face felt... familiar. Like I'd seen her before. "You were there?"

She nodded again, then pulled me back, her face gone tense, and gestured to the room as a whole. "The structure remains the same but the general concept changes as from Warrior to Warrior."

"Yeah, the rooms shift in prevalence now because someone," Jackson started, slinging his arm around my waist, steering me father away from the questions behind me, "can't decide on a permanent focus."

"Just feels mean," I muttered.

"Oh!" Kali chirped, pulling us at rapid speed to an intricately dressed door. It wasn't golden, hued up in a soft black, and behind I could smell something cooking. Kali gestured wildly. "This one is mine!"

Above the doorway was thick calligraphic scrawl I couldn't read but I trusted her and way too eager pushed open.

Kali laughed low as I stumbled in, dumbfounded.

"Oh. My. Parvati[53]," I whispered.

So, Imma be real for a hot sec. My dad follows Greco-Roman gods so when I die, I hoped we'd be sent there with him because it didn't really seem all that great to be separated from Dad because of death opinions. Of course, general hope was that the Underworlds were merged together in some way or had exchange programs so I could, ya know, at least visit him, but when it came down to it, I was fully content on heading to the Greek Underworld and pledging my allegiance to Persephone[54] to be able to stay around my family.

Judging from everything so far it was safe to say the Underworld was a bit of a combo mess too but oh my gods.

Svarga[55] was a lot nicer than I ever gave it credit for.

Kali was grinning stupid wide and I wondered how long she'd been waiting to show me this, how much it killed her not to show off.

Walking into the room was like an insta-calm. Nothing like that calm push, where all the panic in my body remained level and I just couldn't exercise it. No, it was legitimately peaceful. I exhaled softly and took a step forward onto soft grass, feeling swayed by the warm breeze to just rest, relax, never hurt again.

"Kali, I change my mind," I said loudly, patting her arm rapidly and too much. "Your religion is the best one."

She smiled even wider and nodded. "Yes. Yes, it is."

Jackson huffed behind us but even he seemed swayed by the peace and niceness of it all. "This is the top layer, right?" he asked, looking around. He laughed a little low. "Haven't been here in so long..." He brushed his fingers against the grass beneath our feet. "Ranj used to..."

He stopped. He stepped back, face clouded. Kali shifted and stretched up towards the sun beaming down at us, warm and content. "Ranj?" she started, prompting for a continuation

At the name, Jackson's face blanched, turned sour and dark. He stood up sharply, stiff as a board, and stepped back, shaking his head. "No, Kali, c'mon, we- we should go."

Kali twisted her head to face him, eyes lost until she caught sight of his. Her grip re-firmed on my arm. "Yes," she agreed, sounding a bit miserable but otherwise understanding. "Too much of a good thing can be bad."

"But- But it's so nice," I said as she pulled me out. I pressed my face to the cool door. "I wanted to meet Airavata![56]"

"I will introduce you at another time," she said, pulling me close.

I groaned and gestured rapidly to the door. "But elephant!"

She rolled her eyes and pulled me away. Neither one of them bothered to tell me who this Ranj person was and I chose not to ask, filing it away.

Had a feeling I'd be filing a lot of things away. But it was cool. I was gonna ask. Eventually.

Probably.

We petered out of the hallway of doors and into a wide room. Before speeding on a little faster, Jackson's eyes darted around the room, the platform in the middle and the raised seats like a stadium, and swallowed thickly. I squeezed his hand reassuringly.

"What happens here?" I asked as we drew close to the exit under the stadium of seats.

"Our confirmations basically," Jackson muttered, shoving the door open and hurrying us out.

"How does-"

"I don't want to talk about that right now," he said quickly.

I withdrew. "Oh."

"No, Al." He groaned, angry, into his palms. Kali ran a hand over his back, face concerned. He shook his head and dropped his arms. "I just- It didn't go well. And I don't like thinking about it, okay?"

"But you'll tell me, right?" I asked, squeezing his hand. "Eventually? About what happened? And the whole Norse hate thing? And this- this Ranj person?"

"I-" His voice fell strangled and he sighed, deep. "Not- not all at once. I haven't- I haven't really talked about it before and I don't like thinking about it." He cupped my cheek. "Sorry."

"Nothing to apologize for," I said. I shrugged. "I just want to know about you guys. What I don't actually know. I mean, the foundation of our friendship was built off a lie, I'd like to change that. Preferably soon, but like, whenever you're cool with it is great too."

Kali leaned into my side. "We are still the same people."

"Yeah, just..." Jackson faded then ended, weak and faint, "Gods."

"Gods," I echoed because it still sounded hella ridiculous.

Jackson took a deep breath. "Yeah, it sounds really stupid when I think about it."

"Really unbelievable," I agreed.

Kali made a vague noise of affirmation into my hair, laughing as she slung her arms around my waist, keeping me close. "Slightly farfetched," she amended. "However, completely true."

I nodded. "Still can't believe it. But, ya know, it's been a day." I wiggled my hand vaguely into the air. "Give me like..."

"Six months?"

"Five hundred," I corrected. "And one."

Jackson rolled his eyes. "That's like ten years, Al."

I pursed my lips, refraining from yelling as I squinted vaguely at him. "It's about forty-one and a half. But, ya know... good estimate." Kali laughed even louder into my hair. "Kali, don't laugh, I'm dying right now."

"Now you know how I feel," she said, bumping my hip.

"English isn't even your first language!"

"Yes, but it is yours," she said, pulling away and marching off, me and Jackson in tow. "You should know more than I and yet you do not."

I groaned into the open air. "English is stupid," I muttered as we twisted down a corner.

We passed a number of doors, a number of open rooms, people milling about, too quick for me to get a good glance. Jackson and Kali talked in rapid fire Hindi ahead of me, Jackson sending me short smirks because I didn't understand.

But I would.

Someday.

Eventually.

Kali peeled to a stop so sudden, I walked right into her back. She shifted me to her side as she asked, "Why do you have it?"

"Kamrusepa[57] gave it to me when she died," Jackson said. "Not like I chose it. She just said, "Here", gave it to me and then no one ever asked for it back so? I kept it." He jerked his head to me. "Besides, I was on duty this time so figured it didn't matter because when he needed it, I'd just give it up. But like. Let's be real. He probably isn't going to use it."

"You have had the sword for fifteen years and have not said anything to me about it until now?" She pointed at him. "I should slap you."

"Everyone should slap Jackson," I agreed, still not fully paying much attention, too busy looking up to the ceiling where murals were painted in heavy detail of different gods holding hands, all connected in peace. Which, if you've even heard one story about them, is a damn lie, but I guess it was symbolic of sharing the same space or whatever. "Who painted this?"

"Some dumbass," Jackson said. I frowned. "Look, Kals, it's not like he's gonna need it. He's got you, rage monster, and me, punch fist. Plus also, Nick. Psycho man, probably killed ten people since they've been gone."

"Not a man," Kali and I chorused.

Jackson's face fell. "I know, I was just- oh, fuck you both." He brandished his hand on his hips. "Alex, are you ever going to use a sword?"

"Hell to the no."

Jackson gestured widely. Kali rolled her eyes. "It is not just about death," she huffed. "There are other uses he will need."

Jackson cut his eyes back to me. "Al, you ever want to be possessed by a whole ass deity?"

I blinked to him. "What?"

"Do you want a god in your body?"

"I mean, that sounds... cool, but like." I stopped, trying to process what he said and made no sense of it. "Why would they want to be in my body?"

"To help you utilize their great and awesome power," he said, eyes wide. "You know." He gestured out into a straight line. "Directly."

"Yeah." I nodded slowly then shook my head. "No. I don't wanna do that. That doesn't sound cool at all."

Kali pressed her free hand to her face then flattened out into the air, head to the ceiling like she was Mom, waiting for a sign from God[58] that would help her explain why I needed to eat my peas.

"It is not painful," she assured me at last.

I kept shaking my head. "No, thank you."

"Alex-"

"No." I pushed back my hair. "Kals, I already feel weird with the whole asking for help when it's not really an ask because I have some kind of vague authority thing. Why would I want to utilize power that doesn't belong to me?"

"It does," she said. "We gave it to you, in effort to keep us all equal and alive."

"Cool explanation." I patted her hand. "Still no."

She glowered at Jackson who looked everywhere but her face. After a few seconds of instilling fear into his soul, she turned back to me, calm. "Will you please keep it on you anyway?"

"I-" Her eyes turned pleading and I couldn't hold back. "Fine. Yeah, okay, I'll-" I winced. "I'll hold onto the sword."

"Excellent," she breathed. She turned to Jackson, voice dark and deadly. "Get it."

Jackson rubbed his face and glared at her before slinking off towards wherever he'd put it.

After a spell of quiet minutes, we reached a solid purple door. Or what used to be a purple door. It had been spray-painted gray in some spots, words I couldn't read, strange scrawls carved into the side, chipping away the paint. It was easy to tell what was meant to be there and what wasn't. The bird head at the top of the door, meant to be there. The weird carving beside it of what looked like a crude drawing of some guy getting their dick cut off, not supposed to be there.

It hit me.

Oh.

This was Jackson's room.

He stared sourly at the door then hit it twice in the center and shoved it open with his hip. It stuck for a second before sliding open, like it hadn't been used in a while. The room wasn't like the one I'd visited over the years at his apartment building. It was clear of anything, bed neatly pressed and floor impossibly clean.

It wasn't massive, but not tight and small, reminding me of a dorm room you'd see on TV than someone's actual bedroom. There was just the bed, the closet and a small desk, though. No personal effects, no indication anyone actually lived inside, save for a calendar from 1968, turned to August, dates marked up until the 9th.

I took a random guess that Jackson hadn't been in the room since that date, save for the short period of time he did to hide my future weapon inside it.

Stepping inside, I turned around to get a full look at it all. Jackson immediately rushed over to his desk, rifling through the drawers. The ceiling was pink, well painted from corner to corner. Kali pushed the door closed behind her and Jackson glanced up at the noise, a ring in his hand.

His face twisted, catching sight of a vase filled with fresh lavender. Without thinking, I reached out and touched the sprigs. They felt fresh and new. I frowned.

"It's the vase," Jackson said behind me. I glanced up at him. "He- Ranj gave it to me because I was always shit at keeping plants alive but I- I liked having them around."

"Well, that was nice," I said.

He nodded. "Yeah, he was great. Anyway," he rushed, pushing the ring into my hand, "there you go."

"It's a- it's a ring." I stared at said ring, small in my palm, then looked back up at both of them. Before I spoke again, I raised my palm, showing off my tiny ring so they could both clearly see it. "A ring."

"Yes." Kali smiled and gestured to my small ring.

"Kali!" I huffed. "You know damn well I have no idea what's happening right now."

"Yes," she said again, smiling wider because she's evil.

Jackson rolled his eyes. "Okay, just put it on." I did. "Now, see the gem at the top?"

I looked at the gem, a swirl of blue and green. "Yeah?"

"Touch it and think of whatever," he said.

Confused, I glanced between them both before taking a deep breath and rubbing my thumb over the gem, thinking loudly of a sword, something I'd seen on TV, something classy. The weight dropped fast into my hand and I panicked, dropping the whole thing and nearly severing my foot in the process. Kali's hand jerked out, fast, instinctual, and caught it at the hilt.

Both of their shoulders were shaking as they held back laughs. I scowled and took the sword back, examining it over. The blade, bright silver, was the same colour as the ring band, the hilt the same colour and material as the pendant the gem had sat upon, clean gray limestone with a clear coating of something solid.

The gem remained in the center of the hilt. I ran my thumb over it again, thinking of the ring, and the weight vanished, the ring back on my middle finger like it had started off.

"That's- that's kinda cool," I said, trying again. This time I didn't drop the sword, but still jerked at the sudden weight of it.

"It's so when you do get possessed by a god, if you need it, you can change it to whatever weapon would suit them best," Jackson said.

"How do I..."

"Press the gem and think of me," Kali cut it as I faded out.

I glanced up at her then pressed my thumb into the gem, thinking calming of Kali, as she was in the myths, not as she was as a friend, black skinned and wild hair, her necklace of heads clattering against her bare chest.

In a swift second, she dissolved into the air, still smiling, and then Oh, it worked.

I jerked. The sword fell from my hand again but I caught it easy, without even thinking. Kali had taken over my arm. "This is-"

Like she'd promised, it hadn't hurt. It just felt weird. Like I was full. Full and warm. I glanced down at the sword and pressed my thumb to it, not thinking of anything specific but then her thoughts broke over mine, her weapon of choice, the scimitar[59], implanted and the sword began to change.

Again, without my actual permission, I chucked the sword up as it changed and caught the scimitar with both hands as it split in two. Kali spun it expertly in my grip, laughing inside my head.

Jackson was amused, but his face bled a bit tense as we matched eyes. "How do you feel?"

"Hot," I said. "It's... weird. I don't-" My hands pressed together as a ring flashed to my mind. "I'm not sure how I feel about this."

I can leave now. I just wanted to demonstrate, Kali assured me.

"Yeah." I brushed my hands off on my pants, feeling sweaty and weird. "How do I-"

Imagine me exiting.

I couldn't really do that but instead, just thought of her in front of me and tall again, not in me, not in me, not in me. The warmth of her presence drug out me slow and steady, though I figured in any other case, it'd go fast. But she didn't want to leave me drained, I realized, once she was fully gone, appearing in front of me. Wooziness broke to the top of my head. Bile shot to my throat, stomach in a thousand knots of discomfort.

"Whoa!" Jackson said as I pitched forward. He pushed me back and set me down on the bed. "Al?"

"Yeah," I said, tongue sluggish in my mouth. I shook my head, strength slowly returning. "Yeah," I repeated, a little clearer. "I'm- I'm good."

Kali brushed her fingertips against my skin, eyes apologizing over and over again. "I forget how much I take. I am sorry."

"Nah." I shook my head again, trying to clear the rest of buzz between my ears. "It's all good in the hood. No stress." My hand cupped over hers and I leaned into her touch as she rubbed her thumb over my cheek in soothing circles. "It's gravy."

"Are you just saying random words now?"

"Little bit," I muttered, blinking rapidly and feeling much more settled in myself now. "I'm probably never going to do that again."

"That is fine," she assured me, smiling light.

"Okay. So fighting for me, sword-thing," I said, flipping Jackson the finger so I could pretend to examine the ring. His face dropped. "Gods also imbuing me with power. Is that it? I'd like that to be it."

"Yeah, I mean, no, it-" His face fell frustrated. "Okay. So I can die, right? And you can kill me. And how that happens, is you take that ring, touch the gem and shiv me."

I nodded in understanding, pulled the ring off and threw it at a corner.

Without hesitation, Kali slapped her face, mumbling under her breath probably a dozen swears at my expense. Jackson stared at where the ring clattered against the ground, kept staring, then swirled on me.

"WHY?"

"Can't kill you if I don't have the thing," I said.

He sank to his knees. "Al."

"Kali!" I said, eyes at her.

She dropped her hands and turned to him. "Jackson."

"Why are you saying my name?" he protested. "He's the one who chucked it!"

"You should not have explained it as you did," she said, crossing her arms, spitting image of when we were nine and she was explaining it was it all his fault he got punched by Cranston, this really annoying kid none of us liked or currently like. "It occurred because of you. It is your fault."

He gaped at her then pressed his hand to his chest, pulling back, offended. "Kali, how else would I explain it?" He gestured wildly at me then wildly into the air in general. "He'd still fucking throw it!"

"Maybe so," she said, loftily because she knew he was right.

Jackson rolled his eyes and pushed off the ground, storming over to the ring and scooping it up. He brought it back, grabbed my hand and forced it back on. "You're not going to kill me, Alex. Your propensity for murder is the exact opposite of Nick's. So a solid zero."

I scuffed my feet against the ground, staring at a weapon that didn't look like a weapon but felt a lot more evil. "I just don't want to risk it."

"It'll be fine," he said. "You can only do it with intent. It's fine."

Still, the concept terrified me. Because now not only did I hold all of Kali's power, and basically life, in my hands, but now I had to hang onto a weapon that could murder Jackson, my other friend. A friend, who may have tried hard to make me fall in love with people I was not interested in liking and constantly made quips about sex and dating and my dad, but was not a friend, not a person, I wanted to die at any time soon.

Not one I wanted the ability to hurt.

It was different with Nick, I guess, because while I know they could destroy me in an instant if they wanted, logically I'm all too aware of the fact that they don't want to. But unlike me with Nick, Jackson tested patience. And maybe not me, but someone who knew what the sword-ring could do and was tired of him. Or of any of them.

Any second god.

I swallowed thickly and clenched my fist. Okay. So. Just never be without a weapon of death and then all should be good.

Fantastic.

"Okay," I said. "Sounds good."

Jackson watched me carefully, then turned to Kali. They held a silent conversation with their eyes and minute hand twitches at their side. They knew I didn't want it, knew I was just caving because there wasn't any other option and it was difficult to find a new topic with this one looming over our heads.

Finally, Kali turned to me and clasped both her hands together. "Are you still hungry?"

"Yes," I said firmly, standing up. "Let's go."

As Jackson slung his arm over my shoulders, Kali reached down and grabbed my hand. In seconds, we dissolved into nothingness, into the air, and as freeing as it should've been, or as terrifying as godly teleportation should've felt for my first time a victim to it, I couldn't help but feel tight all over my skin, all over my body, etching deep and down and dragging heavy with me as we vanished.

I've never been the person to hurt other people because it hurts me. Even Elaine, we fight and we hate each other but aside from a couple times when we were young, it's never been physical.

The idea that I could hurt Jackson terrified me because I cave. I cave very easily under the threat of pain. So if someone wanted me to hurt him, I might do it.

And that sick feeling travelled with me, burrowing hot and heavy and miserable.

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# Chapter Six

Mary snagged a couple of Peter's grapes with a quick flick of her wrist. The grapes jerked into the air, floating unsteady towards her at such a pace they bounced into her cheek and fell into her lap. She didn't seem particularly phased as she picked one up and ate it.

"So, you doing the holiday camp game?" she asked around her grape. She swallowed and grinned. "Because I'll be honest, we could use a guy with your expertise."

"Mary, he just got here and knows nothing," Peter chided. "He has no expertise. And stop taking my food."

I smiled as she deliberately swooped up a few more grapes and carried them over to her. Again they bounced off her face and into her lap. "What's the holiday camp game?"

"It's like the hunger games but less murder," she said.

My eyes went wide, confusion, panic and concern twisting up my chest and digging into my heart. Lena winced beside me. "It's not the hunger games," she assured. "It's just-"

"The hunger games," Jackson said, from my other side. He pushed her hand off where it was patting my thigh reassuringly. "I know, I've participated twice as a moderator."

"Yeah, no." I flattened my hand against the table. "I don't want to do that."

Kali's head shot up from where she'd been in deep conversation with Alice at the end of the table. "Perhaps it would be nice to gain experience, as well as observing other methods of combat and self-preservation." She gave me a look, pretty clear that, much like how Nick had no choice playing the elf in our Christmas pageant, I had no choice but to go through with this and participate in the fake hunger games. "Consider that."

"Oh, well, he's doing it now," Jackson said. I groaned and pressed my face to the table and Jackson patted my back soothingly. "He's not going to be on your team, though."

Mary frowned. "Why not?"

"Drop the Norwegian and we'll talk," he said. "Otherwise, it's a team of one, nerd."

"You're not counting yourself because you're not a student, right?" I asked quietly. "Not because you won't do it with me?"

"Yeah, that's why," he said, quick.

Relief hit me and I sank into his side. "Oh, thank God."

Fish, who had Ben propped up against his side, asleep but with his fingers unconsciously trying to stack tater tots into something, exhaled sharply then glanced at Lena. "Look. How much does Pete really provide?"

"I'm literally right here," Peter deadpanned.

"You're right, you're right," Fish said, hand up. He flattened out his palm, pointing out to Peter. "What do you really provide to our team?"

"I'm the only one who can cook food on a campfire without burning it or making people sick," he said. "And pitch a tent. And negotiate with other people. And make sure Ben doesn't kill himself on his own bomb."

Alarmed, I glanced to Lena, mouthing, Bomb?

Her casual shrug did not help my emotions about participating.

"He did that one time!" Fish snapped.

Neither did that.

"He's done it at least once every time we've played." Peter gestured down himself. "You don't notice because I'm keeping him alive."

"It's not like they're bomb-bombs," Fish muttered. "All they do is throw paint or explode a net in your face."

"That's what you said about that blowtorch that spat out confetti," Alice said, loud and amused. "And you still bitched to high heavens when it burned the shit out of your arm."

Instinctively, Fish's hand drew to his arm, though there wasn't any evidence he'd ever been burned there, the skin smooth and clear. "It was the wrong blowtorch!"

"Could be the wrong bomb," she teased.

"He doesn't make real bombs," Fish huffed. "He's not stupid."

"Yeah, and we didn't think he'd be stupid enough to willingly get into a pissing contest with a ten year old either, so who's to really say what Ben is and isn't capable of," Lena said, dry.

"Not real bombs," Ben grunted, turning over and dropping so suddenly, he hit Fish in the crotch and caused him to jerk up, head to the ceiling, swearing rapid and fast, as he gripped his hands in tight fists. Ben didn't seem to notice, his voice muffled, asking, "How many days has it been?"

"Three hours," Peter said. He glanced down at his book. "Go back to sleep."

Ben moaned but they smoothly moved from moans to soft snuffles of light breathing. Fish pet his hair, smiling down at him, so obvious in how lovestruck he felt.

Lena smirked and threw a tot at him. "You're so gross."

Fish opened his mouth, ready to refute that, probably mention something else judging from the gleam in his eye, but then jerked, eyes flashing mad to Mary, who was steadily looking away from him, and said nothing, just growled low in his throat at her instead. At the end of the table, Kali tensed, body raising ever so slightly, but otherwise focused clear on what Alice was saying.

No one else seemed bothered by it or at all concerned that Kali might behead him but nerves pitched high in my head and I gathered up all my wits, cleared my throat, and, even though I was sure I would find some way out of it anyway, asked, "So how does it work? The game?"

The air brushed over my skin, featherlight and ticklish, picking up my discarded fork and Lena's right from her hand. She dropped Mary a look, who grinned, all teeth and cheeky.

She started, "So it's just a weekend camping deal that they like to put on with anyone who stays over the summer or winter breaks. It's like right before school starts so we shake off holiday chill and get back into the nitty gritty stuff." Our forks banded together, bouncing over the table, before separating and smacking one another. "Then, uh, you just kind of fight it out or hide for the duration. Just tests your ability to survive and keep yourself afloat." She jutted her chin over to Fish. "He's betrayed us twice so we're working on noticing that."

Fish shrugged, a sort of "what are ya gonna do" look on his face. I nodded vaguely. "I do like the hiding forever part."

She laughed and shrugged. "Same. But certain people-" She glared down at Ben. "-like to explode things." Her eyes snapped to Lena. "Or laugh psychotically for no reason."

"I was practicing," Lena muttered, snatching her fork from where it was still battling mine to the death. "It starts Friday, ends Monday morning. But it's optional, so like." She nudged me with her knee, her smile shy. "You don't have to do it."

At that, Kali shot me a look.

We made eye contact and after a couple seconds of deliberation, I conceded defeat. "I don't think I have a choice here."

Deep, Alice laughed. "It's actually a lot of fun. I wouldn't worry about it, eh."

Fish jerked and gave her the most betrayed look of all time. "Alice!"

"It's part of the accent, Fish, baby, let it go," she groaned, turning away from him.

"No Canadian stereotypes!"

Eyes metaphorically ablaze, Alice swung her head to him. Her tone dripped viciously passive-aggressive from her lips. "I'm so sourry aboot that, eh. I can be such a hoser sometimes."

Fish pointed his knife, plastic and half bent, at her. "I will kill you."

"Try me," she said, before smirking dark and wide, adding, "Puppy."

He gasped, hand to his chest, offended and horrified, and I couldn't for the life of me tell if it was a joke or just him being overly dramatic or whatever. Judging by the way everyone outside of the table seemed to be moving away or glancing over, tense and concerned, I had a good feeling this was something that occurred often and in reality.

I nudged Jackson lightly as Fish kept sucking in deep gasps. Run? I signed under the table.

F-U-C-K yes, he signed back.

Fish slammed the table with his fist. "I AM NOT A PUPPY!"

Kali's head snapped up, her skin seeming to darken immediately and the sudden vibe of calm, even strange weird our-friends-are-arguing-and-its-kind-of-tense calm, vanished. Alice's eyes widened, almost as though just remembering why she shouldn't tease her brother. Fish swallowed thickly and drew back, almost scared but not quite.

There was still defiance in his eyes as they levelled with Kali's. Never one to back down from a challenge, she held his gaze, her body growing tense.

My mind raced, some way to defuse the tension, defuse the situation, make sure neither one of them actually hurt the other, and I blurted out, "What would my nickname be?" Everyone sent me lost looks, Alice's half grateful. I cleared my throat, gestured loosely. "You know, animal wise."

"Horse," Kali said without fail just as Jackson cut in, "Duck."

Should've expected that.

Assholes.

Jackson shook his head. "No, Kals, it's got to be a duck. Horses are proportioned to their bodies. Ducks are just large for being so small."

Mary looked between them then at me then back to Jackson, her eyes drawing wide and her voice nearly a laugh. "Wait, are you talking-"

"Yes," I cut in, closing my eyes. "Yes, they are talking about my penis. And no. You can't see it."

She pressed her hands together in front of her face. "What if I said please?"

I covered my face with my hands, feeling Lena shake beside me. Jackson patted my thigh reassuringly. I dragged my fingertips just below my eyes and looked at Kali. "I need you to burn this place to the ground."

She snorted, rolling her eyes, and just like that, everything back easy. Still kind of tense, but nothing I felt the need to stress about. I relaxed back into the bench. Lena squeezed my knee, sending me a fleeting grin. At ease, I smiled back and continued on.

Now just to do this for the next seventy years, I thought, swallowing down the creeping feelings of dread.

After lunch, Fish snagged my arm, pulling me back. Both Jackson and Kali looked alarmed but I brushed them on. They slipped out of the lounge but their shadows mingled under the door. I rubbed my wrists.

"What's up?"

"Just wanted to say thanks," Fish said, eyes snapping from the door to mine. He shifted a bit more to the corner, lowering his voice. "I get reactive easy. The whole puppy thing started because Ben calls me that sometimes and it's different because it's him but they think it's funny and I just-" He pulled in his lips, dropping his eyes. "I get annoyed easily.

"Yeah, no, I get it," I said. "It's fine."

He cleared his throat, looking me in the eye again. "And, um, I don't- I don't know what they might have-"

"I know," I said because his eyes fell downcast once more, body shifting, embarrassed and tense. "It's fine." I rubbed the back of my neck. "Jackson explained."

"Oh." He stood up a little straighter, looking me in the eye again. "Okay." He paused then, "Do you have any questions?"

"No." I bounced back on my heel and exhaled softly, shaky. "I mean, well, yeah, but it's really none of my business."

His Adam's apple bobbed. "Okay. Well. Um." He exhaled sharply. His eyes were cautious, watching me, confused. "Okay."

It wasn't okay. He wanted questions. He wanted to explain his actions or say something, something he didn't want to just admit at random, just in case I didn't know.

I let him.

"Why did you bite her?"

He leaned back and smiled shaky. "I-" He shook his head. "She was making fun of Alice. Uh, cause, uh, when we were born, my mom was told she was having fraternal twins, boy and a girl. So Alice came out first and they thought I would be the girl but I wasn't and Mom panicked, named me Daniel because drugs apparently." He laughed shaky and fiddled with his fingers. "Alice came out pretty early on though and Mom was happy about it because she always wanted a girl anyway but other people-" He winced. "She wanted to play princess with the other girls. They wouldn't let her and made fun of her dress, which, I think, is because they knew she picked it out herself. She started crying and I-" He swallowed. "I don't like seeing my sister cry."

Alice is trans?

Yes. She's very open about it. I'd realized before Fish told me.

"So you bit her because she made fun of Alice?" Understanding, I nodded. "That sounds fair."

He laughed, broken and shaky. "Thank you." He licked his lips. "It wasn't my dad's fault either. He's a good man, not dangerous. I just reacted." Suddenly, he drew up tense, voice guarded. "I don't know where he is either. I mean, I know where but he changes so often, they wouldn't be able to find him so I don't always know where anyway and- yeah."

"Oh. Oh, I'm not really stressed about your dad," I said. "I mean, I feel bad because that sucks. For all of you. I can't imagine my dad not being in my life anymore but." I shrugged, uselessly. "I wouldn't tell on him. And I don't really think you're dangerous either," I added. "If any of that helps."

"Your friends don't seem to agree but-" He crossed his arm. "-thanks."

I glanced back at the door. "Yeah, about that-" I turned back to him. "-if Kali makes you uncomfortable or anything, I can ask her to hang back or-"

"No!" he said quickly, too rough. I jerked and apologies flooded to his face but he bit them back and relaxed. "No, it's fine. I just- They have a smell. And I just-" His face turned tense, struggling to come up with an explanation that worked.

I tried to ease him along, understanding where he was going with it. "It wasn't a fun time."

"No, no, it wasn't," he laughed. "Would rather face a pack of bears fresh from hibernation." I laughed low with him and he smiled. "But Kali is fine. Alice likes her anyway. I think we just- ya know, have to learn each other. But, um-" He smiled a little shorter, calmer. "-I just wanted to say thanks for interfering."

"I don't like violence," I said. "Or anger."

He cocked his head. "Huh." He brushed his hands off on his hands. "Well, there goes your invitation to my hunt in January," he said, grinning. He gestured loosely. "I go catch rabbits and squirrels and stuff. It's- it's just a thing my dad used to do with me. Alice wanted to start it up again since we're not stuck in the city anymore."

I stumbled back as he slid up beside me, walking slow but in pace to the door. "That sentiment is sweet but everything else sounds gross actually. Really disgusting. Sorry. Not interested."

He leaned against the doorknob, grinning viciously. "Lena will be there."

"Semi-interested," I allowed and he swung the door open, smiling low.

Kali looked from him to me back to him. As he passed her, they gave one another a curt nod then Fish wrapped his arm around Alice's shoulders and walked off with her. Lena gave me a short wave and I waved back, watching them leave.

Jackson sidled up still beside me. "What if you join with the wolf boy and sleepyhead instead? Polyamory[60] is better than being whatever the hell with whatsherface"

I sighed. "Jack..."

Kali bumped him and locked her arm around mind. "What did he discuss with you?"

Her tone was floaty, like the question didn't matter, but I knew she was just being nosy as fuck. "Just wanted to thank me for interfering before you could attack one another," I said.

She bit her lip then a disgruntled, affronted look fell past her face. "I would not have done that."

"I know." I bumped her hip. "Changing things, remember? Gotta start somewhere."

She frowned, unsure.

Kali, for as long as I've known her, didn't take to change very well. She was headstrong and solid in her ways and looked from people to people, declaring that none of them could really become new, go against what they'd already settled on.

And maybe that was true. She was ancient, aged beyond my ability to really grasp, really connect to. She had her own experiences that she'd picked up on, her own understandings she'd come to.

But I didn't want to live in a world where kids died just for being born as they were. Had to change that. Change the rules.

People were reactive, people did things without thinking. You can penalize a child for being cruel because you can't penalize them for being them, especially when they don't know any better. Some things are just gut instincts, reactions. My instinct was to run, hide. Nick liked to fight, would rather hit, scream, punch before they let themself be swept up into the danger. And they did. From the moment they could strike something, they fought if it terrified them, upset them, angered them.

Fish's laughter carried, loud and abrasive, but happy.

I stuck my hand in my pockets, leaning into Jackson's side. Change, change, change.

Where to start?

** ** **

I shoved the books into my bag and swung it over my back. Camping wasn't really anything I'd actually done before. I mean, we tried but somehow, I doubt that pitching a tent in Nick's front yard and running back and forth to the house to sneak food from the fridge and get movies to project on the tent wall really counted.

But Jackson had yanked out this list from nowhere and we'd started packing that afternoon, so by Friday we were mostly set.

In the meantime, Lena and Jackson took up giving me a short training lesson in fencing, in which I panicked right before I could touch the mat, ran to a bathroom and refused to leave. Jackson dragged me out, demonstrated a couple things with Lena which I later tried to mimic using a fake sword and a dummy but still couldn't quite get done.

"Maybe if you just-" Lena cut herself off, trying to shift my stance a bit.

"Oi!" Jackson yelled as soon as she touched my leg.

We agreed everything about my struggling was his fault and I continued to fail mildly to everyone's disappointment. But, to be honest, I think I'm better at it then English so there's that, I guess.

I was bringing out the rule book Kali had managed to snag from Layla for me after telling her I was attending the game because no way in hell was I doing that. She wanted me to throw myself into the danger, she could do it instead.

But the rule book was key in my whole "attempt to change the structure of the current world I'd just been thrusted into". It didn't just state school rules but Warrior rules in general. Things everyone had to abide by. Hopefully, I could find some stuff in it that would let me start drafting my argument.

Which. I would be. Presenting. To the gods.

Lucky, there was no date set, no one beside Kali and Jackson who were aware, so my panic could very easily just work at it super slow and put it off as much as possible.

But, I felt strongly about it.

Probably because I'm from Brokes and we feel strongly about a lot of things disenfranchising people who don't harm others but are annoying believed to be doing so anyway.

"You got the sword?" Jackson asked, looking me over. For what felt like the billionth time, I showed off the ring and he clapped his hands. "Excellent! Okay, so-"

He began looking the rest of our things over for the tenth time. Kali huffed and I crossed my arms. "How far into all things military did he get?"

"Sergeant," Kali said. "I was quite shocked. I did not see him getting anywhere beyond enlisting."

Jackson shot her an annoyed look but said nothing and threw her one of the bags. "It was petty officer," he told me dryly. "Equivalent to a sergeant if I was in the army but I went with the navy because Kalen was in the navy and he was my first assignment."

"I wanted to join the air force," Kali said, voice sour.

"Well, look Kals, you can pick the next place we enlist into when Alex dies and I throw myself into a dangerous scenario to avoid mourning," he said and he cut us both a look that said, "no questions".

We walked out of my room, bags full. I leaned into Kali and gave her a look, eyebrows raised and fingers drawing a question mark into the air. She bit her lip then bumped my hip, reshouldering her bag.

"His parents died shortly before the war was declared," she said. "He did not take it well. I followed him in because we were friends." After a moment, at the end of the stairs, she stopped and looked at me. "And because I believed he was trying to die."

I wilted.

Oh.

"Seconds can sustain many injuries without failing but too many in succession can hurt them grievously and they can die. It is nearly impossible to attain." She cleared her throat and dropped her voice a touch lower. "Nearly impossible."

So it was still possible. And a war so harsh and fierce was likely the best place to go do achieve it. Get blown up, shot or tortured enough times and one of those times was bound to stick nice and solid.

It was hard to see Jackson as the type of person who would try to hurt himself like that, try to kill himself but he loved his parents like crazy and he could feel so intensely and he could break so easily, it was believable as much as I didn't want to believe it. I'd seen it once when I was twelve, a misery cut so deep into his face, it hurt me just looking at it.

I didn't ever want to see him like that again.

And it made what happened, what he'd said and how he acted, that time so much more understandable.

We kept walking and Jackson's body was tense, his eyes constantly brushing over me, and I knew he knew was Kali had said. He didn't seem betrayed, just shot her a grateful look, and I figured he just forgot she was there with him when it all happened.

That she could talk about the hard parts he couldn't, if he really needed her to.

See, the thing about the two of them was they both relied so easily on the other, from years and apparent decades of knowing each other, and yet always seemed to act as if they were alone, like there weren't other people around. Which made sense, I guess. If you're an immortal god who can do anything, becoming a mortal seven year old doesn't change the fact that you still think you can do anything and that you think you kind of have to.

You don't need backup to murder a raging demon.

You don't need help finishing a modern-day geometry quiz.

But they were wrong. They could still use help. Everyone needs help, even if they don't think the do.

We touched the border of the woods. I glanced over and checked the time. A couple hours into the day. As far as I knew, the game was active from midnight that day to a minute before noon on Monday. School started Tuesday so everyone had enough time to clean up and prep, if they hadn't done so already. Inside the border around the campus was a safe zone. As long as you were inside, you weren't counted as part of the game and if you came inside after leaving, you were immediately booted out. Game play technically started at noon but as long as you were in the forest before then you were solid.

Knowing my luck, we were probably the last people gearing up to play. I'd heard the telltale thump-a-thump of people sneaking out early, trying to get ahead of the rush, minutes before midnight.

The stars were still bright above us.

I swallowed down my nerves and failed. "Are you sure I should really walk into the forest of monsters? Especially in the middle of the night?"

"It's not the forest of monsters," Jackson said, though he craned his neck a bit as though making sure that statement wasn't going to come back and bite him on the ass.

"Lies," I muttered, following Kali's bouncy lead out of the border's edge and into the trees.

We trucked on, luckily coming across no one. The air felt still and tense. The longer time went on the colder it seemed to grow. I was used to walking around in frozen air in the early morning. I wasn't used to doing it when the option to go back inside was waylaid to days later.

But it was nice to look around and see everything under the small peaks of moonlight. Kali stayed ahead of me, Jackson behind, walking backward as he kept an eye out for anything or anyone who might've chosen to follow us. The trees were tall and towering. If my pants weren't so think, the grass would've brushed my ankles. Beneath our quiet footsteps, fallen leaves crunches and twigs snapped. Every time Jackson winced and went still.

He kept his eyes to the trees.

I kept my eyes to the ground.

Kali kept her eyes forward.

We stopped at the edge of a partially frozen lake. Jackson dumped our stuff down and rubbed his temples then vanished to go establish a perimeter. While he did that, I tried to pitch the tent. After three failed attempts, all of which she watched with concern growing deeper and deeper into the lines of her face, Kali finally took over by handing me the stuff to start a campfire and pushed me off in the direction of a bunch of dry twigs and leaves.

I decided I didn't want to play with fire, handed her the stuff back and went about making a makeshift fishing pole. After a couple minutes, tent pitched and fire burning low, she joined me.

"Nick and I did this once," I told her. She frowned but I shrugged. "It was before you." I grinned, cheeky. "See? I can have secrets in my past too."

"I have been there for most of your past," she said. "Even if you could not see me, I was there watching. I do remember you left Brokes for a few days with your family and took Nick along."

"Yeah, Dad went to his sister's wedding. And then-" I hooked the edge of the line. "-when they told him he wasn't allowed in because he was an abomination, Mom took us to this nifty fishing cabin and since we were passing through, we picked up Nick on our way there." Gently pushing a spare piece of bread onto the end, I dropped the line into the lake. "And we made a whole bunch of crap rods with the spare line."

My line bobbed in the water.

I smiled.

"It was fun." I bumped her with my shoulder. "You'll have to kill the fish if I catch any."

She patted my thigh, smiled gentle and stood up.

That trip had started off tense. Dad loved his family, even if they didn't care too much for him, and despite Mom's warnings, he'd been broken up about what they'd said. His sister, an aunt I never talked to and couldn't remember, hadn't even invited him. Her husband had done it by accident when he was getting down the names of their families to send invites.

He didn't know.

It was the first time I'd ever experienced the world outside of Brokes, first time I'd ever gotten pissed about anything. There I was, seven years old, fresh out of first grade and watching my dad, my dad who'd only been my dad for like a year and a half, cower under his family's vileness.

I started screaming to cut everyone off and didn't stop until Mom had successfully dragged the two of us out of the venue and into the nearest cab. We went back to our hotel, packed up, rescheduled the next flight out and went home. Then Mom brainstormed the bestest idea.

What if we went fishing?

In the back of my mind, I thought she was doing it to erase everyone's mind of what happened but as I got older, I realized what she'd really been trying to do.

Dad didn't grow up in Brokes. He didn't have all the affirming "it doesn't matter who you are, you can do whatever you want" kind of stuff. Fishing was a manly sport. And Mom was just trying to remind him of that.

He was a man.

Despite what anyone else thought.

So we picked up Nick, drove down to a creaky fishing cabin and spent the rest of the week there, catching fish and trying to snatch up frogs from where they lingered. For all that it had started off awful, it was a great for a lot of reasons: fishing, catching frogs, Nick shyly telling me that sometimes they felt like a boy, us spending the week playing around with different names like Zenon and Glurg, me finally understanding the world I lived in wasn't as tolerant or nice as I had once thought.

I fingered my bag beside me.

Definitely not as tolerant or nice.

Digging my stick into the ground between my thighs, I kept it trapped there and pulled out the rule book to start reading up. I couldn't change the world, I knew that. I can't change the world. I wouldn't even know where start.

But I could make some improvements in one area.

Make room for some kind of tolerance.

My aunt Mel always like to quote things, one of which was the paradox of tolerance, simplified down into its basic bits. "We cannot be tolerant of intolerance," she'd say, looking down at all us as we sat beside her feet. "Remember that strictly." Then she'd jab whoever was closest and say, "It's important."

Well, Aunt Mel, I thought, I'm remembering it.

** ** **

A couple hours and a few fish later, Jackson had settled an edging of rope and alerts around our campsite. Kali had gone and caught a rabbit but let it go after I stared at her in horror at the thought of eating one. Even Jackson seemed a bit wary about it. So instead she'd gutted up the fish I'd managed to yank up while I buried myself in the tent to work a bit more on my argument.

So far, I'd come up with its rude, it's mean, I don't like it, not cool.

I'm not the best when it comes to this stuff.

Yeah, I noticed when you called me up out of nowhere and asked if I'd write your biography.

Heh, yeah.

"Hey." Jackson ducked his head in. "Food's set."

"Nice." I pushed up and slipped back out, leaving the book inside.

The air was still frozen around us but the heat of the fire helped soothe the chill in my fingers. Kali passed me a portion of the fish and smiled loosely. "How is it going?"

"Decent?" I tested then I shook my head, sighing. "Difficult. You know I suck at English."

"Perhaps if you tried..."

I scowled and scuffed the dirt with my boot. "I try."

"In everything but this class," Jackson said around the fish in his mouth. At my betrayed glare, he shrugged. "I'm just saying ya gotta look at the facts."

I muttered something unsavory under my breath and leaned against his arm. We ate in silence for the next few minutes then, as Kali scrapped the last bit of her fish into her mouth, an arrow fucking shot down out of nowhere.

It hit the dirt just beside Kali's leg.

The three of us stared at it, confused, me because the fuck? And them, probably because who in their right mind fires a weapon at gods?

IT DIDN'T MAKE SENSE.

"The fuck just happened," Jackson said, leaning over and poking it.

Another arrow hit just above the last and just barely missed the top of his head. He whirled around, eying the trees where it came from while I stood, slow and steady, and hid behind him. Kali blew sharp, a burst of wind hitting the fire and sending us back into chilly darkness. She backed up into me, watching the other side of the trees, searching for whoever shot the arrow.

Whoever it was, was quick at disappearing.

I couldn't see them either.

"Where the hell-"

Motion just out of the corner of my eye and I jerked around, shoving Jackson back mostly by accident as a whip of water from the lake burst and hit between us, slapping the once existing fire so hard the air steamed and a snap echoed.

Panic broke out into my throat, bile chasing it. Jackson caught me round the waist and pulled me into him.

"Okay, this is the moment, take out the sword."

I shook my head.

"Alex, now, please."

"No," I croaked, turning around and trying to run.

"Alex, now is not the time to flee!" Kali chided me, grabbing the back of my shirt and pulling me into her. I went without a fight, only thinking of running, fleeing, escaping to Oregon to live the rest of my life as a librarian.

Don't know how I thought I'd do any of that trapped in Kali's hold but I don't think a lot of things through when I'm terrified out of my mind and I'm very easily terrified out of my mind.

"I SEE YOU, EVIL!" Jackson yelled, conjuring a sword from nowhere and traipsing off into the woods without a second thought. As he chased whoever, I heard them shriek followed by his crazy laughing.

I tried to crawl into Kali's chest and she was too busy searching for whoever threw the water at us to really stop me. Finally, when it seemed as though it all was over, she drew back and peeled from her front to her side.

"Watch my back," she said and I tried to.

I drew out my sword and eyed the area in front of us.

Somewhere in the distance an explosion sounded.

I nodded slowly then tilted my head up to hers. "I would like to leave now." She sent me a soft smirk, eyes bright. "You enjoy this, don't you?"

She shrugged. "I was made to fight," she said. "To protect. It is the core of all that I am."

I shook my head. "I always knew beneath that pacifist exterior was a secret rage chasing junkie."

She snorted, bumped my back with her elbow and steadied herself. "You were quick to notice movement earlier. You have good potential."

"I wish I had none." I jerked my head to the side, a crack of around the bushes. "Then maybe I wouldn't be here."

"Your natural fear propels you. All you need to do is learn not to run," she said, not quite noticing the slight sound and the way the bushes ruffled quiet, as though a breeze I couldn't feel was touching the leaves.

"Easier said than done," I whispered. I turned my gaze a slight bit to the left, as though looking at the wrong spot. My voice dropped silent. "Kali. The bushes."

"I know," she breathed and then she turned, spun in front of me, and threw a knife to leaves.

Whoever had been hiding in them yelped and darted back. They vanished into the trees and Kali drew up tall.

"It was the wolf boy," she said dry.

"You can smell him too?" She sent me a look and I shrugged.

"I saw his face," she said, stalking forward and collecting the knife from the ground.

As she fell back into place next to me, I patted her arm. "You're so cool."

"Yes, I know," she said, watching the trees for a few more seconds. "I do not think they were here to harm us."

"Distraction?" I turned around to our tent, some supplies to set out. "Supplies?"

"Jackson is a second," Kali said. "Seconds have innate magic as the rest of us but it is limited. Most require physical magic so they do not drain themselves. I assume they may have been coming for that."

"Physical..." I blinked and glanced at her. "You mean the powder stuff he keeps in a bag?" She looked to me and nodded. Relief hit me like a tidal wave. "Oh, thank God. I thought he was just really taking the whole "salt for protection" thing seriously."

She laughed, a quick chuckle, and sat down by the tent, looking over our things quick. All was where it was supposed to be. We hadn't been raided, at least not yet. I sat down next to her and waited for Jackson to come back.

"How are you feeling?"

"Nervous, uncomfortable." I bumped her foot with mine. "On edge to the point of bursting. You?"

"Settled." She bumped my foot back. "Easy, calm. At peace to the point of tranquility."

I rolled my eyes and sank into her. For a moment, we were quiet. I was still processing everything, trying to calm my shaking nerves and she was warm beside me, watching and alert.

Then, "Ranj was my son."

I went still, saying nothing.

"Seconds are mostly born," she continued, still and not looking at me. "Occasionally, those without the right to birthing and even those with, bless a child to be our own and a few times we've done it in conjunction with one another. He born in the early 1800s. He was an orphan. Despite his hardships, he was determined and kind and at peace with the fight within him. I blessed him and a few days later, so did Agni[61]. I loved him very much."

As she spoke about him, her eyes turned sad, her gaze haunted and distant. I took her hand in mine, tracing the lines of her palms with my fingertips.

"Jackson is different from most seconds," she said, breathing sharply. "It is not normal for us to have children outside our own people. It gives them too much power. He was intended to be a demigod but neither realized what the other was until it was too late."

"Seconds aren't mixed," I clarified.

"No," she said. "He was the first and only one."

I didn't know what to say to that. She was done with speaking. I could tell it from how she finally looked down at me.

He was the first.

But he wasn't. I knew it from how he stressed Egypt as his home, his origin as Nick used to tease. Even if he hadn't said it yet, I knew from the moment I found out about him that he didn't consider himself mixed. He was Egyptian. There was no Greek, no Chinese in him.

I could respect that.

So I let it lie. "Is it weird being a god?"

She shrugged. "It is not that strange. I have always been what I am. I know no different."

"It's gotta be a little bit weird though," I said. I gestured uselessly into the air. "I mean, I can't imagine it."

"I think it is different if you are elected into it," she said. "I woke up one day and simply was. It has always been my beginning. I know nothing else."

"You were never born."

She paused. Then took a deep breath, trying to find her words. "I have always been alive. However, if I think hard enough, I can remember my creation." She paused, eyes tracking steadily over the trees in front of us. The air was still, quiet, waiting for her to tell her story. "I heard the words of my name spoken over and over again. The world was so quiet and I saw nothing. Then I woke. I existed. Kali. Goddess. I knew my responsibilities, what I was made for and what I had to execute. Protection. Anger. Time." She tilted her head to the side. "There are many stories to my being. In some, as you know, I have always existed. In others, I was created. But..." She traced her hand over the grass. "I like this one most, if I let myself believe in it.

"I was created... because my people wanted me." She looked at me, her eyes down, almost ashamed, embarrassed. "Is that silly?" she whispered.

I shook my head. "No, Kals. It's not silly. It's good."

She relaxed immediately. "Good," she said, firmly, with a nice jerk of her head to seal the deal.

There had always been a regality to Kali. Something that made me want to worship her, even before I knew what she was, and it wasn't just her name. It was the way she held herself up, confident and brave. How she levelled her eyes at nuisances and told them they were such.

She didn't fear anything. She looked danger in the eye and waited for it to move around her. She was everything I wanted to be.

But in this moment, she was just herself. Kali. My friend who stole chip bags from the store just because they went up a dime in price and she wasn't having it. My friend who knocked herself in the face with a locker on more than one occasion. Who smiled without showing her teeth and bristled high with praise and told me in great detail multiple times how much she wanted to kiss Anne Hathaway.

Kali.

I loved her.

And it amazed me that she let me see her in all her flaws, in her all her awkward moments.

I buried myself into her side, soaking into her warmth. She didn't stop me, just curved her arm around me and laid her hand flat on my side, watching the stars.

"Okay!" We both looked up to the bushes in front of us. A shadowed figure stood in front of us, hands up. "So we've decided that we're at a serious disadvantage and we're offering that in exchange for thirty percent of all your things," the familiar voice started, "Peter will show you his dick."

"Hey!"

I snorted and the voice coughed awkward. "Uh, I mean, I will flash one boob."

"One breast for thirty percent?" Kali asked. She shook her head. "No deal."

"How about she flashes both?" another voice, not Peter's, called out, still hiding.

Kali and I laughed and we stood up, my legs shaky. "Alice," I started, "do you even have breasts?"

"I mean, they're not that defined but they're there!" she huffed back, stepping into the light, hands over her head.

"Why did you shoot at us?" Kali asked, head raised intimidatingly.

"Oh, yeah." Alice scuffed the ground and laughed uncomfortably. "We were trying to scare you off. Fish normally takes the lake because giant source of water is easier to manipulate than scourging up water from the air."

"Why are you still hiding?"

She glanced behind to the bushes where the other two were hiding. "Fucking- Guys! I said an ambush wouldn't work! Stop hiding!"

Lena popped her head up. "You don't know that it wouldn't."

Peter glanced up nervously beside her. "I'm just hiding from the crazy one."

"He's not crazy," I said. Kali sent me a look. "Okay, bombarding a children's Christmas production is a bit insane but that was one time."

She shook her head. "I was thinking of the time he tried to fight Derrek."

I dropped my head and groaned. "Oh Hades, I forgot about that time." I rubbed my face. "Why is Katelynn my only non-fighting friend?"

"She is seven," Kali said. "Also, Nick is there."

Oh, Nick, I thought. Nick would've been great to have. Stupid school-only event rules.

I brandished my hands out. "Well, you guys just wanna hang here?"

"Do we still have to get rid of Peter?" Lena asked. Peter shot her a dirty look.

Shaking my head, I locked arms with Kali. "I'm in charge," I said, though I didn't feel like it. "Which means Peter can stay."

Peter didn't look all that enthused by my declaration. "He's not gonna kill me in my sleep, is he?"

"He-" No, he would. Or he'd come close. I could see it so visibly in my head it disturbed me. I bit my lip. "Uh, I'll tell him not to."

"That is not encouraging," Peter muttered.

"Come on, fresh bait," Alice teased, grabbing his arm to drag him off to collect their things.

Only Lena stayed behind, looking me over. She grinned small. Gesturing to my jacket, she said, "You look warm."

"Thanks." I swallowed thickly. "You look- you-"

She looked fucking gorgeous and it was killing me because it was the middle of the night and her hair, undone and very clearly not washed, fell into short curls around her head. She was wearing a beat-up coat, worn in boots and pretty much looked as though she'd been living out here for days.

She didn't look like the ethereal beauty my head was laughing at me that she was and yet.

"Uh- you- it-"

"He thinks you look well," Kali said, voice dry but amusement underlying it.

Lena laughed and threw down the bag she'd been carrying. "Thanks."

I shot Kali a dirty look and muttered, "I had it."

"You were fufumpering."

"I was not fufumpering!"

I don't think that's a word.

Oh, it's not. But we use it in place of fumfer. Kali, queen of big words, used it religiously when we were nine and used to cake it in wherever she could. Unfortunately, nine was the year she lost her front teeth so in her effort to pronounce words correctly, she consistently sounded like she was saying fufumper instead of fumfer.

We teased her about it forever and in the process, it got stuck.

We're kind of stupid like that.

I'm noticing.

Yeaaaaaaah. It's a curse.

A couple minutes later, Alice and Peter were back, Ben in tow. He was mumbling, playing with a Rubik's cube, his fingers flying fast. I asked Alice what he was saying and she just sent me an excessively pained look and Lena shook her head rapidly, eyes wide, while Peter set Ben down.

"Is he- is he okay?" I asked because Ben didn't seem to have any awareness of other people.

Peter shot Kali a nervous look but she didn't say anything or even acknowledge the gaze, just turned away and went back to setting up Alice's tent with her. He looked back to me. "Uh, yeah, no, he's a demigod too. God of creation. Um- Un- Unk-"

"Unkulunkulu[62]?" I asked.

At the name, Ben's head snapped up. "Mama calls him Kulu."

He went back to the Rubik's cube.

Peter sat down, dusting off his pants. "Yeah. Him. And, uh, thing about creation is it's very broad. Not easy to limit. So it's kind of a rule that he has to waste himself before the year is up. Or they'll drain him."

I paused. "What?"

"Creation demigods. They can make anything. As long as he wants it to exist, he can build it or yank it into existence. So if he wanted to make a weapon to destroy all the gods..." Peter trailed off, looking at me clear behind his glasses.

I looked away from him, to Ben whose fingers were flying fast, eyes not even watching as he matched up colour to colour.

"So to stop from being a concern, he has to use his powers?" I frowned. "That doesn't make sense."

Kali stabbed the earth behind us. "We have tests," she said, and it was clear from her voice she didn't want to talk about it. "A weapon of to create that level of destruction requires much energy. At the beginning, end and other strategic points we test them to ensure that they do not have that kind of power, and if they do, they are wasting their own energy to avoid the risk of ever having the possibility to create it."

"Yeah, but sometimes, like Ben, they get better as they go on," Alice said and she glanced, stance cautious, to Kali. "And he's been building stuff since he could move. Which means less energy gets used for stuff. Which means he goes into spells, especially before testing, where he just builds whatever he can to waste it away. Which means-"

"Zombie," Lena said, settling down beside Ben. She took the Rubik's cube, which was completed by now and began jumbling it up. Ben didn't even notice, staring at the patch of dirt in front of him, frozen and still.

Lifeless.

I curled my hands into small fists in my lap.

Why, why, why, why?

So Ben junted his entire life behind gods. He didn't sleep, too focused on building things and making things and wasting his own reserves just because someone was afraid if he didn't, he'd kill them?

Wouldn't that make him more prone to wanting to get rid of them? If they didn't exist, he wouldn't have to log himself into the rules they designated.

Maybe I could understand why some people didn't care for the gods, like I did.

But all it did was remind me of my dad in the hospital and brushing my hair out of my face, telling me, "Sometimes people do stupid terrible things when they're scared, Al."

But he was talking about a one-time stab wound. This was a century's, maybe millennia, long ruling that dictated people's lives to a pressure point.

I brushed my hand over my pants twice before I could think of anything to say. But I looked at Ben, who was back at it with the Rubik's cube, and withheld it all. He didn't seem aware of me, or anything.

"Alex," Kali said clear and I resisted the urge to look at her. "We should locate Jackson."

"Ah, yeah," Alice said. She ran her fingers through her hair. "Fish and Mary were distracting him, last I checked."

"I wonder what it'll kill them first," Lena said loftily. "Jackson-" She leaned back, brushing her head back to stare at the stars. "-or their refusal to work together."

I stood up as Alice made some chiding remark and Peter laughed about it. Their words sounded like fuzz in my ears as Kali and I hiked into the trees. She didn't say anything to me, just kept quiet and when it all came tumbling down, striking me to the point I couldn't handle the silence anymore, she opened her mouth.

"You are upset," she said without looking at me. "You have no reason to be."

"You're ruining kids' lives," I shot back, angry. She cut me an offended look. "Fish doesn't have his dad. Ben is a lifeless mess at fifteen. I'm me."

"You are fine," she snapped. "What are we supposed to do? Should we wait for one of them to be successful?"

"Kali, Kali!" She swung around and looked at me, eyes set. "Exactly how many children have actually considered harming you guys? Or me? Or whoever you set up those little rules for? Give me a percent of the total that exists."

She scowled and didn't say anything.

"You're breaking them and hurting them to stop them from being what you fear but when you hurt someone enough times, you create the thing you were trying to avoid," I said. "I don't get how you guys don't realize that. If you tell enough people they're inherently dangerous, eventually, whether they are or not, they'll believe it. And sooner or later one of them is going to come to the conclusion that maybe there's a reason for that. And that's when the real mess starts happening."

"I am aware," she said testily. "You are not the first to say anything about this but the rules of which we govern ourselves are-"

"Wrong," I said. "They're wrong and you know it."

She looked at me, hard, then cut her eyes away. "We do not want to end."

"Then maybe you guys should stop giving people reasons to think about doing so," I said.

Her entire body turned tense, angry, upset. Her face cut horrified and she stared at me hollowly, no doubt offended. I didn't mean for it to sound cruel and it stung me to hurt her, to have said it in the first place, but.

But Ben was a kid.

Fish was a kid.

I was a kid.

The thing about living in Brokes is we're pretty sheltered. Here, everyone, except for the one percent[63], is mostly accepting of other people. Of course, we have our limits and our own personal regulations that when we hear of other places or other people trying to work around in all the defense of equality we get a little confused.

But despite the sheltering, you grow up with a specific kind of morality and understanding that doesn't always coincide with other people's thoughts or actions. Slavery may be legal but it's hella bad. If you've got money and you're vaguely white-looking, it's just common sense to utilize that. You gotta go down to those gross places, purchase a couple, take them back and free them. Give them housing, give them a job, teach them how to survive again or how to survive period then let them go when they want to, when they're able.

No one owns anyone. That's just dumb.

We gotta get rid of the natives? Okay, cool, we never had them. They're not here. No, they're not hiding in our basements. That's my cousin. That's my aunt. She's deaf, can't talk. He's a bit stupid, speaks in tongues sometimes, why we don't let him meet new people. I have no idea what you're talking about, sorry, have a nice day.

After a spell, it became "Well, seems rather stupid to keep their land but where we would go, so what if we make it a rule to have at least a few elected into public office, that way they can put across their best interests" then, around the 1900s, it became "Okay, you know what, you guys were in charge of this place before we came along, why don't we just make it a general unspoken rule that only you can be mayor".

Wait, we have to elect laws to let people of colour marry people outside their race? Wait, we have to elect laws to let people of the same gender marry?

What do you mean it's not legal until the state declares it is?

What do you mean it's illegal?

So yeah, we grow up with this sort of confusion at the outside world because we know better. Even if only a slight bit better, we know. And I knew that it cruel. It was practically a Brokes thing to see cruelty and be confused because why the hell would you do that? Why would you hurt a bunch of people for no reason? Why are you turning them away when they need help?

Why, why, why?

So hearing that Kali and a bunch of other people, people will extreme power, looked at a bunch of kids and saw weapons was concerning.

They were children.

Children.

How anyone could look at a bunch of babies and think, "This is a danger we have to regulate even though we have no proof or knowledge that they'll hurt us because they are actual babies and don't even have a concept of us" was concerning.

This child who attacked another kid because they hurt his sister is a danger but, you know what, his mom is a good person so let's blame his dad for his actions even though kids hit other kids for upsetting them all the time and he was just utilizing a method that was instinctual and he knew would work to achieve what he wanted, which was revenge.

This child was given a power he never asked for, a power that literally came from one of us, so we gotta regulate him and make sure he exhausts himself continuously because otherwise he's dangerous.

We're murdering these people's parents and family members and they're reacting poorly to it so let's just decide they're all evil and siding with the family that we've just executed so we don't have to deal with their justified complaints even though, logically, not all the people we're killing are out to get us.

I stilled.

My whole belief, my whole trust in gods, and it was all wrong. Once, I asked Nick why they considered themself atheist[64] and they just shrugged and said, "Everyone disappoints me."

I knew what they meant but I didn't get it. Sure, people disappoint you but these were gods we were talking about. Yes, most of them were representational of nature, representational of the human condition but still. Time goes on, people grow, we learn things, we change.

Oh, how pointless that thought had been.

I just thought, ya know, being immortal and all, one day they'd look at all the pain of the world and just know better.

I was wrong.

I was wrong.

I was so, so wrong.

** ** **

"Hey." I looked up, saw Lena standing above me. She smiled softly and sat down. "You look a bit down."

"Just thinking," I said, eying the water.

The pitch of dawn was breaking overhead. After we dragged Jackson back to camp, where he was wholly unimpressed I invited Peter to stay, we split the time up into shifts for the night. I called the first shift for the night, too shaken and on edge to even consider that I'd be able to sleep.

After a few minutes of debate, Kali had crashed with Jackson in our tent but I knew she was unhappy. But look, I was unhappy.

It was difficult to ascertain that the people I believed in, held full trust in, were all mean enough to regulate the lives of people who posed no actual or verifiable threat to them. It was worse to think that one of them was my best friend.

And I knew having her nearby would just keep that thought flowing over and over again.

Lena spread her gloved hands over the grass. "Ben doesn't mind it, you know."

I didn't look at her.

She took a minute then went on. "His dad actually talks to him too. Not many get that chance. Alice, I think, is only because her dad feels guilty about it. That or because, as far as I know, his dad's a dick and you know the whole spiel about parents and being better than."

She laughed at the last bit, her tone upturned, meant to breeze it as a joke, but it just stung more.

She wilted when I didn't say anything and turned to gaze out over the lake.

"Peter told me about your whole religion thing," she said after a couple of silent minutes. "So I get if you're upset about everything but-" She paused and shook her head. "I know it's difficult to accept when you're from Brokes. When Fish first told me about his hearing, I wanted to rush up there and yell at all of them. Whip out the fisticuffs."

She mimed punching in the air and I snorted, dropping my eyes to my feet. She smiled and nudged me with her elbow.

"It's just one of those things we have to deal with," she said and her voice was miserable. "And it's why a lot of Warriors from here don't stick around after graduation. Most just graduate and leave. We can't really work for people like that."

I scuffed the ground. "And you?"

She shrugged. "I don't know. I know Layla wants me to work in the field for a couple years or at least over the summer when I'm out of uni but I dunno. Sometimes I think it'll be okay and then other times, I see Ben all hollowed out over his desk. Or Karen panicking because her test is coming up and she hasn't made enough things and I just think-" She looked at me. "-why would I want to?"

"You never told me about you and Layla," I prompted.

She gave a short laugh. "Oh yeah." Stretching back, she cleared her throat. "So basically my parents abandoned me when I was a baby." I winced because yeah, same, and she shrugged. "Yeah, it sucks but not like I remember them. No one claimed me as family so I got junted into foster care. Which didn't sit well. I was prone to tantrums. Didn't deal well with other people. And having powers meant I was using them accidentally whenever I was mad or upset or scared. After I woke up a dead body at a funeral, the school decided it would probably better if I just stayed here. Especially since I was coming here anyway.

"So I was seven and a half and I was here and Layla was technically my main guardian but I was literally a ward of the school so I couldn't really call her mom or anything." She picked at the ground. "I used to ask her all the time why she just didn't adopt me since I was basically her kid anyway and she just gave me this look and reminded me that I was a child of the school and blah-blah-blah, technicality, technicality, until finally, she got the permissions changed."

"She adopted you?"

Lena shook her head. "No. I mean, I'm her foster kid now. Not the school's."

"Does it hurt?" She sent me a strange look and I backtracked. "I mean- I'm adopted. And I was adopted pretty young, but I still went through a round in foster care so I know it's annoying to wait. For someone."

She nodded, understanding, then exhaled sharply, blowing hair out of her eyes. "It stings a bit. When she got full control of me, she told me outright she wasn't actually going to adopt me. Refused to explain why. But I mean, she takes care of me, ya know. And we celebrate my birthday and holidays and she always used to take me on her vacations even before so I know she at least likes me."

I laughed, voice sour. Then, shy, thinking about what she'd said about tantrums and not dealing well with other people, I asked, tentative, "Do you ever feel like you need to run?"

Her stance fell guarded. "What do you mean?"

"I mean," I started, slow, "do you ever just... get the urge to bolt? Like you weren't supposed to be here? You're supposed to be somewhere else?"

She was still for all of a minute before nodding slowly. "Yes," she said firmly. "A lot of the time. It's irritating as hell." She scratched the bridge of her nose. "That's actually what caused my whole "waking up a dead body thing". That time it was so intense I'd kind of... panicked, I guess? And stole my foster mom's credit card and tried to buy a bus ticket out of the city. And the bank flagged it as unusual purchase, called them while we were out and they got pissed about it and I just kept thinking-"

She stopped, freezing and sending me a nervous look.

But I knew.

"You thought they were going to kill you."

She shifted, eyes a little wide, then, "Yeah. How'd you guess?"

"Same with me," I said. I fiddled with my fingers. "Before my parents. Even with them, in the early days, I used to freak out a lot. I was certain that everyone wanted me dead. Probably didn't help that someone tried to do that when I was nine."

Her eyes widened even more. "Seriously?"

"Yeah. Must've been a Warrior thing, I guess? Guy never really explained. Not that he had a chance," I laughed hollow. "I was out. With my friend Nick. We were eating some ice cream at Harold's Park and this man just came out of nowhere, yelling at me that I was a monster. And then he-"

The glint of metal in the sun flashed by my eyes. Nick was beside me, staring lost at this guy shouting obscenities at me. Then they saw the knife.

I was frozen.

People around me were yelling, trying to get close, trying to stop him but he was so close and I was so scared.

I couldn't run.

I couldn't move.

Then Nick arced up, hit them. Every bit of the way they moved was instinctual, without pause. Smashed his face into our table. But that just brought him closer.

Metal. Glinting. Everything in slow motion.

It was so close.

I was going to die, I was going to die.

And then I didn't.

When they asked me about what happened, my parents, the police, I told them. A man attacked me. He tried to kill me. He said I was a monster. He said I was supposed to be dead.

Then Nick killed him.

But I could never remember that part.

I knew it happened. But my brain just blocked it out. All I could remember was screaming, my own, I think, and then the weird sudden feeling that I was okay, I was safe, and Nick pulling me away, my hands wet from melted ice cream and their hands wet from something red and smudging against my arm.

Logically, I knew it was blood but it took days for that to really sink in and once it did, I stood in my bathroom and tried to scrub it all off, even though it was long since gone.

I could still feel it.

"He tried to kill me," I finished, voice sounding rough and hollow. "But my friend Nick got there first."

"That-" Lena released a sharp brush of air. "That is terrible."

"Yeah, it wasn't the best moment of my life," I muttered, wondering why I'd even brought it up. Five and a half years and I'd managed to forget about it, managed to push it away when it popped up, a sudden reminder of my past fears.

She touched my arm. "I'm sorry that happened to you."

"I'm sorry your mom won't adopt you," I said.

She laughed and dropped her head to my shoulder. "Ugh, yeah, no, that's definitely worse than your thing." I snorted and everything fell quiet. Then she breathed deeply. "You feel familiar."

I bit my lip. "You do too."

She relaxed. "Oh, good, because it was actually driving me crazy."

I laughed and looked at her in all her glory. "Well, I say we call it a day, declare each other soulmates."

She choked on a laugh and swatted my arm. "How can you know? Maybe I have another soulmate out there."

"That's fine with me," I said, stretching out a knot in my back. "Bring as many as you want. Polyamory is lovely." I laughed low. "Anything else kind of sounds-"

"Suffocating," she finished with purposeful vindication.

I looked at her, this girl I just met days ago but felt like I'd known for years. She was familiar in a strange way and I was drawn to her in the most immediate sense. Wanted to remember her.

She drew back. "I could do monogamy, if I had to. But I think open is more preferential. I like the idea of love and finding people who match me."

"Same," I said, my voice faint like an echo.

She looked at me and a short laugh dropped from her throat. "Wow," she said. "This is getting weird."

"Well, this is Brokes," I tested. "Bound to be a lot of things we agree on."

She smiled, almost rueful. "I guess so." She ducked her head back to the tents then turned to me, smile blown and wicked. "So how do you feel about making out before Jackson "you can't date a girl" wakes up?"

"As if he didn't wake up the moment you sat down next to me," I laughed. I shook my head. "Can't. Made a stupid promise they'd get my first boy and girl kiss respectively."

"What about enby?"

"Ah, that was Nick. Which I've passed. So if you want to call yourself agender for a spell then I could go for it," I said. "Don't like breaking promises."

She smirked. "Yeah, I feel you. I made everyone promise I'd get to name their first child and I'd hate it if they backed out. How else am I gonna name someone Zenon?"

The laugh just burst from me, loud. She looked at me, shocked, wide-eyed, confused but amused. I shook my head. "No, no, I just- that's one of the names that we debated for Nick. And then, a little bit for myself."

"Damn, this is spooky," she said. She leaned back and grinned. "So. You wanna make out anyway?"

"Uh-"

"NO!" Jackson yelled from behind us, so sudden and unexpected I fell back and Lena nearly jerked herself into the lake. He sent her a sour look, sent me one of disappointment, the hypocrite, then pulled me to a stand and dragged me off to the tent. "Goodbye, heathen."

"Thank you!" she yelled back and I snorted, letting Jackson push me into the tent.

I splayed out between him and Kali. "One of these days I am probably going to kiss her."

He scowled, a petulant child of ninety, and flopped down next to me. Then he kicked Kali's leg and grumbled, "Go murder her face for me."

Kali didn't even roll over, just leaned back and slapped his face with excellent accuracy.

** ** **

When I woke up, my watch told me it'd only been a couple of hours. Kali wasn't in the tent anymore. Chatter drifted in from outside. I blearily ignored the need to run bubbling in the back of my head, danger, danger, danger, and rolled onto my other side. Jackson was awake, staring up at the ceiling, his hands folded over his chest.

He glanced out at me from the corner of his eye and then went back to staring at the ceiling.

Voice full of sleep, I murmured, "Kali told me about your parents. And the mixed thing."

He bristled, but not angry, just... put off. "Yeah. She asked me if she could say something. Said I'd take forever to get to it and then by the time I did you'd probably on your deathbed."

I flicked his arm and then cuddled back into the warmth of my sleeping bag. "Tell me?"

He exhaled sharp, tired, unwilling. Then rolled over to his side to face me. "So power for gods comes from two places. The place where it all began and the people who still believe in you." He licked his lips, eyes darting all over my face. "Which means I have three places. Greece. China. Egypt. Which is considered too many. Every other god, first or second, only has one. I am an accidental anomaly.

"But doesn't matter. My people were Egyptian, even if they were just intending me to be a demigod, and I'm Egyptian. I don't want anything more than that," he said.

Knew it, I thought. Out loud, I said, "Sounds fair. So, in terms of power-" I rolled onto my back. "-what does that mean for you?

He fidgeted for a bit then sighed. "I'm on par with the forgotten ones. Out of all the seconds, I'm easily the best one."

"Doesn't sound right," I said.

He snorted. "I know. Especially with the whole love bullshit because how does that even count, but-" He shrugged. "-there we are."

"Jack?" He looked at me. "I'm sorry."

"For what?"

I looked at the top of the tent. "I don't know. Anything."

He laughed quietly, a short breath of it and flicked my arm. "Did she tell you about Ranj?"

"She said he was her son." I glanced back at him. "What was he to you?"

Almost shy, Jackson drew into himself and said, quiet, "My boyfriend." I had already guessed that. A crush, a close friend, a lover. Brushing back my hair, I was about to ask but Jackson cut in, "Some stuff happened and he- he died." He drew up to a sit and sighed deeply. "I don't really like talking about it."

"Sorry."

"Nah," he breathed. "I- he was amazing, ya know? All the people in my year who got confirmed, they- they didn't hate me, they just didn't get me. They thought I was weird because I was three places, because my form was weird, because I didn't want to be a god. I just wanted to go home. But one day, he just showed up, which annoyed everyone, why was someone like him talking to me, and he asked me if I wanted to sneak out. And I did. Then he just kept showing up. It was weird. I was so used to being attracted to other boys but I never actually thought one would be interested in me. It didn't seem right.

"But my parents liked him," he said. He laughed quietly. "Mom actually adored him. I used to think they were only okay with it, with my being gay because there wasn't any way I could actually act on it, definitely not back then, but I introduced him after he asked me out and they were sold."

Softly, I smiled up at him. "That's nice."

He nodded, tapping around his feet. He was so quiet, not as brash, and I was used to that, occasionally, when other people weren't around to bother him or stress him out. For all that he seemed extroverted, Jackson preferred his quiet moments, his silence in the comfort of individuals he liked. But it felt strange in this moment. In the years that I knew him, Jackson rarely ever got quiet when he was being personal.

He looked up at the flap, still zipped and said, after a moment, "I wanted to die when they did."

My stomach dropped. "Is that why-"

"Yes," he cut in, shooting me a long meaningful look. "That's exactly why."

It was on the tip of my tongue to apologize again but just like Jackson didn't want to talk about the things that had hurt him deeply in his past, his parents' passing, Ranj dying for whatever reason, I didn't like talking about that time.

Much like almost being murdered, it wasn't the best moment of my life.

I dropped my gaze. "I like her."

He exhaled sourly. "Can you ask her to spend the rest of her life as a man?"

I rolled my eyes. "You ask her if it's so important to you."

And just like that, we were done. Personal time was over, the rest scheduled for another day.

But it was nice, the bit I got, despite the sadness around it. It didn't explain anything about him, nothing suddenly demystified but it was something.

It was solid.

We left the tent a few minutes later. Ben was up with Kali and they were talking animatedly, him looking a tad bit more refreshed than anything else but still hollowed out, deep-set bruises around his eyes that I shouldn't have been able to see with how dark his skin was.

He grinned, all teeth. "Alex! Good morning!"

"Morning." I sat down next to Kali. "Did you do something to him?"

She shook her head. "No. I stepped out to relieve myself-" At my confused look, she muttered, "Urinate. He was awake and very... chatty."

Ben didn't pay us any mind and I didn't even know if he heard us talking or he was just being polite and ignoring us because all he did was shoot the two of us wide smiles and continue sketching out plans. "So I've been asking Kali there," he said, jerking his head towards her like I somehow was not aware she was there, "but since you're up, you can take a look too."

Jackson looked over his head. Ben didn't acknowledge him.

I wondered briefly if he even knew Jackson was up.

He flipped me the page of his sketchbook, displaying it proudly. "It's my arm!"

"Don't- don't you already have one?" I asked. "Or two?"

"I have ten," he said. "But I'm thinking aesthetic. And silicone. With some metal. Give it a steampunk look."

The sketch was fairly clear, not displaying any kind of silicone but definitely the steampunk variant he was going for.

So, I don't think I mentioned it and judging by your face I probably should, but, uh, he was talking about his prosthetic. I didn't learn about why he needed one until January but pretty much he was born without it so it's not some big story. It's just his life.

I'd seen him with a few different ones if I thought hard enough but to be fair, I don't really notice that kind of thing so I missed it when I met him and then missed it again at lunch and didn't notice until dinner the next day when he was wearing short sleeves and his prosthetic was bright green and I was trying to figure out how I missed a bright green arm.

Alright, yeah, that was a bit confusing.

Yeah, sorry about that.

"Why do you need ten?" I asked.

"Aesthetic, function, for throwing toys automatically when Fish is a dog," he rattled off, flipping the book back around. "So what do you think?"

"It- I mean, I'm not an expert but I think elbows are fairly important," I said. "Also hands?"

He blinked. Then looked down at his book. "Oh, shit."

"Yeah. But the design looks cool," I said. "Why silicone though?"

"Comfort." He kicked the arm resting by his feet. "This one is titanium, nice and light? But it digs in and hurts when I take it off. Now silicone is difficult 'cause I've never really worked with it but I tested some models and I think if I try hard enough, I can build it without having to extend from my imagination."

He trailed off, hand twisting around the book to add in the elbow and hand. After a beat, he cleared his throat. "Also, I'm sorry if I freaked you out earlier. Fish said you were concerned."

"Just a bit," I said.

He sent an apologetic look. "I don't build much straight out of my head anymore. Not as fun as getting into the dirty of it."

It felt weird to ask but I couldn't resist. "Can I see?"

He paused then set aside his book and reached out. Yanking his hand back, a black screwdriver just dropped in front of us. He picked it up, showed it off, smiling. Then held it out in his palm and watched it. It contorted, shifting up as it seemed to melt, turning different colours, reds, greens, a brief blue, and then rainbow, until the screwdriver wasn't a screwdriver, but a flopping fish, golden bright and yet rainbow shimmering scales, twisting rapidly in the exposed air. He chucked it, underhand and over our heads, into the lake.

It hit with a plop.

He cracked his knuckles out and wiped away the wet on his pants, all the while smiling. "Nothing to it."

"That was super cool," I whispered in awe.

He grinned wider. "Thank you!" Sitting back down, he picked up his book. "My mama used to hate it when I realized what I could do because I'd practice like crazy. Of course, she was proud of my studying until she realized why I was doing it but if I don't know what they're made of, how they look inside and out, how am I supposed to make them right?"

"But you can make it functional without all the right parts?" Jackson prompted, settling down next to us after sneaking a couple more peaks at Ben's book. "I'm pretty sure I've seen that..."

Ben looked Jackson over, his brows furrowed confused, but not because of Jackson, just where he'd come from. "Yeah, as long as I want to act as normal. I just like making them right. But that's how platypus came about, I think. One of us messing up and then recreating it because it was cute." He frowned and dropped his eyes, muttering under his breath, "I don't think they're that cute."

I leaned forward. "So is there an arm you didn't build yourself?"

He pointed with his pen to the one at his foot. "That one. I didn't have one until I made that one, never really needed it." He went back to sketching. "It was an accident too. Mama was trying to give me a haircut and I was not interested, just thought it'd be easier to fight back if I had two arms and then it just appeared. We were both confused."

Picking it up, he displayed the top part that cuffed over his arm stump. There were burn marks and stretches, occasional overlays of metal, from where he appeared to have widened it to fit from a small child to a small teenager, change up the thickness of his arm to mimic the other as he grew. "I have to modify it as I get older, otherwise it won't fit, but it's my best functioning one because it's magic basically. Luckily I don't grow much."

Was that because of the exertion of everything else I wondered, holding the question back because how would he know?

He undid his jacket briefly, pulling out the right side of his upper torso and shoving the prosthetic on before the cold could really hit him. Tucking his arm back inside his jacket, he wiggled it around until it fell out of the sleeve and flickered his fingertips at me, smiling loose and content.

The arm was the bright green one, I mentioned earlier. I guess it made sense he'd created as a child. Children tend to be a lot more colourful in their execution of things.

But it suited him. Behind the deadened, tired eyes and weary frame, he was upbeat.

I liked this side of him. Hoped I'd see it a lot more because frankly this was the first time.

We sat out in the sun, lingering, while the others woke up quietly to the sun. Fish and Mary recruited me to go forage for food, even though I pointed out my makeshift fishing rod and also the food we each had packed for the weekend. Kali seemed about ready to follow until Alice drew her back, asking about something I couldn't hear as I stepped into the trees. Jackson caught my arm and glanced up at Fish, a few feet ahead waiting.

"Just- call. If you need us," he reminded me.

I fingergunned at him and traipsed off, completely certain I was walking into a trap, if only because it was the first time Fish and Mary were around each other and making pleasant conversation.

A couple minutes in, I just decided to breeze out with it. "You guys are leading me into a trap, aren't you?"

Mary looked at me, my straight face, my knowing eyes, and any urge to lie that had stuck in her vanished. "Alex, if you knew this, why did you even come?"

Fish clapped his forehead. "Mary! You don't tell someone when you're going to trick them, you just trick them."

Mary shrugged. "I'm a shit liar."

"I hate you so much," Fish breathed, pulling out a rope from the bag loped around her shoulder, resting on her hip. "Look, we're just gonna tie you to this tree and then, while you call your friends, we're gonna steal your shit and run. Sound good?"

"Why?"

"Fun!" Mary chirped.

I turned to her. "Alright, fine, but if he betrays you guys, that's not on me."

Fish's eyes went wide for a brief moment, snapping to me all concerned, having forgotten what Mary had told me, and I was cinched. Mary glanced at him, realized what was going through his head before he could hide his face from her, then, "Fish!"

"It was Alice's idea!" he protested and I backed up, certain that they would either start fighting, fists and/or powers, and I'd have to run from it or that they would start arguing and I could run from it.

"Is there ever going to be a year where you don't betray us?" Mary snapped, slapping his chest.

He swatted her hands away. "Hey, don't-" His head snapped to mine. "Where are you going?"

"Um- Left?" I tested.

He frowned. "Left?"

"Yeah." I paused, not sure what else I was supposed to say or do here, then, "Bye."

Turned around and ran.

They stood there standing, maybe confused about why I'd run or just confused about me as a person, then yelled and started chasing after me. I was an unathletic fat. One was an actual dog and the other was a Warrior of Air.

You can see why I was cornered into a clearing within seconds, yeah?

I brought out my sword, hoping I could maybe intimidate them, but they didn't seem all that impressed. Fish whirled his wrist around, catching a frozen baseball bat. Mary pulled out some knives from her holster, looked at him and swatted the back of his edge with her elbow. He changed it from a bat to an ice sword, which would've been very cool to see if it hadn't been pointed at me.

In the back of my mind, I knew logically they wouldn't actually hurt me and I also knew that I could just call on Kali or Jackson or anyone to come to my rescue.

Logic doesn't really last long in my brain.

"I have no idea what I'm doing," I said loudly.

Fish gave me a thumbs-up then charged forward. I avoided because I avoid. If the fight or flight response could be manually set, mine would still be stuck and lodged hard on flight and no amount of push or pulling it would or will ever move it.

Mary lunged forward, knives arcing just past my face. I dodged, ducking her hand and shoving my hands against her stomach. She grunted fell back.

Kali! I thought but she didn't appear because voice, voice, voice!

I couldn't make it work, circling back as Mary stood in front of me. Fish came in from the side and I darted around, not thinking until Mary caught me round the waist.

Arc of metal. Sword. Screaming. Someone- my name, he was calling for me- he was- and they-

Everyone was dying.

That thought hit me like a tidal wave, slamming hard into my chest, all the alarms of danger, evil, bad, bad, GET AWAY-

Mary grunted as my elbow slammed into her stomach, moving without thought. Only the hit registered, shooting pain up my arm and then-

I shouted, dropping my sword as my hand exploded into flames.

She'd cut me.

It was an accident, the knives still in her hand when I elbowed her and coming down with the hit, but she'd hit my skin, cut right into it and split a thin shaky line down my palm. It burned, took over my hand and burned down to my elbow, meeting the pain from the earlier hit and cascading, gross and overwhelming.

My ears rung, the pain moving into first gear as it echoed through my head, thick.

Around me someone was swearing.

"You-" Fish's voice cut out, garbled and chunky under the heat of pain that twisted through my mind. "kill- him!"

WHAT?

Hot breath curved over my ear, too warm, too burning, I couldn't- who was-

"I didn't kill him! I just cut him! Alex?" Mary's face loomed over mind, trying to get me to look at her. "Hey, why you freaking out, man?"

Her bag, velcro unsnapping, Fish nearby, "What are-"

"First aid!"

First-

Aid.

Aid.

No.

No.

The rip of gauze and- Alcohol. A terrible smell. An awful smell. So sanitizing and powerful, the moment the stench of it hit me, the pain in my hand burst harder, hotter, over-enveloping to the point where I could only think of getting away.

Clenching my hand into a fist so tight the burning heat of pressure overtook the pain and let me calm down by a fraction of a percent, I pushed back out of her grip, ducked under Fish's reaching arm and bolted into the trees.

Keep running, keep running.

I avoided trees, avoided low hanging branches, avoided thick bristles of bush and avoided thinking about how the voice in my head didn't sound a thing like me. Behind me, Fish and Mary kept calling for me, their voices fading, panicked and unnerved. At the last minute, I ducked around the trunk of a tree, nice and thick, and hid while they brushed past me, not noticing, too worried to notice.

Exhaling shortly, I slid to a sit, back against the tree and held my hand tight to my chest. My fist didn't drop even though the stretch of my muscles grew bunched and exhausted from being held so harsh but my stomach churned at the thought of opening myself up to pain, anxiety spiking in my head like a river and I nearly hyperventilated into the snow.

The fact that I didn't pass out immediately was a good sign.

But, it also could've been adrenaline and fear combo-ed up to magnify the edge I was teetering on.

With shaky breath and nerves, I finally stood up and slunk around the tree to meet a little girl. She looked to be around Katelynn's age, maybe a year or so older. Pretty similar to Katie too, dark-skinned, brown eyes, thick afro curls tied back into tight bun. She had squinting eyes, narrowed up at me, and her lips were withdrawn.

Peeking between her hair right from her skull were thick stubby horns.

The moment she caught sight of me, she moved quick, clamping a cuff around my wrist. A chain dangled from the edge, connected to her wrist at a thick black band, almost like a bracelet. She smiled proud and for a moment, confusion took me over, why was she smiling at then-

We were off.

She darted through the trees, said nothing the entire time, just yanked me on and on. I had no choice but to follow. The thought of not moving, of standing still, impeding her, didn't even pass through my head.

I doubt it would've mattered.

My help in the situation was minimal, everything about me struggling to process what was happening, what had happened, and thereby not really moving as fast as I could've. Yet she was tugging me along like it was nothing.

Freezing, she doubled back, grabbed me and pulled me down. Overhead voice echoed, talking low amongst themselves. I breathed hotly, trying to keep my exhales slow and low, but she clamped her hand, so small and dainty like a doll, over my mouth and scowled down at me. Her eyes burned a violent red. The voices vanished and she peeked over the bridge of leaves that surrounded us, then shot up.

"Where is it?" she growled, looking around.

I stared at her blankly from the ground then said, "You're a Demon?"

She shot me a dirty look and snapped her eyes away.

Yes.

Yes, she was.

And she was trying to kidnap me.

Oh, fan-fucking-tastic.

She flicked her bracelet twice then scowled and groaned low under her breath before dragging me fast to the left.

Now I'm sure you're probably thinking something like "Alex, if this really happened, wouldn't you have called on your friends by now? Why haven't you done that yet?"

Yes, that's exactly what I'm thinking.

Great. So you have to consider these options. One, I was still trying to process things and understood what was happening but from, like, a distance. Two, she was a small child who I knew was going to be killed immediately and the thought of a dead strangled tiny tiny body did not sit well with me. Three, I am an idiot.

She slowed her speed when she noticed how well I was cooperating, not saying anything. Speed was of the essence when I could come get someone to kill her at any point but when I kept doubling after her, even after she stopped every few minutes to check her bracelet, she seemed to get the point that I wasn't interested. All she did was send me annoyed and confused looks every few seconds.

The question was in her face: Do you want to die?

The answer there is a vague not really?

I mean, I don't want to die. I'm not depressed or suicidal. I just was aware that I was probably going to and couldn't think past "oh, it's happening sooner than I expected" to maybe consider the option that I didn't have to.

But every time the thought of calling for someone echoed through my head, thunderous and loud, her body showed up, small and dainty, and skewered on a stick.

Blood.

Too much blood.

I didn't want it to be a reality.

Finally, she glowered up at me, hitting her bracelet for the millionth time. "Why do you keep holding your hand like that?"

"Cut," I said blankly.

My voice didn't sound real.

I frowned.

Why didn't it sound real?

Everything felt kind of like a mirage. Or a dream.

I was waiting to wake up.

She stared at me then took my hand down, fiddling with her pocket. Without looking at me, she said, "If I bring you in undamaged, they'll feed me."

My brain didn't catch that. "What?"

She tried unpeeling my fingers but that didn't work because I was not interested. Which says a lot about me that the only time I was resisting her was so I wouldn't expose a wound I'd been holding so tightly my hand went stiff and numb. She glared at me but then pulled out a handful of golden powder, dusting over the extent of my whole hand.

The numbness faded.

Tentatively, I unfurled one finger and when my skin didn't burn, I let my hand fall flat open. No wound.

I stared at my healed palm. "Thank you?"

She smiled, gently, the first smile I'd seen on her and it caught me so quick. She was a kid. She was a kid. A baby.

She didn't want to do this.

She just didn't have a choice.

Maybe I could-

Her smile vanished, eyes snapping wide, as she jerked to see something behind me. "Shit!"

She yanked me quick away, just as a thump echoed behind us. Kali's voice called out my name. My stomach dropped.

No.

Oh no.

I tried to pick up the pace but there's only so fast I can run and my instinct rarely was to run from Kali, Kali who caught me before I could fall off the jungle gym and who defended me when we had subs that didn't understand that I'm not supposed to play dodgeball.

Jackson dropped down from the trees in front of us, murder in his eyes. I backed up, then jerked in front of her. His eyes widened, understanding why but still shocked.

"Alex, get out of the way!"

"She's a kid, Jack!" I yelled, arm in front her. Kali slid in and I spun, pushing the girl out of the way while they cornered us. "She doesn't have a choice. You don't-"

"She's trying to kill you!" he yelled but he didn't charge.

His eyes, her eyes, both of them were frantic, looking me over. The little girl edged up close. Her fingers were shaking, bumping up against my back.

She was mumbling something I couldn't hear or maybe couldn't focus on as I pleaded, "She's just a child! You think she wants to do this? She's a kid!"

Do it.

What?

"Alex-" Kali started, her voice a warning, and her lips kept moving but I couldn't- I couldn't focus on her words, a jarbled mess of sounds and tone, all hidden under the voice echoing very loud in my head.

Do it now.

Do what? Who was talking to me?

The little girl was whispering under her breath. They were pleads, quiet begs.

No. Please no.

Who was she talking to? I backed up, trying to shield her as Kali and Jackson moved forward, their voices talking at me but I couldn't-

I SAID DO IT NOW!

Something grabbed my arm.

Looking back on it, I don't think her intention was to snap it. But she did. Right at the forearm. Pain thudded through my head. The world burst black and blue and stars.

I hit the ground just as everything vanished sudden, all black and hollow.

|  |

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# Chapter Seven

She didn't want to.

It was the first thing I thought when I woke up. She didn't want to, she didn't want to, someone made her. Someone made her. Someone she could hear. Someone I could hear.

Someone other people couldn't.

They said someone told them to do it.

I stared at the white ceiling, not sure where I was, not caring.

They all said someone told them to do it. Someone no one else knew. Someone only they could hear.

Someone I heard.

I was a Demon.

The fact didn't shock me. It just labeled into all the other facts about me. I was a Demon. I was bigender. I was bi. I was mixed race.

I was a lot of things.

Monster never seemed like one of them.

I looked down at my arm then raised it above my head. There was a weird scar where she must've snapped the bone through the skin, where they couldn't heal it all perfect smooth, but I just let my arm fall flat onto my chest, not caring. I felt so numb, empty, hollowed out like someone removed all my innards while I slept.

I was a Demon.

And my friends knew.

They knew.

And the little girl was dead. Wasn't she? I thought about it. And then I sat up, swung my legs over the cot and stared at the ground.

She was dead.

She was dead.

I was certain of it. There was no other way. Maybe if she hadn't broken my arm. Maybe if I wasn't a coward.

Maybe if I could just be a fucking person-

Oh, but I wasn't, right?

Monster, monster, monster.

I caught sight of my reflection in the metal stand of the weight-height tool, warped and barely visibly but me, me, me, me.

Hitting the ground with a soft step, I found my shoes, settled at the end of the cot, and stepped into them just as the curtain swung open. Alice was looking up at me, relieved.

"Hey," she breathed. "You were out all weekend. Was a bit worried."

Rubbing my arm, just above the scar, the memory spiking through my head of blinding pain, I asked, "What day is it?"

"Sunday," she said. "Healing magic can take a lot from a person because it's not just the magic working. Has to speed up the system and stuff. Which is taxing. Luckily, I'm here to help that process! Demigod fun and all that."

My face fell. "Sorry you had to miss the game."

"Oh." She paused, bit her lip then shook her head. "No, they canceled it after..."

She didn't finish but I got the gist. After my arm was snapped. After the little girl died. After me, after her, after all the bullshit I'd brought with my presence.

For a moment, I wanted to say something, reveal myself, see how'd she take it. I wasn't certain of course but I dunno. Maybe she would've gotten upset that after everything Fish and her stepdad had been through, the fact that I, a Demon, got picked to be a Warrior of the Gods would piss her off enough to snap my neck. She didn't seem like the type of person, but I'd heard the jokes from everyone else about her "Roman" side enough to know that she could twist in an instant if she really wanted.

Fish wasn't the only overprotective sibling.

But I held back and finished typing up my laces. "What happened to her?"

She looked confused for all of a second before her face twisted, uncomfortable. "Oh, well, she-"

"Dead, right?"

She swallowed thick enough I saw her Adam's apple, or Eve's apple as my Lawbling[65] Marshall likes to joke, bob. "Yeah. Pretty quick after."

"Cool," I said, voice vague. "Where are they?"

Alice's eyes turned concerned. "Oh, well, I was supposed to call-"

"Nevermind, I can find them," I cut in, scoping out the area for any more of my stuff. Nope. All good.

I stepped past her. baffled by my tone, my attitude, she reached out and snagged my arm. I flinched, the pain of being snapped memorying its way back into my head. She dropped it immediately, her voice all kinds of concerned.

"Alex, are you okay? You look a bit tense." She brushed back her hair. "I think you need to lie down."

"I'm fine," I said, tone clipped, trying for breezy and failing a mile away. "I just want to see my friends. The god ones."

She tilted her head. "Okay," she said slow. "Maybe you can wait for them to come and get you?"

"Nope!" I said, popping the P and turning on my heel to walk, quick, out of the room.

"But-" She stopped then said nothing else, leaving me to rush out of the room without any reason or explanation for my hurriedness, my rushing.

I walked through the tunnel to the dorms then sped up the stairs, pushing open my dorm which was already open. The whole way over my mind was stupendously blank, nothing in it at all, save for the focus on moving forward, focus on every step I took, until I got to my room.

Inside Kali was pacing up a storm while Jackson fiddled with my things, rearranging everything over. It was clean, everything so meticulously tidied and neat that I knew he'd probably been doing this for hours.

I let the door fall shut behind me, cutting them off before they could say anything to the looks of sudden relief on their face. "Is this room soundproof?"

Jackson, standing up, faltered. "Uh, yeah? I think it is." He glanced at Kali, who paused for a hot second before nodding.

"Yes," she said. "In the event, you need to discuss something quickly but I do not think it is necessary. Everyone is at lunch."

"Oh, cool," I said breezy tone not so breezy, voice clipped, tone broken. "So when were guys going to tell me I was a Demon?"

They both froze, the truth shocking wide in their eyes because they never thought I'd figure it out. Never thought I'd know.

Then, like clockwork, their faces fell, amused. Jackson leaned close. "Al, did you hit your head on the way down? I mean we checked but maybe we missed it."

He reached out, as though to tap my head, see if it was secretly wounded, but I batted his hand away and glowered at him. "So I am?"

"Do not be ridiculous," Kali said.

"Stop lying to me," and that was the first order I'd ever given them. "Tell the fucking truth." That was the second. "Am I a Demon?"

Jackson jerked, his hands immediately flying to his mouth, voice muffled. Kali glared at him, her lips pressed tight.

Never said they had to answer.

"Answer me."

Third.

So quick, so many, in such a short amount of time.

In books, the jump from learning what you were to what you secretly also were was always so spaced out, allowing for growth, ready acceptance when the time came and secret kisses under the bleacher with a hot guy. Or girl. Or enby.

Apparently, that doesn't span in real life.

Jackson's hand dropped and he was gone.

"Yes."

My heart cracked.

"Yes, you are."

"Oh," I said, voice chipped. "Great." I clasped my hand and stared hollowly at both of them, voice firm, venomous, a tone, a feeling, I'd never felt towards either of them. "So when are you going to kill me?"

Kali jerked, her eyes flashing angry. "Alex, we would never-"

"You murdered a child," I whispered hotly. "A child who didn't want-

"SHE BROKE YOUR ARM!" Jackson yelled.

"-TO HURT ME!" I finished, voice screaming over top of his. I threw my arms out, angry. "She didn't want! He told her to! THAT'S HOW I FUCKING KNOW!"

Kali froze, her eyes wide. It didn't click for Jackson, not right away, but for her she knew. She knew.

They had been right.

Someone had been forcing them to do what they'd done in the past.

And she'd gone and tore them up anyway.

I cocked my head, staring at her. "So when are you going to kill me? Soon right? Because I know?" I gestured roughly at her, laughing without voice. "Why don't you just do it now? Get it out of the way?"

Hurt, offended, mad, she glared at me, everything about her so powerful and overwhelming but I didn't care. I couldn't care.

She picked me out of a lineup, knowing exactly what I was. She made me love her, she befriended me, only to run the risk of having to destroy me some day.

And that was way worse than anything else she could've done to me.

"How dare you think that I would ever hurt you?" she snapped. "I am your friend!"

"A friend doesn't pick a child they know to be a Demon, a thing they kill, to be their protector," I spat and the anger, the malice in me, it felt so wrong, it didn't sit well but I couldn't breathe around the thoughts, the words falling from my mouth, angry, miserably and hot.

So unlike me and yet-

"I just want to know why," I hissed.

She stared at me, then stepped to the side, gesturing to my bed. I walked between them and sat down, waiting.

For a few seconds she was quiet, collecting herself. The tension hadn't vanished but held thick and distrusting between us. Jackson squirmed, uncomfortable. Then finally, she cleared her throat.

"We found you in a small village in the Sahara," she started, looking me dead in the eyes. "We had heard talk of Demons in the area, a numerous amount, and felt it best to come directly to assess the situation. They were living, a good hundred of them, right where we were told they would be. We..." She failed.

"Killed them," I said flatly. "How many were kids?"

Jackson's face went slack, his hand flying up to his mouth.

A good number then.

Watching him, Kali continued on. "There was strange magic in the area. Our Warrior, Coral, was a demigod, the daughter of Heka[66]. She was able to locate the magic faster than the rest of us. We uncovered it, discovering a house. Inside was empty. We searched, trying to decipher what they were trying to hide from us."

"Then Coral heard a baby crying," Jackson said, voice muffled.

A flash of metal.

He was calling my name.

They had tried to kill me.

My stomach jerked, uncomfortable, angry, scared, horrified. No wonder I tried to run so many times. I felt the magic around me and knew it was the wrong kind, knew it was kind that tried to hurt me.

The kind that had killed my family.

"We, um-" Jackson swallowed, shifting awkwardly, his voice thick. "We looked for the sound and then your dad, this black guy, just kind of jumped out of nowhere, tried to stop us. But, uh, Coral killed him and then went to go-"

"Kill me," I said.

That's why her face felt vaguely familiar.

Like I'd seen it already.

"Your mother, I suppose, she tried to stop her," Jackson went on, still not looking at me. "And I-"

Killed her.

Killed him.

Killed them.

I was friends with murderers.

"We located you quickly after," Kali cut in as I stared at the ground, sick twisting inside me. "Your father was not truly dead and before we could, um-" Kill me, kill me, before she could kill me. "He killed Coral and tried to protect you from us. We did not know why it was so important to him-"

"I was his child," I said. Everything in me was on fire. "I was his child and you're questioning why he wanted to make sure I didn't die?"

"Alex-"

"No! No, keep going," I said. "Keep telling me how you murdered my entire family. Because my report says they left me in an abandoned house, with only a birth certificate and a family photo I never saw!" I shot to my feet. "I love my parents but do you know how awful it is to sit around and wonder why they didn't just hand me in?" I shouted. Jackson flinched but Kali stood there frozen solid. "WHY THEY JUST LEFT ME THERE?

"But they didn't!" I said. "They didn't leave me. They wanted me and you two KILLED THEM! AND THEN YOU SAID THEY LEFT ME!"

When I was little and I got scared and hid in a closet or under the bed or deep in the basement under a mound of dirty laundry, Carlita had a neat trick to getting me to calm down and come out without forcing me. She'd sit and read my reports. The one from the foster care agency. The one from the police. Sometimes both if I was being finicky.

I don't know why it helped but I'd recite the words she'd said to me in my head sometimes to calm down.

I hadn't done that in ages.

But I was found, approximately a year old and in good health, in an empty country house just outside the city limits. The place had been emptied as if in a hurry. I was in a crib. My birth certificate was left lying out in the open. They thought it was an accident but weren't sure. A single family photo was left behind in the haste, something I'd never seen because it didn't exist but I just thought it had been tucked away in a file somewhere and wasn't interested in looking at it anyway.

They never left a note explaining why they'd rushed away in such a hurry or why they left me behind. Someone supposedly heard me crying as they were fixing up a popped tire and called the police when they found me, alone, abandoned.

Maybe that's why it was so calming to hear Carlita repeat the words.

Because my starter family, my birth parents, they didn't want me, didn't care enough to just dump me off at a hospital or a fire station. But Carlita liked me. She liked me enough to come downstairs where it was dark and scary and ask me if I was okay.

Even if she didn't adopt me, she still kind of wanted me.

But I was wrong.

They didn't abandon me.

They died. They were killed.

They had to leave me.

"Why did you let me live?" I asked, voice at a toneless whisper.

"We- Um-" For the first time, Kali was faltering.

Jackson snapped his head up, looking above me. "Oh, we didn't- we didn't think you were really a Demon, you didn't look-"

That snapped a cord in me. "I didn't look like one?"

Jackson stopped.

He'd hit the wrong note and failed the whole performance. "Alex-"

"I didn't look like one so I couldn't have been one," I said, my tone thin. I swallowed around all the anger, all the hatred in my chest, all the betrayal I felt because he should've known better. "So funny because Nick doesn't look white at all and they're still mixed."

"That's different," he said.

"You don't get to say that!" I snapped. I pointed roughly at him. "You don't get to say I'm not what I am just because you don't fucking want to be!"

He jerked, eyes angry for the hottest second. But I ignored it.

"Just because I don't look like a Demon doesn't erase the fact that I am one! I was in the fucking village! I was protected, I was hidden, I was important to them!" I balled up my hands into fists. "Even if I'm not fully a Demon, I'm still part of one! If it counts for Fish, if it counts for Katie, it counts for me!"

"Alex-"

"You don't get it!" I shouted. "You don't know how annoying it is to see people do a double take every single time I say Mom is Mom! AND THIS IS BROKES! But there's always a hesitation! But at least they don't question it! Then they find out I'm adopted and I see it," I hissed. "I see it! They think I call myself that because they're my parents but it's not real. But it is! It's on my birth certificate. You two just said it!"

"Alex," Kali started, her voice irritatingly patient but her eyes wary. "Calm down please."

"NO!" I shouted, waving at her. "You picked me! Knowing that you were going be friend, knowing that you might have to kill me! You knew!"

"We didn't-"

"YOU KNEW!"

"NO, WE DIDN'T," Jackson yelled. He cut his arm through the air, a sharp arc, as though splitting the air between us in a nice violent line. "WE WEREN'T MEANT TO BE YOUR FRIENDS!"

That shot me down in an instant, all the fight escaping from me like a deflated balloon. I fell back into the bed. Jackson's eyes were clamped shut, his chest heaving, and then his words hit him and he froze up.

I pushed back as he stepped close.

"Alex, wait-"

"Get out."

They both went still, staring at me.

I threw my pillow at them.

"GET OUT!"

Before it could touch them, they were gone, leaving behind haunted eyes and sorry faces.

I sank back into my bed, trembling. The tremors turned to violent shakes turned to choking back sobs turned to me sliding out of my bed, crying in thick heavy bursts to the ground.

** ** **

Hours later, I hunched out of the bathroom, deciding with a semi-clear head that I was going to set up a schedule of studying that I'd never follow. Kali and Jackson hadn't come back yet. They weren't there after I finally woke up, face crusted with the tears I'd cried myself to sleep with. They weren't there after I took a long hot shower and they weren't there as I exited the bathroom a second time, hollowness turning into a strange attempt at productivity.

My phone was still open and on. After I woke up, I'd tried writing messages to my parents. Angry ones at first, asking if they were there when the decision to get rid of me was still in the air. I'd deleted those quick. The hurt look I could imagine on my dad's face stung me more than anything else. Miserably ones came next, whining about the issue. I deleted those to, not wanting to talk about it, not knowing how to complain, and knowing Mom would call me the minute she saw them. Tried to hash out empty ones, asking how the day was, telling them I was okay since, judging by Dad's rushed messages, they knew about my arm.

But I deleted those too. They sounded too fake. And I didn't want to talk.

I didn't doubt that they'd known. Of course they had. Layla likely did too. It explained why I didn't get told until now. It explained why my dad had said, "Something like that" when I joked that it was about turning evil. Why Layla seemed so wary of me.

But despite the fact that they knew, they still willingly took me in anyway so that had to count for something.

Right?

Still, I couldn't stomach talking to them or to anyone. Not even Nick, who was always my go-to when I had no one else I could emote to.

And it clicked then too.

The man Nick killed. Hadn't been trying to kill me because I was a Warrior. He'd been trying to kill me because I was a monster. A Demon.

Supposed to be dead.

Why wasn't I dead?

Stupid question. The answer was so obvious. I was hidden when no one else was. I was encroached in power. They couldn't justify keeping me around to test me out, to see why I was hidden, because I was a Demon. But lucky, lucky their Warrior just got dead so they could just give me that! That way they could put people in charge of observing me and maybe figure out why I was so meticulously hidden in the process.

And if nothing came of it, then it was all good. They'd just kill me, because Demon, and appoint someone else.

My friends weren't meant to be my friends. It was an accident.

For all they said they loved me, they never wanted to. That was an accident. I mean, no one ever goes into a friendship hoping they'll love the person at the end of it all but at least when they do it's not an actual accident to have done it.

But I was a finicky nervous child. I saw monsters everywhere. I was paranoid. Danger ruled my life and I fled from everything. Of course, they had to befriend me. It was the only way to watch me without freaking me out.

But did they have to do it so well? Knowing they were probably going to have to slit my throat in the future?

At the thought, my hand jerked to my throat, wincing. I pushed the image out of my head and sank down into my chair.

Well, at least when I had no one, I still had Nick. Nick who was leaving Wednesday and Nick who I couldn't bring myself to talk to.

So I had no one.

Great.

Fantastic.

Wonderful.

No wonder Kali had been frowning about all my talks about changing all the shitty stuff in the rules. I was the shitty stuff, top of the list. No one was going to listen to me, a foe masquerading around as a friend.

A friend, a friend, I thought, hefting my phone into my hand. Katelynn's name was bolded at the top of my alerts. MUTANT with a short one of a new message and the words "I know". Of course she knew.

My darling Mutant.

Future seer. Knower of all.

Did she always know what I was?

The message beeped again. No.

I laughed. Wondered what universe she saw me sending that message, that question, or how many hours, days, months, years later I'd bring it up to her, saying I'd thought about asking her the question. Sometimes that happened. Other times, she was just good at guessing what I was thinking from the expressions on my face.

Another beep, followed by a picture of Nick passed out on the couch. Then, They love you. Won't change, okay? Smile face.

I smiled.

Good sister.

She went offline, probably deciding that drawing mustaches on Nick's face was the pertinent thing here to do, and I went back to moping, deciding that I just wanted everything to go back to normal, wished I could reverse time back to that day, literal days ago. Maybe I could've changed it all. Snuck a bit of bleach into Mrs. Hern's hot chocolate since she was going to die anyway. The thought made me sick but I ignored it, continuing my fantasy.

Then the Dreamkeeper wouldn't have taken her over and I could've gone downstairs to get the movie, gone back upstairs and watched it. Jackson and Kali would still be Jackson and Kali, two kids I was friends with and comfortable with and happy with and loved like crazy, not two gods I wasn't supposed to be friends with, who were technically virtual strangers.

My mom would've come back from the store and whipped us up something while she graded papers. Dad would've been made dinner from turkey and ham leftovers, if we didn't eat it all up during the day. At midnight, I'd go to sleep, texting Nick stupid memes, scrolling through Tumblr and laughing at dumb cat videos.

When I woke up, I'd go to Nick's, hang out with Katelynn for a while as Nick stayed glued to their bed, then we'd march into the city, meet up with the others, have fun, hang out, be together, happy and comfortable.

The fantasy played out for the next hour or so, so simple and easy but so hard to deduce. It was all up to happenstance, universes and worlds away. Only Katelynn knew the specifics of any of them.

Quietly it passed through my head. How long had she'd known?

She'd never treated me any different. Maybe she always knew. But Katelynn saw everything and didn't let any of what she saw flounder her. Sometimes she'd drag along an umbrella when she saw it was going to rain despite clear skies and uninformed weathermen. One time, she'd dragged out a whole change of clothes out of her bag when Kali randomly remarked that we should go to the beach and Jackson groaned that none of us had anything for swimming.

But her feelings, her emotions, nah.

She saw everything but unlike others, who sometimes got stuck in a bad future or stayed waiting for a good one to come to pass, she carried on. She'd never let the everything consume her.

Such a smart girl.

I tapped her icon and typed, Tell them for me.

After a beat, she was back.

Okay.

** ** **

Classes were postponed to Wednesday. It was Tuesday afternoon now, a full two days after I'd learned it all, and I still hadn't called Kali or Jackson back. And they were staying smart, keeping away. I also avoided the shit out of everyone else.

I didn't eat until the peak time for people in the cafeteria had waned and just snuck food back to my room. I pretty didn't leave my room except for food. I didn't talk to or call or text anyone after I sent Katelynn that message.

I just hid.

Cuddled deep in my blankets, eating a quick grilled cheese out of the stack I'd made first thing that morning, I wondered if I could just hide forever. But classes started Wednesday. So I'd have to leave eventually. People would talk to me eventually.

And as much as I would've liked to, despite how disgusting it was growing to be, I could not live off of hastily made cheese sandwiches and tap water forever.

Stupid human dietary-

I froze.

No.

Stupid Demon dietary needs and limits.

Catching sight of myself in the closet mirror, I wondered why I didn't look like a Demon. Probably for the same reason I didn't look black. Genetics. Maybe one of my parents had been human. I highly doubted every single kid came out like Fish or Katelynn. There had to be the ones who were mixed but looked like a Demons, without the powers or abilities of a Hybrid. Or the ones who were mixed but looked human, nice and normal. Like me.

Mixed but not always clear that they were.

But how would I know? The only people who could answer my question were dead. And it wasn't like the people who killed them let them live long enough to ask. Or even cared.

Still a Demon, I thought, staring at my blonde hair and darkly tanned skin. I looked away. Still mixed.

But if there were variations - horns, tails, wings - couldn't that mean that looking human was just another variation? Passing as it were.

I locked my head, stared at the ceiling, cheese tasteless and flat in my mouth.

Still mixed, I thought. My birth dad was a black man. Which meant my mom had to be something else for the blonde to happen. White seemed most likely but anything else could've worked, I guess. But I liked white. It was like my parents, my actual parents, the ones who raised me even if they didn't have me, just the genders swapped up.

I knew the difference. I knew who was really my family and who wasn't. I knew a person who I didn't know wasn't really my mom or my dad just because I happened to have a mix-up of their genes. Dad was still Dad, Mom was still Mom and the other two, the birthing factors, were just DNA.

I still felt bad for them.

I still felt miserable about.

It was one thing if they didn't want me. It was one thing if they gave me up willingly. But they fought, supposedly, to the very end to make sure I was safe, probably thought as they died that I would be there soon with them and it didn't happen.

That was a whole new can of worms I had to ruffle my way through.

But at least now I knew they didn't leave me behind to die.

As I leaned back, I wondered what he'd been calling me. Scott, which is my deadname, now moved to middle name because Cornelius was not sticking around if I was changing stuff, seemed unlikely. It was something longer, something nicer, tucked away in a memory I'd never fully unlock. But whatever it was, I knew it was my name.

I remembered that. As vague as it was, I remembered he was saying my name.

Right before the sword gutted him.

My chest panged.

Maybe it was Scott.

I pushed off the ground, set my sandwiches aside and remade my bed for the third time that morning, pulling my socks all the way to my knee and settling down in my chair. My phone buzzed beside my computer. I ignored it, leaning back.

Maybe if I ignored everything the world would forget I existed and I could disappear, become someone new.

A librarian in California. I spun around twice then started looking into becoming a librarian. Saw the words Master's Degree and exited out of Chrome, pressing my face into the cool side of the table. So back to accounting. Bachelor's degree. CPA.

Easy peasy, good money and numbers.

I loved numbers.

With that thought, I brought up my favourite math websites-

Oh my God.

-and started playing around on them.

I don't remember how many games or how many hours, minutes, days, what have you that he showed up but it wasn't that far down from me giving up on working through all the problems around me and choosing to play math games like a dip.

But I felt it the moment he did. My skin prickled. Mental alarm bells echoed.

I swung around. It wasn't Jackson or Kali, just some nice Indian man in a tailored suit, colourful bangles on his wrist. He smiled pleasantly at me. I resisted the urge to smile back, wanting to be sullen and put off.

It worked but for whatever reason, I didn't like that it had.

"And you are?" I asked, gesturing out.

He held out his hand. "Shiva."

Kali's husband. I immediately dropped my hand from his hand and spun around. "Okay."

He didn't seem perturbed by this, probably expecting it because I'm a teenager and moodiness after accidental betrayal and heartbreak should definitely be expected. "Kali's told me quite a lot about you."

Cultured accent. Bit of a British twang in it but thick, more leaning to what Kali had. Stupid white people breaking into places. Messing up the gods.

"Okay," I repeated because what else was there to say?

"She would like to know if you're alright." My fingers curled, angry. Didn't want to talk to her. "She'd ask in person but she wasn't sure if you wanted to discuss it with her."

"No," I said, short. "I don't."

He made a quick humming noise. "Perhaps I could shed some light on the situation."

A bitter laugh echoed from me followed by a curt, "No thanks."

He conjured up a chair and sat down next to me anyway. I ignored him. Folding his hands over top of each other, he looked at my face, tried to see my eyes but I refused to make eye contact, and said, "You see we don't normally befriend our Warriors. It can make it difficult if the time comes to ever..." He paused then, tone cautious, continued, "Remove them. Attachments can run deep, as you know."

Making a vague noise, I opened my bookmarked page to the CPA website and began rereading my requirements again.

He went on anyway. "In some cases, though, we haven't much choice. Either they are moving on a different path we don't wish or, in your case, they are far too wary and unnerved by the presence of someone watching."

Without looking at him, I cut in, "Luckily the other unlucky dopes already knew." I snapped my gaze to him. "I didn't. That's what makes it a joke." I spun my chair to face him. "That's what makes it aggravating. That even in any other case, those Warriors got to know what they were and they likely knew that if they did anything wrong those people that said they were their friends would kill them. And they got to figure out how much they wanted to give." I stood up sharply, feet thumping against the ground. "I didn't get that chance to decide and now it's fucked me over.

"So, no, I'm not alright. I trusted her and whether she loves me or not, doesn't erase the fact that she knew she might have to kill me for being what I am and still chose to vote me in. At least the others never had the risk looming over their head, got to avoid it. I can't avoid myself!" I snapped.

His expression, calm, pleasant, relaxed, never changed. "I understand. I did urge her not to suggest you, that it would be best we removed you in that moment, but my wife is a forceful woman. She was determined you might be of use in uncovering whatever plot they have going on." I opened my mouth, to angrily complain, refute that, or to shout or scream obscenities or to tell him to leave, I didn't know, but he held up one finger and stood slow. "But she cares for you very much. To the point where she has come to me, several times, complaining that she made a mistake. That I was right. She should've gotten rid of you then and there instead of running the risk of loving you, only to have that possibility of hurting you lie over both your heads."

I went still.

I didn't know what to say to that.

So she knew it was a mistake. She cared about me enough to realize that she didn't want me to die. It didn't make what she'd done, what they'd both done, hurt any less. It didn't change that she never considered liking me a possibility.

Shiva went on. "They both care for you and have been arguing for your life since yesterday. I am pleased to state they were successful. Not that there was much resistance." He smiled pleasantly again, either ignoring the fact that I hadn't the faintest clue that my life had even been on the line or just trying to keep the mood calm. "You will be fine. And when you are ready, my wife would enjoy seeing you again."

He vanished without another word, not even a pause to let me get something in.

I stared at the space he'd been taking up, he'd been existing, physical and real, in. Then I sat down.

I didn't know what to say or think or do.

So I spun in my chair and did nothing.

|  |

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# Chapter Eight

After the first week of awkward classes, most of which I spent introducing myself to people who kept staring at me, probably wondering where my gods were or thinking "this is the kid they picked?" or maybe "yeah, I can believe he got his arm snapped by a child", I settled down, Friday afternoon, into my room and looked up at the figurines atop my dresser.

Nick, who Jackson and Kali still considered a friend even if they were mine first, had sent me annoyed messages telling me to talk to them because apparently, they were hanging around them and their dorm instead. Nick, who said, "I know", when I showed up, parents behind me, the airport to see them off and then teased me about my hair needing a cut.

My parents had been pretty adamant about it too. That and making it clear that I wasn't supposed to tell anyone about the thing, but I wanted to take my time. While they were gone, I hung out with Lena and her mass, which was fun. Ben was a lot more lively after his test. None of them asked where Kali or Jackson were and I never explained. I doubted, unless the walls weren't soundproof, they guessed I was a Demon and had angrily pushed my friends out of my life for not killing me when they could've, when they should've, but figured, from the way I'd talked with Alice after I woke up, that they probably thought I was uncomfortable around people who killed children.

I was, but that didn't mean it was the reason.

I sighed and leaned back. "Alright. Hurry up before I change my mind."

They were there in seconds. Jackson was already spilling apology after apology and Kali just kept throwing roses at me, symbolic of when we were eleven and I was avoiding them because, I guess, in their haste to not reveal themselves as gods, they got a bit rude about my beliefs.

After a few days my parents let them up, Jackson gave some weird dramatic speech about friendship and Kali threw roses at my face, saying, "I love you" over and over again.

It was nice they still remembered that. I barely remembered.

Catching one rose from the air, I cleared my throat. "Stop."

It wasn't an order but they did.

I twisted the rose in my hand, thorns removed, but flower blooming. Placing it beside me, I looked up at them. No red eyes from crying or blotching skin. They looked normal, just like when they left save for a change of clothes.

Sorry.

Apologetic.

Please don't hate me faces.

"Thanks for saving my life," I said, bushing back my hair. I tried for a breezy smile and came up just a tad bit short. "Guess that evens out the being-okay-with-murdering-me part."

Kali's shoulders relax. "I am sorry."

I waved her off. "I don't want to talk about it. Bad jujus. What's important is that you guys don't have to and because, I'm not evil and don't have the capacity for it, probably never will."

The "probably" hung between us like a grenade.

I cleared my throat and waved my hand around. "But you did hurt my feelings so I want two very honest answers from each of you."

Jackson spread his arms. "Try me, babe."

I rolled my eyes and glanced at Kali. "Is your favourite colour actually blue?"

Her eyes sparked amused, a little lost, but she nodded and smiled. "Yes."

"And you-" I pointed at Jackson. "Exactly how far we talking?"

"I don't really think it matters," he said quickly.

"Oh my god, you complete virgin."

"Look, I've touched dick okay! Maybe it wasn't directly but it still counts!" he shot back.

Kali choked on a laugh, blocking her mouth with her hand and grinning widely at me. I grinned widely back, all teeth, all cheek. I leaned back. "Alright, last question for both of you," I started, smoothing out the place beside me. I faltered with it for a moment, trying to get up the nerve, trying not to cave, and then finally I did it. "If they said I had to die, what would you do?"

Jackson went stiff, shot a look at Kali. "Very true, very honest?"

I nodded.

She looked at him then me and in the clearest voice she'd ever mustered, "I would take you and I would run."

Jackson nodded. "Same. Just straight up flee. Keep you safe until you die. Naturally. No gods."

Feeling oddly quiet and strange with their words, I fiddled with my fingers. "Okay." I looked back up at them. "I'm sorry too. For yelling. And getting mad."

"Alex, you had all the right," Kali said.

"Maybe. But I should've more rational about it. Of course, you'd want to know why they thought I was special. And naturally, you didn't know I'd be paranoid enough to have to be befriended." I dropped my head. "So I'm sorry."

"It's not your fault," Jackson said. "Though, you know, it does make us hypocrites."

I laughed at that, quick and loud because that was still a touchy subject to bring up, then jerked my head to the spot beside me. Kali threw herself onto it, Jackson flopping down to the floor in front of us. Kali laughed at him and I grinned, awkward and patient. She took my hand and held it, tracing her thumb over the lines on my palm.

I thought of the little girl.

"Someone is out there," I said. "Telling them what to do. I heard them." I closed my hand over hers. "She didn't want to hurt me."

Kali's hold fell. She cut her eyes away from me. Protector of women, protector of children.

I wondered how much it killed her to hurt that little girl. And Jackson, who'd fought in a war, who'd likely seen firsthand all the horrors forced on small children who didn't deserve it. It hurt him too, I could see it as I glanced over at him.

Neither one of them asked me to elaborate but I didn't have anything else to say.

We lapsed into a familiar quiet and for the first time since I sent them away, I felt at peace.

It's amazing what the presence of friends and an apology can do. Even in the bad of it all.

** ** **

By mid-February being a Demon had faded mostly from my mind. I still had nightmares, fresh and feeling real each time, of the little girl dying, of me sometimes taking her place. Most of the time I just observed.

I waited for the moment when one the nightmares would secretly reveal something important, like they always did in stories, but they never did.

We didn't talk about the voice I heard either and when I got called in the following day to finally recount what had happened, I didn't mention it. I just said the basics. Mary accidentally cut me. I panicked because I have algophobia and got scared. I ran away. The little girl came down. I recognized she was a Demon but all I could see was a kid.

I followed her because I didn't see any other option.

She died anyway.

They asked why I didn't call someone. "I didn't want her to get hurt," I said, looking Layla in the eye. "I knew they'd hurt her and I knew it was smart to call someone but to me she looked like a child. Not a monster."

I could tell, when I said that, that they wanted to refute it somehow but they held back. I had said what I needed to.

I was done.

Everything after that went off without a hitch. Elaine came in the next week - bless holiday illnesses - because she goes to school here, a fact she used to laugh at me about for years - "I get to where no one else does and you don't!" \- and we got stuck as partners for all of one lab assignment until our teacher realized that was the stupidest choice ever.

But she caught my arm at the end of the day, before she caught a ride home with her friend

"Hey, I know you know," she said, voice hushed, after pulling me off to the side. "And that's not why I never liked you. I don't like you because your hair is too bright for your skin tone. It looks fake. Fix that."

I snorted and rolled my eyes. "You've already used that one."

She fixed her bag on her back. "I know." She watched me for a moment. "You're okay though? Your arm and... everything?"

I shrugged. "Arm's fine. Everything... It's weird. I feel like I'm being layered with too many things at once. It's uncomfortable." I dropped my voice to a mumble. "I don't want to keep changing."

Her face softened. "Alex, despite everything else, you're still Aunt Anna's kid, the numbnuts that wanted to learn about our dumb religion so you'd get what we were talking about. You're still the idiot who shaved my hair and grew yours out so we could still fight about that. You're still you." She gave me a small push on my arm. "Demon, Warrior, nerd, whatever. You're not changing because of one or two dumb factors. You're the same either way. Got it, stupid?"

I laughed low and she smiled pleasantly. "Got it, frizzface."

She stuck her tongue out at me and then bounced off to her pack of friends.

See, it's not a performative hatred like some people guess it is. She is annoying ninety-nine percent of the time and we mutually dislike each other, always have, and I could never see myself becoming her friend on accident or purpose but we're good to each other when we need to be.

Explain the hair thing.

Well, when we were thirteen, her mom, my aunt Helen, was diagnosed with cancer and it had gotten to the point where she was going to be starting chemo. She'd kept quiet about it up until that point because our family is a family of worriers. After she told everyone, Elaine vanished. I found her first, outside a Quick Mart. She had a pack of razors. She thought her mom would rather get the hair part over with than wait for it all to fall out.

She wanted to cut her hair off in camaraderie.

She cried as she talked to me about it and it wasn't the first time I'd see her cry but it was the first time it really meant something. So I told her, for as long as her mom was sick, I would let my hair grow out.

Because for years, one of the things she complained about was my hair, always talking about the longer the better. And as stupid as it was to focus on, she didn't want to suddenly chop all her hair off and be like me.

And I got that.

So I buzzed her hair off in the public restroom and she gave me all the hair bands on her wrist and then I texted everyone that we were coming home and we went home and argued and sniped at each other because that's all we could really do.

Then Aunt Helen was cleared just after my fourteenth birthday, I threw her hair ties back at her, chopped my hair off and we continued on.

Because that's all we could really do.

And her reminder of that, the slyness of it, really stuck with me.

Continue on.

It changes nothing. You're still the same person.

And it didn't and I was.

Until it did and I wasn't.

** ** **

We were clattering down to the gym. I wasn't amazing or anything. Barely had any workable skill but Lena called me her work in process and my other cousins, the ones who I liked despite their relation to Elaine, liked to practice with me.

Vin clapped my back and pushed a pair of boxing gloves into my face. I pushed them back. He pushed forward again.

"Come on, Al," he whined, too squeaky voiced for a ten year old. "Please."

"The day I let you punch me is the day Elaine says she loves me with actual verbal words," I said, swinging an arm around his shoulders and giving a quick squeeze to my side.

He scowled and huffed away to go bother some other relative into fighting with him. End of day. End of week. Some kids were sticking around to catch in a couple more practices before the weekend, where they steered clear of school because they could.

Elaine and Vin were the only ones who were attending school for academic reasons, Vin apparently like Fish, which explained the water obsession I'd made my concerns about over the years but no one really seemed to note, and Elaine like Mom and Aunt Helen. Both wanted to help out like their mom had. The others, not Aunt Helen's kids, just came for the gym and I heard them loudly tell him to stop asking, it wasn't happening, you'll get hurt then you'll blab and Aunt Helen is gonna blow her cord.

She would.

Vin was her precious beautiful boy.

When Vin stalked off to go find someone else, Caroline shot her head up and waved at me. "Alex! Come practice with us."

Jackson sent me a pleading look, please do it, please do it in his eyes but I just jerked my hand in Lena's direction, who I'd already agreed to practice with and who was waving happily at me to come over.

They all groaned because they liked to show off when defeating me and Jackson groaned with them because he's a big gay baby.

"Come on," I said, grabbing his wrist and pulling him over to Lena.

He whined the whole way there.

Lena hipchecked him then grinned at me, nice and wide. My heart skipped a beat.

After much deliberation, Jackson had finally agreed to stop being such an explicit baby about it so long as the first date would be my birthday and Lena paid for the whole thing and we didn't do anything romantic or gross until then.

We agreed because what else could we do but that didn't stop the fact that she teased me mercilessly about it anyway. I could never come up with anything to tease her about, except for the whole screw-me-into-a-wall thing, but that still made me blush like crazy and boom, another thing for her tease me about.

May twenty-third couldn't come soon enough.

Kali appeared at my side as I was strapping on protective plating. She passed me a smoothie. Before I could ask where she'd been or where she got it, she said, "I was with Alice."

To no one's surprise, Alice and Kali were... well, they weren't exactly dating but they made out a couple times and hung around each other a lot and I got the feeling if Alice was just a bit older, to where kissing an immortal and ancient goddess wasn't as weird as it just the tiniest bit felt, Kali would pretty much be set to smooch her into infinity.

But it was cool. Give or take a few more years and I'd probably walk in on them doing it on my bed.

I took the smoothie, something Alice got at the end of every week, and grinned, slurping down a large portion. Jackson took it from me when I handed it over and drank down the rest of it, sitting on the floor by the mat. Kali joined him, stretching out her legs and smirking when her feet surpassed his.

He kicked her and nodded over at the dummy Lena had brought out to demonstrate whatever new move I'd never pick up on she was going to show me. I brought myself to attention.

My stomach jerked, uncomfortable.

I twisted awkwardly and focused on the way she lifted her sword to block the imaginary attack, trying to pay attention to her words but for some reason they were all garbled. Everything was sounding garbled. I shook my head, rubbing my ear.

My stomach jerked again.

"Alex?" she prompted. My name sounded like sludge in my ears. "You okay?"

"Yeah," I grunted. I leaned over. "I think I'm allergic to dairy."

"You know how much cheese you eat," Jackson said, pressing a hand to my back, bent over suddenly next to me. "If you were, think we would've noticed years ago."

I tried to laugh with him but it hurt. I grabbed my chest, my sword tumbling from my hand. "Ow, ow," I said, eyes widening. "Okay, shit, shit."

The pain passed.

I relaxed.

But Lena stayed tense. "Maybe you should sit down," she said quickly, helping Jackson pull me, all shaky legged to the ground beside the mat. "Did you get any sleep last night?"

Nausea swarmed me as I settled down. I tilted my head back to breathe. "Uh, yeah, I mean I was up until midnight studying for Claren's frigging chem test but-" My chest panged. I pressed my hand to it, terrified. "I slept in, skipped breakfast. I was fine."

I breathed hotly.

Why was everything so warm?

Their voices turned garbled again. My vision blurred, their faces twisting into blobs of colour. Oh my God, the light hurt. Why was it so bright? Why was it there? I tried to roll over but couldn't move, trapped in their holds.

They were yelling at me.

I didn't know why. Once I closed my eyes, everything felt so much better. The darkness. Yes. I was supposed to be in the dark.

Dark was so cooling and fresh. Why did anyone like the day, the light, the sun? Living is darkness was so much easier.

Someone with calloused hands rolled me onto my stomach like I wanted but they tried to pull me up and the moment they did, hands yanking around my middle, the pain burst like a crater at the base of my spine.

It exploded and hurt and I couldn't breathe, couldn't think.

"Oh my God," someone said and my eyes snapping open in the agony of it all watched them, watched the people who'd come around to me back up rapid.

What was happening?

My chest was on fire, my back was crying. It was like someone had shoved their hand inside of me and was rearranging everything. And no matter how much it burned, like fire, terrible terrible fire, I couldn't pass out.

There was an unholy amount of cracking sounds that terrified me in the midst of it all. Against my better judgement I tried to curl into myself, see if that blocked the pain, screaming hollowly, sobbing loud. Hands gripped me, held me firm, voices trying to soothe me but I couldn't hear any of it, couldn't process any of it, just the fact that it hurt, it hurt.

It wasn't supposed to hurt, why was it hurting?

And then.

Instant relief.

Like it'd never happen.

I stopped screaming, going still and pliant. The people hovering moved but someone hissed, "No, keep shadowing him."

What?

Kali's face blurred in front of me. I fluttered my eyes, waiting for my vision to clear. When it did, all she looked was scared and concerned. My entire body was winded.

I couldn't keep my eyes open.

"Kali?" I said, tongue sluggish in my mouth.

"I am right here," she said, quickly, brushing back my hair.

"Feel weird," I mumbled. Someone took my arm and snapped something around it. I blinked at it, bringing it to my face. Thick black band. My arm dropped, heavy, and I lolled my eyes too her, vision swarming again. "What did you feed me?"

"It was not the drink," she said, still brushing my hair back, nice and soothing. "It was not the..."

Her voice failed and I stared at her, so confused. What happened? I was so tired. The bodies hovering around me moved. Someone - Jackson, I realized with a weary pang, inhaling his lavender cologne - heaved me up to a stand. Caroline stood in front of me, her eyes all mopey.

Hanging off of Jackson, I reached out and cupped her face. "What's wrong, Giggle?"

She gave a short laugh, a little giggle, the same that coined her nickname from when she was two and I was new and she thought that meant I was the coolest thing ever. "I just-" She shook her head. "Um, feel better, okay?"

She sounded so scared. Why was she scared? They all look scared, even Elaine. That was weird. I frowned, trying to move my head, my mouth to ask but I was so tired. I was so tired and I had to keep moving, everyone was moving me, why was I moving?

I was supposed to rest.

You rest when you're tired.

I wanted to rest.

"Shit, Kals, I can't- Alex, stop dropping!"

"M'tired," I slurred, vision flashing and suddenly I was on the ground, squeezing my eyes shut. Everything felt so weird and warm and bad.

I just wanted to sleep.

Just wanted to sleep.

** ** **

I woke up, still tired, but feeling better, rested. Dad was next to me, reading a book. I grinned up at him and tried to move but couldn't.

Cuffs kept me attached to the cot.

"Dad?" I said, suddenly concerned.

He glanced up at me then clapped his book shut. "What's up?"

I tried to move again but couldn't still firmly locked to the bed. "Why I am chained to a cot? And-" I shifted, something under me, just under my spine, thick and uncomfortable to lay on. "-can I at least get out so I can move this thing under my back?"

Dad looked me over. He tried but failed every time he opened his mouth to speak. I stared at him and stopped moving.

"Dad?" His eyes snapped to mine. "What happened?"

"You, um-" He cupped his hand over his mouth, heading dropping down. "You-"

I looked away and stared at the ceiling. And then, just ever so slightly, I raised my hips, glancing to the side where a thick fluffy tail swung out and flexed over the side. I dropped and stared up at the ceiling again, waiting for it to sink in.

It sank in.

"Oh no."

"Alex," Dad started but I shook my head, not listening to whatever was coming out of his mouth.

That's why they looked so scared. I was their cousin and I was going to die. Executed. Or maybe they were afraid of me. Well, not Elaine. And Vin was a fearless kid. And Caroline loved me so I doubted either one of them were afraid of me but the others? Maybe. Unlikely though.

Either way.

I was their cousin and I was screwed.

Jackson trying to take me but I kept slipping, exhaustion weighing me down. Had he been trying to run? Or was he just trying to get me somewhere before the final verdict came down on my head? But the fucking barrier.

There was no escape.

Dad pressed his hands to my chest and I glared at him. "Alex!" he said, stern. "Calm down."

"Why am I chained?"

"Well, technically you're cuffed." I didn't laugh. His face turned a sick gray and he looked away. "It was just a precaution. People would've complained otherwise."

"So death is still being debated?" I tested. "No current guarantee?"

He smoothed out my shirt, patting my stomach. "It's still being debated."

"Oh awesome," I breathed. "Dad? I just- before I'm brought in for execution, I want to talk to Elaine so I can get out the deathbed words I've been working on-" At his concerned face, whether for the awkward joke or the list, I rushed on, "-so I don't forget what I wanted to say when I'm old and shit. Also give my socks to the orphans. Any orphans, I don't care and-"

"Alex."

He silenced me and the bubbling panic in my chest.

I tilted my head back and breathed in through my nose, trying to calm. "Does Nick know?"

"Well, last I heard, they were catching a sudden flight to kick someone's ass, Charles, please explain, so..." He shrugged. "I think no?"

I rolled my eyes and exhaled shortly. "How long was I out this time?"

Dad settled back down into his chair. This scene felt too familiar but at least this time he wasn't crying. "Few hours," he said, watching me.

He looked exhausted.

I looked away. "Regretting your choice of kid yet?"

"Not for a second," he said, clear, firm.

I sighed and leaned back as best I could. After a beat, I couldn't stop myself from asking. I needed to know. Now more than ever. "Why? Why me?" I glanced back at him. "You knew what I was so why? Why did you pick me anyway?"

He took a breath, fiddling with his shirt, then finally matched my gaze. "I didn't recognize you at first. Didn't even hit me who you were until I saw your future friends lurking around. And even then, I didn't put two-and-two together. I mean, they could've been watching any kid in that park. Your mom came around and I was excited. I'd overheard Carlita talking to someone about some other kid's new placement and how well they were getting on and I was cinched that maybe we could try and get you.

"You seemed like a nice kid," he continued. "You didn't really cower but you weren't rude. And then you saw Nick and started shouting their name and then you remembered they were deaf and you started signing at them like crazy. Your mom said I looked like a pedophile, just staring at a bunch of kids in a playground, but we were just there to get ice cream."

I nodded. Everything about this was exactly as he'd told me before, exactly as Mom had told me.

"So I took my ice cream and started talking about you because you'd run up to Carlita and I realized out of the kids, you were one of hers and we were having trouble getting a placement because even in Brokes the process is endless, probably even more so, so I thought maybe I could just mention how excited I was to adopt a kid." He tapped the edge of the cot, near my leg. "See if that did anything. And your mom said, "Charles, that is so creepy" and then asked me to point you out and I did and she said, "Babe, that's the god kid" and I said something like, "Oh damn" and then I turned to her, told I was ready to stop being creepy, we could leave and she was gone, talking to Carlita."

That was new.

In the past how that worked was my dad was awkward as hell about it and wouldn't man up and do it so Mom did it for him.

"And then you ran up to me and asked if I'd get the ball from the top of the jungle gym," he said, "and I did and then you said, "Thanks!", shook my hand and ran off. And then your mom came and told me it was time to go and the next day I wake up to a phone call from our agent talking about some kid named Scott who might've been a good fit for us. And I was so excited. Put it on speaker phone immediately and your mom just kept giving me this look and when the call was over, I just looked at her and I knew who you were right away.

"I said, "The god kid?" and she said, "Yep" and I asked her if that concerned her because I didn't- I didn't actually care what you were so long as I got to have you because I wanted a kid like crazy but, you know, you're a Demon and we've fought those and it might've been weird." He licked his lips, grinning and I knew was part was coming next. "But she didn't answer the question. She just said, "He's weird. He screams, he hides. One time he vanished for an entire day and then came out for dinner smelling like smoke", you know all the stuff Carlita told her.

"Then she poured me a coffee, made herself some tea and said, "But he talks his stuffed animals through stitches because he thinks it hurts them and he once crawled onto the roof while crying about being up there because someone threw the neighbor's Barbie onto it and she was sad so he wanted to help and he likes numbers too much." Then she drank her tea, put the cup back on the table and said, "He's perfect" and then... you were," he finished, smiling wide.

"We went through it because you were a child and you needed a family," he continued. "And I think at the end of the day that's all I really cared about. It didn't matter what you were. Or what you meant, just that you needed someone permanent. And we liked you so much that it didn't matter. You were and still are-" He pushed back my hair and grinned. "-the perfect kid."

"Weren't you concerned about this though?" I asked, trying to sound light for all that it was morose. "The risk of being killed?"

"A little," he said. I levelled my eyes at him and he sighed. "Okay, a lot. But then your mom made some good points. Like, who cares, everyone's children die at some point, Charles, you are a literal Warrior of Death, just summon the damn ghost."

I choked on a laugh and grinned at that. "Not the same thing."

"Definitely not but-" He shrugged. "I tried not to worry. You were a kid in need of a dad and I was a dad who needed a kid. And you were cute and weird and the first time you came over to spend the night, it was-" He laughed quietly. "It was amazing. Burned pizza aside."

My grin fell wider, a little looser and he went on. "I checked on you about a thousand times after you went to bed and for all your mom's whining about it, she did the same thing. And then when we finally decided you were safe, you were fine, and went to bed too, I just- I just thought this is how it was supposed to be. You, our kid, asleep in one room. Us, the parents, in the other, trying to stop each other from checking in too much but caving every single time. In the morning, I make you breakfast. Your mom walks you to school.

"But instead of getting picked up by Carlita, I'd do that. I'd pick you up after school, take you home. Make a snack, remind you of homework. Your mom comes home, we have dinner together, watch some PBS, then you go to bed and we check on you a thousand times before we decide to go to sleep too," he laughed. "And then it just continues and continues until you move out. But it'd be like Anna with her parents, not me with mine."

I smiled softly. "I still visit."

"Yeah," he breathed, shaky. His eyes were watering.

"Dad," I laughed out, voice trembling. "If you start crying, then I'm-" The words welled up, thick in my throat.

He laughed, wiping away tears before they could drip, head ducked. I grinned at him. Then I looked around for the other member of the story, of the family. "Where's Mom?"

"Screaming, probably." He bobbed his head a couple times, thinking. "Most likely throwing fists and ruining every shred of accreditation she's earned since she started school."

I laughed because she would. They joked about that. Dad was the lover, Mom was the fighter.

"So Mom. Nick. Hopefully Jack and Kals." I exhaled sharply. "Versus a million gods. Sounds like good odds."

"The best odds," he said. He leaned over and flicked a piece of hair back. "But if they're dumb enough to go through with it when they've been spying on you forever and know better than that, I'll go up there and throw some fists too."

I laughed again, feeling a bit better about the situation even if it felt impossibly dire. Dad smiled and sat back, flipping his book open. He dragged his finger down the page, just like he used to when I was kid, waiting for bedtime tales, and began reading it aloud. The words washed over me but I didn't take them in.

Not fully.

I just looked at his face and tried to memorize him as clear as I could. The early stretch of gray in his hair. The lines of his face. The way he held himself. Knowing my chances, my luck, he would be the last person I saw.

And I wanted to remember my family as much as I could before I died.

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# Chapter Nine

So, as you probably guessed, despite it all, I was cleared. They agreed that since I'd proven I wasn't a danger based off my actions over the years, since I'd only ever shown them the utmost respect over the years of my life (ignoring my little drama spell at the end of December), and that, since after a little test, I could still get them to listen to me, follow what I said despite the Demon-ness, I was fine to continue on. I would just be monitored a little more closely.

Which I couldn't tell either way. Jackson and Kali were still always around but, like, they're always around so what did I know?

Mom dragged me home the next day to Gramma's for dinner. Everyone was there and everyone teased me. Elaine spent the evening brainstorming new insults and Nick, who actually had stormed the Heavens to fight in my defense, just tied bows, courtesy of Mutant who had the flu and could not attend despite her best efforts, around my tail. And it was nice, if not a tad bit awkward.

The tail was something I had to get used to. It had a mind of its own, moved around all the time. It spread right out from my lower back and while it wasn't uncomfortable to rest of it, it was weird. I spent a lot of time in bed now, shifting around trying to find a new position that wasn't resting directly on it that I could sleep to.

The bracelet I wore was the same as the Demon girl had and it was to block me from the effects of burning up in the sun. When I first realized was it was, I panicked, thinking it had been hers. Then Jackson quietly reminded me that vampires, a family of whom he knew personally, also burned in the sun. He'd vanished quick to steal one of theirs right after it all happened and yes, he had been fully intending to disappear me into the woods and never return.

If the barrier hadn't been up and I hadn't been a bag of bricks, he and Kali likely would've been very successful in that.

The end of February cleared without another hitch and I hoped March would end the same way. Eventless.

Nothing happening.

Well, okay, it didn't clear with zero bumps but it cleared without anything else weird happening. Fish avoiding me and shooting me dirty looks for a week? That made sense.

But then we were back to normal before the month was even up.

I didn't know if he realized it wasn't my fault I didn't die or that maybe he shouldn't have wanted me to die or if someone told him off about it all but after a week of being very clearly annoyed with me following my clearance, he popped up outside my room and asked if I wanted to play video games. And I said yes and we were good from there.

So me and Lena were still good, she thought my tail was cute. Me and Fish were okay, he thought I smelled better as a Demon than as a human. I wasn't dead, yet, and it was good.

It was good.

Until it wasn't?

Well, I mean, yeah, but not yet.

So somewhere in the middle or end of March, spring break looming on the horizon, Nick was complaining about not being able to fly in because, like with winter break, they had games scheduled, and also their parents were not cool with the stunt they pulled in February and weren't even allowing them to come home since they also had Jackson's birthday weekend in April to come in for so it was either spring break or Jackson's birthday.

Jackson's birthday won.

So shame, I typed. We go movies.

no!!!!!

Yesssssssss

fck u followed by an image of them flipping me the finger.

Jackson swung into the room and shut the door quick and loud behind him. "I'm ready to talk about Ranj!"

He looked jazzed, like he'd just pounded a bunched of five hours or he'd give himself a rousing motivational speech and it turned too loud and energetic and now whoever was around him had to deal with it.

Both were things we begged him to stop doing.

"Okay," I said, locking my head back a bit. "Gimme a sec." Put on aids, Jackson speak words.

Jackson always speak words.

I phoned Nick, put it on speakerphone then set it between us gesturing widely. Jackson looked at the phone, suddenly nervous. All that excited energy gone. I gestured widely again, tail flicking into the air.

Jackson rubbed his palms against his pants, making weird noises as he tried to speak.

"Yooooo," Nick moaned. "You gonna speak?"

Jackson cleared his throat. "I just- Gimme a sec."

He ducked over, did the same breathing exercise I did every time before I gave a speech, which never frigging worked anyway so I don't know why I keep doing them. I leaned over the phone. "It's about Ranj."

"The boyfriend he didn't fuck?"

"I was waiting for marriage!" Jackson protested, loud.

"It was the thirties," Nick drawled. "Only place it was legal was here and that was still technically illegal."

"Ugh, straight people," I muttered.

Jackson laughed, kicked my seat. "Aren't you straight people?" he teased and I swore in my head.

"I mean yeah but also sometimes I'm a girl, like today for example." I spun around in my chair. "So, technically, sometimes... I'm a lesbian."

Excellent save.

Thanks.

Jackson snorted and then sat down on a chair conjured from nowhere. "Okay. Okay, I-" His voice fell strangled and he dropped his head.

"I can leave if you were just wanting Al," Nick suggested.

"No," he said sharply. "You're my friend too. I once threw a rock at the wrong person and you tricked them into thinking they hit themself with a rock."

Ah, that was a weird fucking day. Hilarious moment though. Remind me to tell you about it.

Okay.

Nick snorted. "Okay, bub." Wolverine says it one time and it's their catchphrase for six years. "Should I group Mutant in too? Definitely caught you out of scrapes."

Jackson groaned because he's not the only one who's got a rivalry with a child. "Do me a favour and delete my number from her phone."

"Every time I do it she just plugs it back, dumbass," Nick huffed. "She lives to terrorize you."

I grinned as Jackson scowled. He smiled slow at my smile, the calmness shedding light around him. Pulling his legs up to his chest, he took a breath.

"Like I said to Al, we met when I was thirteen," he started, voice quiet. "After my confirmation, which was a shitshow, tell you some other time." Nick groaned over the phone because they have a lot of skills but patience is not one of them. "He was nice and pretty and he asked me if I wanted to sneak out. And I said yes.

"And then he kept taking me places and when I was about sixteen, after a couple dates I didn't realize were dates until later, we started going out and it was very gay. And I did kiss his face. A lot." I laughed quietly, watching him as he spoke. "And that's how I met Kali, when he introduced me because she was technically the only parent he ever knew, and I introduced him to mine and they liked him and he liked them and it was good.

"Um-" His voice twisted miserable. "-then they died and I didn't take it well and after threw myself into a war trying to make someone else happy which failed because he went and died like six months in and then- I just stick with it because I hate quitting and I didn't- I didn't know how to go back to a place that my family wasn't in.

"But at the end of it all, he took me aside and he told me to mourn and I did and it was okay." Awkwardly, he drew closer into himself. "And then in, uh, in the 80s, he started vanishing a lot. And not telling me where he was going. And- just being distant a lot and then one day he came back and started saying a bunch of stuff I can't remember, just remember it was insane and then he-"

He stopped, staring at the ground.

I had a feeling this was the part where Ranj died.

I had a feeling Jackson was going to tell us he killed him.

Jackson shifted, rubbed his ankle slowly, then went on. "He attacked me. We fought. I, uh, I killed him. He's dead because I killed him."

Right on the money.

We were quiet, neither of us knowing what to say to that revelation and Jackson was too solemn to say much else.

Then, "What did he smell like?"

During sleepovers, we'd sometimes look up terrible porn novels and dramatically read them aloud to the others squealing amusement. Nick's favourite thing was "he smelled like this weirdly specific thing but also something distinctly him." They said it reminded them of Jackson and how we could tell he was coming or where'd he'd just been by how much lavender was in the air.

Jackson was quiet for a hot second and then started laughing, the sound soft. He tilted his head back, eyes wet. "Oh, fuck, I don't even remember. Uh. Curry?"

"Racist man alive," Nick cut in.

Jackson choked, giggling low. "Well, fuck, I don't know. He smelled clean. That's about it."

"Useless," Nick said.

I smirked. "What did he sound like?"

"God, beautiful," Jackson groaned. "Like, alright, so you know how Kals sounds heavy with her accent. His was like- like light. Like not as thick."

"Like yours."

"Yeah." Jackson nodded firmly. "Because he'd been around so many different people in that weird period where your voice can still kinda change but it was the same, and, oh fuck, the amount of dreams I had where he was just talking."

"Talking you through it all?" Nick teased.

"Hell fucking yes," Jackson said and Nick laugh-groaned.

"And you didn't suck his dick?" Nick groaned again. "Bub, I'm ace and I still know better."

"Look, I was raised in a certain way and that way was I don't give a fuck who you like. Baby-making only after marriage." He snapped his fingers. "Even if you can't make the babies. You people are the heathens."

I grinned, twisting around in my seat. "Were you really going to wait until marriage?"

He shrugged. "Kind of? I mean-" He shifted awkwardly, let his legs spill from the chair to the ground. "-I figured it had to made legal somewhere at some point and we- we would've had all the time in the world really."

"Was he cool with that?" I leaned in close. "'Cause if he was pushy, I'll go down to the Underworld right now and raise hell."

Something weird twitched in him but then Nick was adding, "Yeah, an' I'll kick the ass."

"Oh, yeah, nah, he was sweet about it," Jackson laughed, tilting his head and smiling so soft I just had to wonder loud in my head about why this guy who loved him flipped out, made Jack kill him. "Sometimes he'd tease me about it. Say, "You ready to love one another to completion, Yah?" And I'd say, "Still waiting" and he'd go, "Okay, chotu[67]" and then we'd probably go do something stupid. Or make out."

"Yah? Was that a thing he called you or are my aids fucking up?"

Jackson paused. Then flattened himself a little bit, his feet firm to the ground and hands gripping the edge of his seat. "No, that was- that was my name. Yahya."

"I KNEW IT," Nick yelled over the phone, so loud the speaker crackled. "I knew you couldn't come fresh from Egypt with a white man name. Don't work like that, bub. Alex and his stupid, "you can't just ask people that stuff, Nicole!" Pft, and I was right," they teased, poorly mimicking my voice in their raspy tone.

"Still rude," I'm muttered.

Jackson snorted. "Yeah, no, um, Jackson- I changed that shortly after everything 'cause I-" He took a deep breath. "I don't remember what Aphrodite named me but it was something basic and probably dumb. But my mom used to call my Yahya, as a nickname, because she- well, she couldn't have kids. She'd been in an accident way before I was born and it fucked her insides so." He cleared his throat. "She had names that she'd wanted to give her children and Aphrodite just kind of plopped me on her and Papa and I had a name and shit all set but she spent most of the time calling me Yahya. That was one of the names she'd always wanted to give her kid.

"And then, uh, I just got used to it. To me, it was my name. I didn't even stand when they called me up to the stage for my confirmation until the third time because I wasn't used to it - Amil, or something like that - and that's what I introduced myself as and what people called me and it just-" He faltered. "It reminded me of her and it hurt because I knew it was something special she gave me, that they both gave me, and it hurt when people called me that when they was gone but Ranj made it better because he made me feel better and then he died and I hated it. I hated it." He dropped his eyes. "It never sounded right when other people used it. Just family. Just Ranj.

"But without the main people?" He shook his head. "Wasn't worth it. Didn't want it anymore. It was my mom's name for me. And she wasn't calling me it anymore so I said fuck it and officially changed it to Jackson. Closest thing I could get to it without it stinging." He fiddled with his socks then shrugged. "It's basically just the English version."

"Oh," I said faintly.

He chewed his bottom lip. "I don't- I don't want you guys to call me that, okay?"

"Good, 'cause it sounds terrible for you," Nick snapped. Jackson snorted. "I mean, Yahya? Terrible. I hate it. Jackson is better. Jackson's the guy who will sell me weed for a bag of brownies. Yahya want twenty bucks and the brownies."

Jackson choked on a laugh, grinning wide. His eyes still looked hurt, a faint hurt from spilling so much, but he was happy.

I grinned with him. "So chotu? Kali's said that before but I don't remember what it means."

"Small," Jackson groaned. "He basically just called me small because of course he somehow takes after Kali and was a frigging giant and he's not even her blood son so I don't know how that happened."

He went on, complaining about all the little things Ranj did to tease him about anything, and when Kali came in some time later, she chimed in with her favourite stories, related to Jackson or not, and we sat together, Nick on the phone between us, and just laughed and talked and they told stories and we listened.

Stories are so wonderful, I think. But they're so complicated to give. Some bit of it is always personal and to dredge it up or in can be hard. Sometimes you just don't have the right words to tell it. You have to wait. But they're continuous. They're almost alive.

That's what I used to say to Mom when she told me anything about the gods.

"We're remembering them," I'd said. "That's how they stay real."

And in the warmth of that night, I kind of wished it was true for all of them. Not just the firsts.

I could not ever imagine losing Jackson.

** ** **

Ben was dangling from the rock climbing wall rope a few days later. Lena was standing next to him, trying to tighten his harness since he'd been whining about it being too loose as he went up.

"So?"

He'd also been bugging me for Zulu myths since January.

My tail flickered, annoyed. "I'm dry, Ben. I told you last time was the last one I knew." Last time had also been a month ago. "I asked my mom for some more and she's gonna get back to me when her friend gets back to her."

Lena rolled her eyes, sending me a quick glance, soft smile and all. "Did you ever get anything normal?"

Ben hissed and she loosened the strap just a bit.

I held back, steadying my stance. "Yeah, I got the regular stuff. Tortoise and the hare. Amelia Bedelia." Lena shot me a wry look and I grinned. "But I liked the myths more 'cause I thought they were fun and interesting. More so than a maid who takes everything too literally."

She snorted and stepped back. Ben patted her arm then began climbing all the wall. Lena took the steadying rope from me and loped it around her own harness. Quietly, her eyes focused on Ben, she asked, "Do people do that a lot?" Lost, I eyed her, waiting for more. "Like ask you for myths when they find out?" I nodded. "Is it weird?"

I bit my lip. "Kind of? I dunno. It's-" I exhaled sharp through my mouth. "It can be a little annoying sometimes. But other times I don't really mind it. Like Kali used to ask me a whole bunch of stuff, which, you know, now I just realize was basically complete vanity." Lena laughed, quick and loud. Ben glanced down at us and I gave him a thumbs-up. He kept climbing. "And Nick would ask for Japanese stuff a lot so I know a lot about those because I used to do a hell ton of research."

My tail curled around my waist and I brushed back my hair.

"But, uh, this kind of stuff feels-" I frowned. "Well, I try to stay away from it as much as I can. Like not too much distance that I'm being rude but not too much familiarity it looks weird." She eyed me over, waiting for more. I crossed my arms, trying to explain. "Like Zulu stories, Shawnee[68] stuff? It's personal. It's important. It ties into their culture very deeply. And those people aren't dead in the ground just yet, despite efforts held with the latter-" And we both scowled at the thought, our home essentially stolen property. "-so I feel odd involving myself with them.

"Like I love them, don't me wrong," I said quickly, snapping my gaze to her so she'd see me, genuine, not forgetting anyone. "But I'm not what made them real in the first place. And after all the bashing and bullshit, I just-" I frowned then sighed, sharp and miserable. "I just don't like feeling like I'm injecting into a place I shouldn't be, even though I care about it."

"Well," Lena started, "all you really can do is just be very respectful, yeah?"

I nodded. "Mom says that." She smiled and adjusted the rope, gesturing for me to go on. I grinned. "She used to say that just because we weren't a part of the culture or the origin of it all, didn't mean we couldn't care. We just can't call ourselves the authority. And we shouldn't want to."

Lena's smile brightened and she stepped back, tightening on the slack, one arm dropping. Without meaning for it to, because again mind of its fucking, my tail snapped out, wrapped around her wrist and tugged. She laughed while I stared at it, betrayed, and shifted a little closer.

"You gotten used to it yet?" she asked.

"Kind of." I purposely removed it from her arm. "Little irritating 'cause I forget that it's there sometimes."

She glanced up to my face. Her hand cupped gently over my cheek, moving my face to look at her. "I wonder why they went red."

Embarrassed, I pulled away from her grasp and looked away so she couldn't see my eyes clear anymore. "Who knows?" I rubbed my jaw. "Thinking about getting contacts to hide them."

"Aw, I like red," she teased. She shifted over some as Ben started moving more to the side, trying to grab the flag someone had stuck up there earlier, and I went with her. "Besides, nowadays people probably just think you're an avid cosplayer."

I groaned. "Oh, gods, no."

She grinned, wicked. "What's wrong with that?"

"Nothing," I said. I frowned. "Jackson used to want us to do that after we watched some videos online, make our own mini shows, but all he wanted was to get us to do gay scenes. Because he had all the class of a baby cow."

Lena giggled. "You know, I'll be honest, I did not at all think you'd only be into girls."

"Well, I'll be honest too and say I'm not," I admitted. She glanced at me, eyebrow arched. "I'm bi. But Jackson was really annoying about it when I was younger so I lied to get him to stop setting me up on terrible dates. An unfortunate courtesy of having a love god for a friend, I guess."

She nodded. "Ah, makes sense." She increased the slack in the rope as Ben dropped about a foot. The cord went tense again. "You ever gonna tell him the truth?"

I sighed at the thought but nodded begrudgingly. "I guess I'll have to. Probably soon. Maybe..." Sly, I grinned at her. "Maybe after my birthday?"

She grinned back at me, wide and wicked, knowing. We turned back to Ben who was craning his head, searching for the rest of the flags. He had a couple tucked under his belt. The flags were part of a game setting. So far no one had actually managed to capture or find all twelve but Ben had come close with ten or eleven a bunch of times. It was his new year's resolution to finally score all of them.

Me? I was hoping I'd never have to go any higher than a couple feet at the most. I held a lot of trust in most of the people who held my steadying rope but also, I wasn't interested in the minute possibility of going high only to fall to my death. Or, if not death, great debilitating pain.

Honestly couldn't decide which option sounded better at the end of it all.

"You check under the curve?" Lena called up.

Ben twisted his head to give her a salty look, as though highly offended that she'd even think he didn't already check there, then leaned back. He held up a hand, fluttering his fingers. Understanding what I couldn't, she stepped back, hand tight on the rope as he pushed back, flying back ever so slightly.

When he fell back to the wall, he cheered and began climbing back up to wherever he'd spotted the next flag. Lena grinned wide at him.

"I'm surprised he just didn't build something."

"Ah, he did. Once," she said. "But magic is magic and sometimes things don't want to be found, ya know?"

That tugged hard at my gut, the thought of me, shrouded in magic, not meant to be found, not wanting to be found, but still caught anyway.

"Yeah," I said stiff.

So everyone knew I was a Demon. No one knew that it was a conscious choice. There was no grand explanation that went out after it all. As far as I knew, everyone was assuming that it'd been an accident, especially since I'd looked human. The only people who knew the actual truth of my origin were me, the gods, select Warriors, my family (but not Dad's side), Nick and Katelynn.

Catching my discomfort, Lena bumped me affectionately. She glanced back up to Ben but her focus was on me. "You know, even though I knew they were real, I still kind of think of them as fake stories. Like I know, logically, they're real but it's like I really still can't wrap my head around it."

"It takes time," I said. "Dad said he was like that when he started following the Greek-Roman myths."

She snorted. "I've noticed you do that," she said. "Call them myths?"

"Oh." I paused. I'd been called out on that before but. I dunno. I never really noticed when I did it. "I guess people call them myths so much it just sticks? But also myths at the same time has become synonymous with story and religion." I cupped my hand into a circle. "They're all the same thing to me."

Humming in understanding, she stepped forward, just a bit as Ben craned the slightest big higher, trying to reach the ceiling, where, there it was, a small flag was hiding, almost out of sight.

"I called the Bible a myth once," I said.

She choked and started hacking out her laughter. Ben twisted down. "You okay?"

"You- He-" She keeled over gasping and I grabbed the rope to keep it steady, smiling down at her. "Oh my God."

"Lena!" Ben called out. "What's going on?"

I cocked my head back a bit. "Nothing! I just told her I called Christianity a myth once and she thought it was funny!"

"Tell me about it!" Ben yelled down.

I nodded, waiting for Lena to regain her breath. Her grin was still wide, still bright and infectious and I smiled back at her before calling out to Ben. "Before I found out how to make accounts private, I made this post about it being cool how the Bible was only one book! But that I was disappointed! Because I like it when there's a lot of stories! So some person replied that the Bible was the only book and not a story!" Lena laughed, her arms shaking as she held Ben steady. Above us, he looked to be laughing too. "And I didn't really get it right away! So I said back that it was certainly not the only book! But that it was nice that all the myths were condensed because that made it easier to follow!"

"Did they kill you?" Ben called down, his voice amused and giggling.

Lena leaned into me, breathing hard into my shoulder. I grinned. "No! But that's how I found out about privatizing! Because they started yelling at me a whole bunch and I panicked!"

Shaking his head, Ben yelled, "You're such a weird guy, Alex!"

"Not a guy!"

He gave me a thumbs-up and started climbing. Lena giggled into my shoulder some more before exhaling hard and pulled back. Her eyes were all watery.

"Oh, that was hilarious," she said. She bumped me with her thigh. "Alex Johnson, dissuader of religions, insulter to Christians."

I grinned. "I just forget people aren't all that accepting of others sometimes. And that not everyone agrees they all exist in cohesion."

She nodded slowly. Then smiled, a little wry. "So you never got that though? Like being told something like that but it not being all that real to you. Like a genuine myth?"

I chewed my bottom lip. "Nah. I mean, there was this book my mom pulled out every once in a while, but it wasn't- it wasn't true. Wasn't something we followed." I rubbed my elbow, picking at the dry skin. "I loved it though. It drove me crazy I couldn't find any verifiable proof that it existed."

"What was it called?"

"The Tales of the Boshnishans, by Tom Peoples," I recited like an audiobook reader. She giggled. "My mom bought the book when she was on vacation in Bermuda so I used to call it the Bermuda book. Or the tales of the Bermudians."

"Clever," she teased.

Okay. I'm Bermudian and I've never heard of that book. Or the author. And Bermuda is small and never mentioned and no one here does anything so the moment we are mentioned or do something, it's a big deal and everyone knows about it.

Oh, well, I don't think it's a popular book. I could never find any copies online or anyone who'd read it. Tom Peoples, or whatever their real name probably was, probably self-published it. My mom said she can't really remember because she was about twelve or eleven when she got it but she thinks she bought it at one of those night markets?

Harbour Nights?

Yeah, that! So I guess it just didn't take off? Which is disappointing.

They're really nice stories.

Mmm.

"That's surprising," Lena said.

I frowned. "What do you mean?"

She stretched one arm out, working it back and forth before steadying the rope and taking a step back. "Well, Bermuda is the one place without magic," she explained. "Like real magic. Warriors don't tend to go there. Gods actually avoid it. It's actually kind of funny because of the whole Bermuda triangle thing but-" She shrugged. "Apparently real magic tends to go weird when it's used there."

Huh. I considered that. "Well, she said they won the trip in a contest so, I guess, it would've been a waste not to go."

Lena grinned. "Makes sense." She bumped me again. "Alright, so, tell me one? Like who was the god of death for the-" She paused to snicker. "The Boshnishans."

I grinned because yeah. That's why I was so much happier calling them the Bermudians.

Was it even based here?

I was never certain and neither was my mom. But she guessed it was. Like it was mostly set on an island. The sand sometimes was called pink. They had cedar trees. Sometimes she'd read a description of an area then dig around and pull out a photo of something similar she'd snapped when she was down there and we'd compare the words to the picture and try to guess.

But, like I said, it was never made explicit.

But I still think it was.

I tilted my head back and thought. It wasn't the same as just rattling off gods I followed. Needed a second to remember.

"Grinate," I said after a few seconds. "He was the son of Poln, the sun, and Kempa, goddess of water. He was also the god of sleep. My favourite thing what that he was mute." I gave her a smarmy look. "Because the dead don't talk."

"Neither do the unconscious," Lena pointed out and we shared a stupid grin.

I leaned back. "Uh, so there was this one myth about that. Basically, he kind of fucked up and murdered a guy he was trying to put to sleep."

Laughter bubbling low in her voice, grinning mad, Lena said, "Holy shit."

"I know, right? Like, before he got spirits to help him out, he had to do it all himself. And it was a really big deal because, ya know, the guy wasn't meant to die and he had to offer up something from himself and he chose his voice because he was the god of the dead. And the dead don't speak. So in giving up his voice to bring this guy back, he somehow made the dead able to talk to the living again and became like the voice of the voiceless?"

"Despite having no voice at all?"

"Yeah." I laughed. "Myths can be really weird like that."

She hummed in an agreement. "Okay. So. Hmm, how was the world made?"

"Ah, there's the hitch." I circled my hands in the air. "The Boshnishans believed the world already existed. The universe existed. The gods existed. It was all already there. But they believed that they were created by the goddex Tom, who built them to watch them die, basically."

Lena frowned, upper lip pulled in. "That's... concerning. But, uh, cool? I guess." She laughed awkwardly. "Goddex though? In the 80s?"

"Hey, people can be progressive outside of Brokes if they want," I teased. I brushed my hair back. "Not the word that was used specifically but they were genderfluid and a shapeshifter. Like Loki[69]. So the author said something like, "Tom was not a man nor a woman and yet both at the same time. Whatever they chose to be they were" and always called them they so." I shrugged. "Went with it.

"But yeah. That was the other thing I liked." I grinned, wide. "Finally got an explanation for dinosaurs."

She whipped her head around. "Seriously?"

"Yeaaah," I laughed. "So Tom is the goddex of creation and the youngest sibling between Poln and their brother Achil. And Tom liked to make monsters with Achil and try to see which one would last longest or do best. So one day, in the midst of all the dinosaurs, they made people. And the first batch sucked. The second batch was a little worse. Third batch died constantly and so on and on until, boom! Us!" I paused. "Well, you guys."

Lena snorted. "So humans got made and we were awesome?"

"Basically. How it worked was Tom thought our- your resilience was intriguing and realized that humans could be great, if they didn't have to stress so much about dinos trying to eat them. So they huddled up all the humans and hide them in a protective barrier and then went to Achil, god of destruction and chaos, and asked him to wipe out the dinosaurs real quick and he did. In one successive blast."

She laughed. "So no meteor?"

"Kinda yes, kinda no," I allowed. "But Tom became the god of humanity in the meantime, along with all their other stuff."

"Wow." She shook her head as Ben hit the ground, eleven flags in his belt and annoyance marred on his face. "You have to let me read that book some time."

I grinned. "Sure." I bumped her arm with mine. "Whenever you want."

She smiled back and glanced over to Ben. "Where's the last one?"

He huffed and the two of them leaned back trying to suss it out from its hiding place. After a spell of minutes where we couldn't find it at all, Ben gave up and dropped the flags into the basket before hitting the button. It beeped once and in the far corner, way at the bottom and right beside the painting of a tree, the flag glowed solemnly, bent over as though weak or miserable.

Like it was sad we hadn't found it.

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# Chapter Ten

"English is the dumbest class on earth," I whined, flopping into my room and throwing Catcher in the Rye, the required reading, into a corner where I'd forget about it and then fail any and all tests about it while also having to pay money to replace it, only to discover it weeks after payment and then burn it in a trashcan for being stupid.

You do that a lot?

Just once.

Kali, the traitor, collected it from the corner, smoothed out the cover and then mimed whacking me over the head with it. "If you fail a class wherein the language is one you are fluent in, you will never go to university!"

"I'd be going to college for math. Accounting! Numbers! There's no English in numbers!" I protested.

Jackson bit his lip. Then shook his head. "You know, you'll still have to take English classes even if you declare a major from the get-go, yeah?"

"I did not know that, no," I said, snatching the book from Kali's hand and flipping through the pages. Bored, I whined and pushed it into her chest. "I don't want to read this."

"No choice," she said, pushing it back into me.

I groaned and peeled off my sneakers with one hand as she walked off. Jackson watched me amused from the closet door, hanging up my bag inside for me. I stuck my tongue out at him then brushed my fingers through my hair, wet and damp from the rain. I dropped the book onto the top of my dresser and swung open the bathroom door.

To preface, the barrier still exists. Which means I can't come in or go out of it without it being brought down first. Which isn't difficult. Takes all of a second but does mean that I literally can't get up and leave in the middle of the night and that if I want to go out that weekend, I gotta say something prior to. Luckily Marjorie in the office is a peach and sometimes Jackson or Kali just vanish me up to the Heavens and we go in through the portal door.

But anyway, today, there was "tiny" explosion, not caused by Ben, and we had to evacuate briefly.

Which meant the barrier went down.

Which explained how the towering Demon standing inside my bathroom managed to be there.

In my bathroom.

Towering.

I cursed my shitty luck.

"Hello," he said, voice small, like he was shy. "My name is Dylan."

I stared at him.

"Tao," he added.

I stared at him more.

I just-

Like, seriously, oh my gods, he was huge.

And annoyingly cute. Like. Fuck me.

BUT HE WAS MASSIVE.

Which, you know, is why I said, "How tall are you?" like an idiot.

My speaking broke whatever spell froze us up at his presence and next thing I know, I'm sailing into Jackson's chest and Dylan Tao, the hunkering mass of beautiful Demon, was flat on the floor, Kali pressing all her weight into her knee onto his chest, a knife at his throat.

"No!" I said and she glanced up at me.

"He broke in!"

"But- well- that doesn't mean-" I was flustered. He was so cute. It was difficult to focus on the matter at hand.

"I didn't mean trouble," Dylan assured her but she cut him with one look and he went still and silent, like anyone would.

"I do not care," she hissed. "I have not killed you yet because he will cry but I will."

Her words were a promise.

My skin prickled.

"No, wait, Kals-" I tugged out of Jackson's hold and crouched down beside Dylan's head. "Why are you here?"

He glanced over at me and then smiled soft, besotted. Like I was the best thing he'd ever seen. "I was looking for you."

"Why?" Jackson cut in.

Dylan didn't even look at him, focused on me. "I wanted to see you." His smile stretched slow across his face, as though Kali pressing a knife into his throat matter for naught. "You are just like I imagined."

It took me off guard and I laughed awkwardly, uncomfortable.

What?

People imagined me?

He, hunkering mass of beautiful Demon, imagined me?

"Thank you?" I tested and he grinned, wide and bright. It lit up his face, carving him softer, sweeter. "Gods, you're cute."

Jackson, luckily, was not fazed by this though suspicion seemed alive in his eyes and Kali looked from me to Dylan to me to Dylan and then the window shot up. "I will dispose of him now."

"What?" I looked up to the window then back at Kali. "What, Kali no!" I rushed over to the window and began pushing down on the sill. It didn't budge until I gave her a look and she relented. It clicked shut. I locked it and drew the blinds closed before pushing back my hair. "He doesn't seem dangerous."

"Neither do I," Jackson pointed out, and, well, had to give him that one.

Dylan glanced between all of us best he could and shook his head. "Oh, no, if you must kill me, I'm fine with that. I've termed my death. I just wished to see you before then."

"Why?"

He looked a bit confused that I didn't know why then shook his head, laughing low. "We are soulmates."

I stared at him.

What.

Jackson's head snapped from me to him from me to him and then he stood up sharply. "Come again, big boy?"

Unconcerned that there was still a knife at his throat, Dylan craned his head back as far as he could. "We are soulmates," he repeated. "I am not unsurprised that you don't know so don't worry. I just wished to see you both before I left." He relaxed his head, looking up at Kali. "You may do it now."

Kali looked from him to me, uncertainty in her eyes.

This was weird.

He was still adorable.

"How do you know?" she said sharply.

He squirmed and she eased up just the slightest bit. "My mama told me that our creator is not a creator. He cannot make us perfect, did not make us perfect. Sometimes our souls come out too large-" With both hand, he drew a circle in the air with fire, his hands cupping it at the end. "-and he must split them up." The circle of flames separated into parts. "They are drawn to one another, the other part of their soul. It can be in friendship, as with my mama and her soulmate, or-" He cut his eyes back to me, blush tenting his cheeks. "-kissing-wise."

My stomach did a flip-flop. The hunkering mass of beautiful Demon wanted to kiss me.

I stopped.

Drawn to one another.

Wished to see you both.

My stomach dropped and I croaked out, already in my gut knowing the answer, "Who's the other person?"

"Lena," he said calmly, his face going dopey with the thought of her. "Lena Richards."

Jackson swore, probably still disappointed I'd end up with her, then shook his head. "Okay, not the thing to focus on."

I didn't know what to focus on. Dylan was aware of where Demons came from, even if only a little bit. Had he heard the voice before? Was our creator who wasn't a creator the voice?

And Lena. Lena was a Demon.

In hindsight, I should've guessed it. Or maybe I just didn't want to guess it. Abandoned as a baby with no outside family to claim her. Issues with people as a child. The need to run. Layla's refusal to adopt her.

It seemed so clear.

Except it wasn't.

Demons weren't Warriors. I mean I was the exception but I'd been given that. She'd been born with it. Then again hybrids like Katie had to get it from somewhere so who knew? Everyone had been killing them too quick to even considering asking if they had powers like that.

But Lena.

She was a Demon.

And my soulmate.

I was a little miffed that's why we got on so well but then again it was nice that we did. And Dylan was the add-in, the third to the triad. I'd probably get along with him just as well.

"We don't know if he's telling the truth," Jackson said.

"He knows about Lena," Kali said, her voice thick. "No one knew about her."

I sat down on my bed, the weight of this heavy on me. "So she is? A Demon?" Kali looked down at Dylan, watching his face, and nodded slow and small. I exhaled sharply. "Holy shit. Just-" I faltered. "How?"

"I do not know," Kali said. She shook her head. "The specifics, I mean. I was not there. We found her months after we located you."

"Your dad," Jackson cut in. "He actually found her."

Dad? Found Lena?

Relief cut through me like a cold splash of water. My dad was not a killer. He was not a killer. He found a baby, speculated it was a Demon and still didn't kill her.

Awesome.

Excellent.

Love my dad, great man.

"He told me," Jackson said. "After your adoption, I asked about it when we came by to introduce ourselves. There were distress calls or something in the rainforest in Brazil about the dead rising in the middle of the night. Sometimes, before it, the locals, they'd hear crying. So your dad got sent down to deal with it. He took your mom with him.

"I dunno what happened or how specifically but they found Lena in a small cave. He tried to take her but got stopped by some corpse. When it touched him-" And Jackson traced just above his shoulder, voice faint. "-he said he knew instantly that it was her parents. That they had died while trying to care for her. When they passed, her crying for them pulled their souls back into their bodies. They were trying to get her somewhere safe but couldn't."

"Because they were dead," I said, feeling weirdly empty.

"Yeah. He said they asked him to keep her safe and he agreed and then set them free to die." Jackson leaned back, face drooped, morose. "I don't know how but that's how they got banned from here, from being Warriors. But she didn't so. Promise maintained."

I had to ask him.

I had to ask him.

I did.

But not right then.

"How did you know where to find us?" I asked, squatting beside Dylan again.

He had horns, not stubby but not stupidly long, at the base of his hairline. His bangs fell past his eyes and I brushed them to side to see his face more clearly. His eyes were red, not shot with it like mine, but soft, quieter almost.

Maybe it was just him.

"I asked," he said. "I asked to meet you for so long. I knew I would not have forever-" He glanced back at Kali. "-you find us all so much quicker now-" He looked back to me. "-but I was content to die if I had seen you. One day, I just knew."

"You heard a voice?" I said quickly.

Jackson stood up straighter, focused. Kali went tense.

Dylan's eyes went faint. "No. No, I- I just knew I'd find you. One day my papa, he came to me and told me to come here. A child had told him that it would have the thing I wanted most."

To see me.

To see Lena.

To see us.

And then he would die happy.

I squirmed uncomfortable. The thought of anyone seeing people around them die so much, so fast, that coming to terms with their own mortality was a quick process, that they just accepted it - it felt so wrong. Abnormal.

But Dylan didn't seem like the normal kind of guy anyway.

"The day I left for my travel, I found scrawl with your names on them," he went on. "I knew it was you. I finally made it at the end of the year-" The devil I'd seen, I realized. That was him. "-but I hadn't seen Lena yet so I waited. But I saw you." He looked at me, so sweet. "I saw you and I knew you were it. And I saw her today so." He smiled. "I have achieved what I have been waiting for two years." He hefted his arms from his side and pressed his wrists side-by-side. "I will go willingly."

"Two years?"

This guy had been trying to find me and Lena since he was-

Wait.

"How old are you?"

"I turned sixteen in-" He paused, then weakly, "Enero? Enero is-"

"January," I prompted.

He smiled weakly. "Right. I was born in Argentina. I taught myself English on my way here but sometimes..." He made a vague noise and fluttering motion with his hand.

I smiled, understanding, and nodded.

So at the ripe age of thirteen and a half, fourteen, this guy, one of my soulmates, had somehow managed to travel up from the bottom of the world, teach himself a whole other language, a bullshit language, on the way, managed to not die, get attacked or anything like that, in two years. Just to meet Lena and me. And not even that, just to see our faces.

The fucking dedication.

I would've married him right then and there for that alone.

Kali pulled his arms down so she could look at his face. Slowly, she eased up and when he didn't do anything, she stood fully, towering down at him.

He paid her no mind.

Just rolled onto his side and smiled at me.

"Well, we can't kill him," Jackson said firmly, "because this is the only shot I'm getting and I'm refusing to let it go."

"He cannot stay here," Kali shot back, which, fair point but-

"If he goes anywhere else, he'll be found and killed," I said, looking up at her.

"I am okay with that," Dylan said.

I smiled, loose, uncomfortable, and gave Kali the wide eyed "you hear this fuckery" look, which was normally reserved for Jackson, but in this instance, I made an allowance. She squinted at me, unamused and not caring.

"He has family." She gestured out roughly. "I will take him to them." Which didn't sound so bad except-

"They're dead," he said.

Well, fuck.

"What?"

"My papa called me to warn me that there were dangers in the area," he said, too calm, way too calm, "and then died. I went back but they were all gone. I continued on."

Jackson went stiff, his eyes wide, angry, miserable.

Understanding.

"We can't let him go," he said and this time his tone was serious, not halfway joke-y like before. He meant it. In totality.

Kali threw her knives into the air and they vanished. She crossed her arms. "Then what will we do with him? If anyone comes in here-"

"The bathroom?" I suggested. "Just- keep him there until we come up with something better."

She scowled, not at all pleased with the general consensus in the room. "What if someone comes in to relieve themselves?"

"Shower."

"And what if they require use of the shower?"

I swallowed thickly. The scenario was as unlikely as her dying of a heart attack and yet-

"Then I will die," Dylan said. "I am fine with that."

"Stop saying that," Kali snapped. Her eyes shifted over all of us then she dumped herself in my chair and scowled down at him. "Fine. I will... accept this."

Grimly, I smiled at her and, after a beat, she mimicked it. Looking back down to him, I tapped his horns, my tail reflexibly curling around my waist. "Did these hurt when they came out of nowhere too?"

He frowned. "No." He sent a nervous look at Kali as he slowly sat up, thumbing the edge of the horns. "It was in ritual. It did not hurt and it wasn't from nowhere."

Huh. "Ritual?"

He paused, then crossed his legs, taking a deep breath. "As I know it, we are... incorrect." He shrugged. "At least, that's what my mama's soulmate said. Many centuries ago a man came and gave us rites to follow through if a child was born incorrect. It would ease the pain and change us early. Now we do the process after birth. It makes it easier. So we are not taken apart from each other. However, we change naturally on the sixteenth anniversary of our birth."

He smiled throughout his words and spoke slow, deliberate. Not just because the language was still somewhat new to him but because he didn't really know how to explain it right. He already knew, he already understood.

We didn't.

And that was the difficulty with explaining anything, but especially something so simple yet so odd like this.

The part about incorrect struck out to. What the Dreamkeeper had said popped into my mind. Different from the others.

Was that what she meant?

Either way it explained a lot. Why Lena and I didn't look right. Maybe there was a specific age they waited for, otherwise it didn't work or could hurt us too much, sort of like being given a vaccine. Maybe having a human-looking child made getting food easier.

Maybe her parents died way before they could.

Maybe they didn't know how.

"Did you ever meet this man?"

Dylan shook his head. "No. I didn't."

I exhaled abruptly, suddenly exhausted. Everything, all of this, one right after the other. I was a Warrior. I was a Demon. I was a Demon. Dylan showing up out of nowhere. Lena was a Demon. My birthday was not May 23rd but rather some random Friday in February.

It looked like January was going to be my only month of smooth sailing and easy seas.

How unfair.

** ** **

Later that night, once I'd managed to trudge through Kali's demand of two chapters of Catcher in the Rye, I huddled it out in the bathroom. Kali, Jackson and Dylan were sneaking into the cafeteria to get him something to eat and I was staring at my reflection in the mirror.

Red eyes. Cropped but longish blonde hair. Blonde tail. Thick-ish nose. Damp tan skin. On the tall end of average height, like Jack, but not by much. Chubby face, fat cheeks, fat body.

And yet I had two soulmates.

I dropped my head and laughed. It wasn't at anything, not even the situation. I was just stressed out of my mind. Now, not only did I have my own head to stop from ending up on the platter but Dylan's too. Jackson might be risking death helping and hiding him. Kali? Who knew what anyone could do to her, if they could do anything at all but I still didn't like the sour taste of her being hurt or shunned by the people she liked.

So much risk.

So much crap, so much bullshit, and I could do was laugh psychotically into my towel.

It wasn't like I could tell Lena. Or maybe I should've! I don't know! I didn't know!

I inhaled deeply, thinking of her.

Lena, Lena, Lena Richards. So powerful she snatched her parents' souls from the Underworld and stuffed them right back into their bodies.

I pulled on my underwear and fished my phone out from the pockets of the skirt I'd been wearing, a nice floral green one. Without pause, I logged in and hit dad's number from my contacts. It started ringing immediately and like a small child in need of a hug, I sank from where I stood to the floor, legs to my chest.

"Ally-cat!" Dad chirped. "What's up, bud?"

I laughed quiet and ducked my head, pulling the towel around me like a blanket. "I know about Lena."

He went quiet then whistled low. Over the speaker, something sizzled "Who spilled the beans?"

"I'll tell you about that," I offered, "if you tell me about Lena."

Silence loomed but patient. Always patient. And then Dad laughed, "Okay, Al."

He groaned, that dadly groan they do when they're getting off a chair after a long time of sitting or when they're thinking back on fifteen, sixteen years' worth of memories, trying to recall the time they didn't murder a little girl.

"Let's see, shoot. Anna!" he called to Mom, who's voice echoed faintly over the firm, asking a snappish, "What?"

"Why did we get that call about the girl Jackson doesn't like?"

So glad that's how my hopeful future girlfriend was being memorialized in my parents' minds.

Mom's voice was tiny but got louder as she grew closer. "September. I remember because you were complaining about missing school and I had to get Luanne to cover me for that month of classes. Why?"

"Exchange of information," he said before coming back to me. A beep sounded and his voice fell close but faraway. "So sometime in September of '99, I got this call about the dead being a bothersome bunch down close to the rainforest in Brazil. And, of course, the one language I didn't know was Portuguese, which I said, but apparently all the other people were having the worst luck finding the source of it all."

Mom cut in. "Luckily, I know translation spells."

Dad laughed. "Yeah, me and Mom here-" I could practically see him shoot her a smarmy look. "-went down, talked to some locals. I did my snooping bit around the graves and she found out that sometimes, right before it all, they could hear a child crying. But it was faint and they weren't sure.

"Found it suspicious but didn't have much else to go on and figured if it was faint, that meant it was deeper into the trees." He sighed dramatically. "So we trudged in and in and in and in-" Mom snorted. "and then finally, found a whole dead body. And then another and another and another. They trailed towards this little cave, hidden by a bunch of leaves."

"Like in Tangled," Mom added.

"Yeah. Looked like they'd been headed towards whoever was pulling them out so I woke them up, sent them home. Then we went in the cave. Found this scrawny little girl, no fat on her bones, no nothing, just sad. Couldn't have been more than a year old but despite all the sickliness, she seemed happy, playing with a bunch of bones. Then she saw us and started crying.

"I went to go pick her up anyway and this dead guy just shoots out of nowhere and he wasn't fresh, Al," Dad stressed. "It was really gross. Very disgusting. Not a fan. Too many maggots."

"Charles," Mom chided as I shuddered.

"Well there were!" Dad cleared his throat. "So I step back and he starts coming and then-"

"I tried to blast his head off."

"Yeah, she did but for a corpse he moved fast. She just missed. He just walked over to the child right after and picked her up. Immediately stopped crying. I didn't- I was lost and confused because he kept watching me. And then finally I realized the bones she'd been playing with," Dad continued, "were from another body.

"That one got up but they didn't attack us, they just stood there and stared at us. Finally, the second one beckoned me over and I went-"

"Like a dip."

Dad huffed and I could see Mom's teasing grin, twisting small and contained but her eyes bright. "Like a dip. And they just gave her to me and then." He stopped. After a quiet stretch of silence, he went on. "They touched me and I knew what had happened. They died while trying to get away from some Warriors sent there months before but she'd stayed hidden. They were only trying to get them away from her. Somehow, she'd brought them back afterwards and they were trying to care for her but it was difficult when your body keeps falling apart.

"They had been moving her slowly since then to the village nearby. But she'd gotten sick and finicky and was hurting so every time she cried, she released power without thinking and brought up the closest dead." I scraped a nail over my ankle, exhaling slowly with his words. "It made sure they stayed around but it also made it harder for them to put her there. They didn't care if they were trapped in their bodies forever.

"They just wanted her to be safe."

I swallowed thickly and hung my head in the solemn silence. Heat pierced the back of my head, my eyes watering.

They wanted her to be safe.

And she thought they'd abandoned her.

"What happened after that?" I asked.

"Well, against all common sense, I said I'd keep her safe and then I released them back to the death. We walked out of the cave, went back to the village and our contact there recognized her right away."

"And that is why you are forbidden from talking to people named Jolene," Mom said.

Dad gave a short, annoyed grunt. "Yeah. She tried to murder her right away. I said no. I pointed out you. You were a known Demon. You looked vaguely person-like. You got to live," he said. "Of course, Jolene did not care so Mom decked her face, which was incredibly arousing-"

"Oh my Fūjin[70]," I groaned, cringing away from the phone.

"-and then we went back to Brokes," he went on, ignoring my pain, "and I told all of them to stuff it-"

"I said that," Mom interjected.

"Yeah, and your mom just hung in the back, holding Lena, doing nothing," Dad said, ignoring her. "And- ow!"

I snorted.

"We told them," Mom began, voice overlapping Dad's until he went quiet, "that children don't deserve to die in place of their predecessors. They disagreed but we came to a compromise. She would live if we left and never came back, because, well, then if we weren't there we couldn't create a ruckus or try to interfere again. We agreed. We never got her name so, like with you, they made one up for her and put in her foster care."

I tilted my head back. "Why did it matter this time?"

They were quiet. The silence thundered, long and tumultuous.

I had a point though. No doubt, if they were as credited as they were made out to be, if Dad had reached the point where he ranked higher than other Warriors like him, if Mom had done all three exams and scored well enough to be the first person to pass, no doubt they'd placed children in harm's way before.

Whether they'd killed them personally or not, they had to have done it.

What changed?

"She was alone," Mom said finally. "There was no one there to teach her negativity, there was no one there to teach her to kill or to be cruel. To me, I saw no reason why she needed to die. She was a blank slate. It's difficult to grow up in Brokes and do this, which is why I assisted but never volunteered, why I prefer monster hunting above all else. There's a trust you have to place in them, that they'll know better." Her voice fell, disappointed, ashamed. "And I realized they didn't."

I fiddled with my fingers, phone held tight between my shoulder and jaw, waiting for Dad.

A couple seconds later, he answered. "Yeah, what your mom said. But-" He faltered, breathing hard as he struggled to come up with the words. "They shared with me their life and it was a first, okay? Before that, I just assumed bad people doing bad stuff but them? They had done nothing wrong. They lived in hiding, in fear. They didn't even know why they were being attacked. They lived their lives so separate from the actual terrors and I tried to explain this but no one was interested. They didn't care."

I bit my lip.

Changing things.

I, an idiot harbouring a fugitive, an idiot who was also most definitely the enemy, an idiot who knew things I was supposed to, needed to change that.

Dylan had recounted his life in small amounts but for all that he seemed okay with it, it was kind of sad.

He'd always been in Argentina but he could never remember where he'd started off to because as far as he knew they moved from city to city so much it didn't matter. The last place he'd lived was in the attic of a shop, where the owner let them stay in exchange for work. He picked his last name at random from the same of some guy he met on the bus that he thought looked similar to him because he technically didn't have one.

He didn't know why the gods hated him, why Warriors distrusted him and sold him out the moment they saw him.

He didn't know any of that.

He just knew that they did and that he wasn't going to live long.

"So I told you our story, you tell us yours," Dad said. His voice, for all that it was weary, tried to be upbeat. "Exchange of information, let's go. Speak the words, Al."

Laughing quietly at that, I took a deep breath and I spoke the words.

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# Chapter Eleven

My parents were not exactly thrilled to hear that I was sharing my room with a random Demon who'd shown up out of nowhere. For all sorts of reasons. He'd shown up out of nowhere. The risk he posed. He could make fire on command. What if I got caught? What if he hurt me? What the hell do you mean he's your soulmate, Alex Scott Johnson, you get that boy out of there right now before I come up and make him leave, I swear to Mama Ocllo[71], don't you dare make me a grandmother, I am far too young.

But once I pointed out that there was nowhere for him to go where he wouldn't be caught immediately, they allowed some leeway. So long as Kali was always in the room, of course. To Jackson's complaints.

He was more than thrilled that my soulmate, or at least one part of that group, was a boy.

He was even more thrilled when I finally came clean about being bi. A little annoyed I'd been lying but all water under the bridge because I was dating a boy.

Which made talking to Lena, both what I knew and wanted to tell her about plus also Dylan, a bit difficult in the following days, but eh. I powered through. Awkwardly. But through it anyway.

But Dylan was great. He slept in my shower. He stayed quiet in the bathroom during the day, reading through my books. I'd bring him food at various points. He talked about his two year trip up from Argentina to Brokes to come see our faces. When it shot winter cold, he built a small unburning circle of fire in the room to warm it up faster.

"Many of us can do this," he had explained when Kali questioned him about it because, well, most Demons she'd met didn't have this, or at least never used it, and the ones that did tended to have powdered magic on them. She assumed that's where it came from. It made sense though. Hybrids like Katelynn had to get their powers from somewhere. "We do use physical magic. To help. These powers... they appear at random. Sometime after the change, I think." He smiled at me and blew a flaming heart at my face. "So I'm sure yours will come soon."

Kali had scowled but really, there was no reason not to like him.

He was quiet, polite, respectful.

And so fucking cute. Like, aaah, it was killing me not to kiss him and despite Jackson trying to get the your-first-kiss-is-mine promise out of the way so I had nothing stopping me, I refrained. Because I was mature. And also because everything was complicated and complex and annoying and Lena was still in the picture but didn't even know there was a picture and, ugh, all that would've just taken away from it anyway.

Which is awful. But whaddya gonna do, ya know?

I stretched in my bed, squashed between Kali and Jackson. Kali's eyes were closed but her breathing was too layered. I nudged her with my foot.

Her mouth twitched but her eyes did not open.

For the most part, she'd been taking it well. She didn't fight him, she didn't secretly try to slit his throat in the middle of the night. Like with Fish, she was just wary but polite and nice either way. In fact, I think she was beginning to warm up to him.

But I knew it was stressing her out. The risk of me getting caught. The risk of him getting caught. The risk of any of us being found out and punished for it.

Besides her most prominent and known thing was the fact that she murdered the demon Raktabija and drank his blood. So. Ya know. Lowkey a bit concerned about that. Yeah, Dylan wasn't under her section of stuff but, ngh, still a concern.

But she was good.

We were good.

Everything was going to be fine.

The door slammed open. I jerked, heart flying to my throat. Jackson immediately shot up, brass knuckles, pointed and gleaming, materialized on his fists. Kali was already at the door, knives out.

Alice laughed breathily. "Oh shit, sorry!" She ducked her head around Kali. "You said you were coming to the thing?"

The thing.

The hunt.

"Totally slipped my mind," I said, rolling out of bed.

It had. My stomach had been churning all night, keeping me up. I'd spent the day in a weird fog and crashed right after my last class, completely forgetting that I'd agreed the day before to tag along on Fish's doggish escapade into the wilderness.

Sending a nervous glance to the bathroom door, I pulled on my boots. Jackson groaned but slipped up out of bed. A thick purple coat pulled onto him. Kali gathered my jacket from the back of the door, handed it over to me. We pulled the door shut tight and started walking down, Alice chattering excitedly to Kali.

"Oh." I stopped before smiling sheepishly. "Have to go back- forgot my key."

Alice smiled, good naturedly, and continued on with Kali and Jackson, who sent me a worried glance. I slipped back inside and ducked my head into the bathroom.

"Hey," I whispered.

Dylan smiled up at me. "You're going?"

"Yeah, sorry." I ran my hand through my hair. "Just- stay quiet, okay?"

He zipped his mouth shut and threw away the key. I smiled, laughed quietly in my mouth, and pulled back, grabbing my key from the top of the dresser and bounding out the doorway. I pulled it closed, locked it up before bounding the rest of the way down the stairs and to the walkway.

Everyone was piled up outside the glass doors. Kali slung her arm around my shoulders and we walked out. The barrier fell down and then went right back up, the magic of it brushing against my skin. To my left, Lena, bundled up thick, shivered.

I swallowed around the words that leapt to my tongue and settled deeper into Kali's side.

Peter looked us over and smiled low, his voice hushed as we walked into the trees. "You guys are always so affectionate," he said.

"Beat it, Solberg," Jackson said, pushing him out of the way.

Peter huffed but didn't fight and reached out to grab Mary's hand, who smiled up at him, and hurried him along into the trees.

"We are fairly affectionate, are we not?" Kali murmured.

Jackson locked his arm with hers. "It's Nick's fault."

That was somewhat true.

We followed the others into the trees, bundled up to Kali like heat-searching leeches. Alice had her bow out, arrows strapped to her back. Fish looked back at us, grinned cheeky then vanished.

In movies, in books, in anything really, it's always a melting process with all the cracking bones of shifting features and cries and snarls of pain into the air. In reality, it was a lot less gross. He just blipped into the air then blipped back, a second for the total transformation, a real blink-and-you'll-miss-it type deal.

One moment, he's Fish, all-Canadian Jewish boy with a quirky smile and twitchy hands, then half a second later, he's Fish, a northern Inuit dog with sharp teeth and a tail that won't stop slapping your ankles.

Fish barked, trotting over to run a circle around us, before following Alice's sharp whistle and disappearing deeper into the trees with her. As we ventured in, further and further, I couldn't help but shake this uneasy feeling that things were going south. There was the images of dead squirrels or rabbits in my head, clamped bloody in Fish's teeth but I had a small feeling that wasn't it.

We were fine. Dylan was fine. I'd closed the door, locked it. Yeah, there was that little issue with it getting stuck but I'd yanked it tight, hadn't I? The doorknob clicked.

Didn't it?

I slowed down, trying to determine that when something flashed to my left. Everyone was peeling on ahead but I stayed still, glancing up into the trees.

Something wasn't right.

There was no one and nothing there to catch my eye. And I didn't feel unsafe, just malcontent. I squinted up into the leaves more, certain I'd seen something, but nothing showed itself.

"Al?"

I twisted back, caught Jackson staring back at me, concerned. "Yeah," I said, shooting one more look up into the branches. "I'm coming over."

He swung his arm around me as I nestled between him and Kali. His voice was low, eyes darting up to everyone in front of us as they chattered amongst themselves, calm and not noticing us behind them. "Everything okay?"

"I feel weird," I mumbled.

"Like when you..." As her voice faded off, Kali patted my lower back.

"No," I said, quiet. "This is different."

"Is it about the boy?"

I bit my lip and drew back, head to the sky. Couldn't see the stars.

Something white blurred through the top of the trees. Alice directed her bow to it, yelling, "Bird!"

Fish darted after it without a second of hesitation, barking rapidly. Alice chased him.

No.

It was too big to be a bird.

It's happening, I thought, but the voice didn't sound like mine. Soon.

"Alex?"

Lena's voice caught me out of my head and I glanced back at her. She had her hand out, beckoning me forward. I caught it, smiled grimly back at Kali and Jackson, then let her pull me away, after Fish and the others.

Soon, I thought again.

The voice in my head sounded excited but panicked. Concerned, which felt right. The excitement, the eagerness plying the tone. That didn't.

I smiled back at Lena as she bumped me with her arm.

"Sorry," she said, frowning.

"It's nothing," I assured her, still thinking about voice.

Why was it excited?

** ** **

"Sorry," Fish breathed out a fifteenth time. He wiped his mouth even though nothing was there anymore. "Sorry."

"It's fine," I breathed. It was. I mean, it was disgusting but fine.

Mary bounced on the back of her heels. Her voice was laughingly apologetic. "Maybe we should've let you sleep in."

I laughed awkwardly and finally stood back up. After about thirty minutes, Fish had managed to catch a whole rabbit in his mouth, which was, you know, kind of cool. The part where he brought it back to us and deposited at my feet, bloody and somewhat mangled because he'd messed up and didn't kill it right away and had to keep snapping it, that part was less so.

I exhaled deeply and patted his arm vaguely. "I'm just- gonna-" I stumbled off into the bushes and puked for a whole minute, the image of it, mangled, bloody, stomach torn out, burned into my retinas.

Peter passed me his water. I gargled it, spat it out and pressed my face into his arm, still trying to etch out the image. He twitched at the touch but patting my back soothingly.

Jackson scowled and tugged me away. "Alright, time to go, Al."

"Actually-" Lena looked up at all of us, the glow of her phone brushing against her face. "-Layla says we all need to come in now." Protesting noises fell from Fish's mouth in the voice of a whining dog, but Lena shrugged. "Come on, Fish-a-wish," she said, as she tucked her phone back into her pocket. "It's probably all that Demon worry."

They all flashed me an amused look and I scowled. "Fuck off."

"Yeah, Alex isn't the killing type," Mary teased, standing to her tiptoes to try and ruffle my hair. She only caught the back of my head but grinned and locked her arm around Peter right after. "But who knows?"

I snorted softly and sank into Jackson's hold.

Fish whined but followed slow with the rest of us, sticking it out as a dog until we crossed past the barrier. Then he turned back and let Ben clamber onto his back before locking an arm around Alice's shoulders. They ducked into each other, laughing, and we all carried on into the walkway. The door to the dormitory was already open as we walked up to it. As we headed inside, I caught sight of a small crowd of students, some dressed down in PJs, staring up into the staircase.

Lena's laughter at something Ben had said died off.

"What's going on?" she whispered, glancing over at Alice, who shrugged.

My stomach turned.

As we rounded the staircase, a wide berth between it and the crowd, I saw what they were all looking at.

"Alex," Layla started, her hand outstretched towards Dylan, laying crumbled in front of her, "do you know what this Demon was doing in your room?"

"No," I said, immediately, eyes flashing from her to him back to her. "I- I don't."

Dylan's head raised, but it didn't seem hurt, just snapped his eyes from me to the crowd. He was searching for Lena, I realized.

He knew he was going to die and he wanted to see her one last time, in person, not at a distance.

"Really?" Layla started testily, taking a step down the stairs. An older Warrior behind her stepped where she had just vacated. "He was sleeping in your bathtub."

"Must've just moved in," I breathed, feeling everyone's eyes watching me, concerned, confused.

Kali's hand tightened against mine.

Stilling halfway down the stairs, Layla eyed me over. Then nodded. "Alright." She glanced back and waved her hand. "You can do it now."

I reacted.

I mean, logically, logi-fucking-cally, I knew she wasn't going to kill him, not with a whole crowd of kids in front of her to see it, not in the dorms where people lived, not on the stairs.

But I couldn't help it.

I jerked forward, screamed, "No!" which might've been fine if I hadn't added, "He didn't do anything!"

Jackson exhaled sharply and I fell back, pulling into myself.

Well.

Just revealed myself a liar.

Or, the very least, a sympathizer.

Both terrible things to be right now.

Layla's eyes were dark, angry. "And how," she started, "do you know that?"

And there. I'd done it.

I'd finally gotten us caught.

There was nothing I could say that wouldn't sound like a lie, nothing I could come up with, nothing that sprouted to mind anyway, except for a dozen stammers that amounted to nothing.

We were done for.

"Alex?" Lena whispered, eyes shooting from me to Dylan back to me. Her face looked a bit pained. "What the hell's going on?"

"I-" My eyes shot back to Dylan. "I-"

The door had stuck.

The door had stuck.

It didn't click locked.

I breathed heavily, stepping back.

"Alex," Layla repeated, catching my attention.

Her eyes searched over mine and when we looked, dead at each other, she knew. Everything in her stance changed, her hand glowing blue as she stormed down the stairs towards me. The Warriors behind her followed suit, one grabbing Dylan roughly by his hair and pulling him back.

Kali's grip tightened in my hand. "Do not let go," she whispered.

And then we were gone.

It wasn't a vanishing into thin air thing. She just pulled me into her chest and darted towards the doorway. Like a knocking over a domino, the reactions flooded immediate. People yelled at one another to fall back, littler kids being ushered to their rooms, Layla and the other Warriors storming towards us as fast as they could.

But all I could focus on was Lena.

She'd fallen over in the midst of it all and was screaming.

Her apologizing after she bumped my arm in the woods earlier. The recent pain in her face, not from confusion or anger.

No, I thought. No, no, please, no.

Then we were out, Jackson breaking the glass walls of the walkway so Kali could dart through with no problem, no pain to me, and I couldn't focus on her anymore.

I couldn't focus on anything.

The wind brushed past my face. Dylan was going to die. The barrier was still up. My parents. Nick. It was just a jumble of subjects and topics, cascading down on me. Kali's arms tightening around my waist and back. Jackson shouting profanities at the Warriors throwing their own magically created weapons at us. Him cutting them down, Kali avoiding them.

A bolt of energy flying past my head.

Lena keeled over in pain, screaming.

It was all too much.

"This will hurt," Kali whispered and then we vanished just before I could hit the barrier walls. She gasped, a sharp, "Agh" as we reformed just outside the limits, Kali stumbling to the ground, me still in her arms. "Jackson!"

He grabbed me, heaved me up and we kept running.

We cleared the first few stretches of trees before Jackson veered off towards the roads and pulled Kali down to the ground. He clamped a hand over my mouth, eyes frenzied. I glances back at Kali concerned. She had one hand over mouth, trying even out her breathing silently. Her chest heaved all the while.

Catching my eye, she dropped her hand and shook her head, saying in a hushed breathy whisper, "It requires much energy to break the barrier. I am winded."

"Sorry," I said automatically.

She shook her head some more, hand to my chest. "It is not your fault."

But it was. It was my fault. I was born. I was important for zero reasons and attracted curiosity. I was paranoid. I needed to be befriended to be protected.

It was my fault.

Jackson leaned back against a tree, craning his head to see over the bush. "I think I can get us far enough for you to rest."

Kali nodded but held up a finger, needing a few more seconds. Jackson patted her hand and smiled back me, grim and tense. I swallowed down apologies I knew he'd just ignore.

"Did you see Lena?"

Kali shook her head, chest heaves slowing down. "I heard her. What occurred?"

"Same thing," I said looking to my tail as it wrapped tightly around my waist, fur sticking out like a frightened cat.

Jackson pressed his hand to his face. "Al, we can't go back."

"I know."

He shook his head. "I would. If I could. If I knew that I could get her out, either one of them out, I would, okay?" He squeezed my hand, pain in his eyes. "But I can't. Besides, she's never done anything wrong." He swallowed thickly, eyes darting away. "She'll be fine."

I laughed, broken and hushed. "I was important to you. She's not."

Dylan. Dead. Lena. Dead. Countless others in the community I'd been born in. Dead. DNA donors. Dead. My predecessor. Dead. My parents, if I went to them. Dead. Jackson, if he got caught? Dead.

Dead.

Dead

Dead.

Because of me, because of me, because of me.

"Regretting me yet?" I asked.

Kali grabbed my wrist and tugged. I looked at her. She stared at me. "Never."

I couldn't tell if it was a lie but the thought of it as a truth seemed wildly inaccurate. Who would want me at this moment? I'd been born in a place where we identified the bad things, tried to come up with a way to change it, became the bad thing, harbored a bad thing and then fled the area as soon as it all got emptied out in the air, leaving the person I'd been trying to keep safe and the person I'd lied to behind him

The person I'd lied to who was now suffering.

Who might've been able to escape if I'd told her.

I tilted my head to the sky, watching the stars bloom down at me.

It's happening.

Soon.

"I heard a voice," I said, not looking at either of them. "Earlier. When we were following Fish."

Jackson squeezed my wrist. "Like before?"

"No." I dropped my head and pushed back my hair. "It was different. It said, "It's happening. Soon." It sounded excited."

They shared a look. Then Kali wrapped her arms around me. "We need to go," she said. Her whole body sank into me, still exhausted. "Now, Jackson."

He nodded and wrapped his arms around us both.

We vanished just as a light hit us.

|  |

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# Chapter Twelve

Jackson shouted and we all tumbled into the ground, Kali twisting at the last minute to cushion me from the blow. He kept gasping, rolling onto his back. Fingers pulled at his jacket, undoing the buttons and velcro and yanking it open. His hand drew back from his stomach, wet, golden-red.

Bloodied.

"Jackson!" Kali and I yelled, shifting up to grab him.

He groaned as we helped him to his feet. The wound was already healing but blood kept flushing out, the cut deep. My side burned in sympathetic agony.

"They must've-" He dropped his head, nearly collapsing. "Ah fuck."

"What happened?" I asked, looking to Kali who pressed her hand to his stomach, trying to steady it.

"They likely cut him off," she said. "When you transport, you can be anchored so you cannot go or, if they are poor at doing it, you do not end up where you should. It can injury you." She looked around the highway we'd collapsed onto. "We need to get him somewhere to heal."

I nodded, struggling not to focus on the blood, the voice I'd heard, Lena and Dylan probably being executed back in Brokes. I tried to figure out where we were but the edge of a highway didn't explain much.

And the edge of highway, nothing in sight, didn't give us a lot of options to put him down either, besides two feet to the left where there were minimal rocks and the grass was a bit longer.

Jackson grunted as we set him down. "Kals- call him."

Kali scowled, rooting through his pockets. "No. He will tell on us."

"Owes me a favour."

"I do not care."

Crouching down beside his head, I squeezed Jackson's shoulder. "Call who?"

"Apollo," he exhaled then threw his head back. "Fuck, Kali."

She shoved her hand, coated with the physical magic powder he kept on him, and glared at him. "We are not calling him."

"We need a ride," he groaned. He flopped his arm against my chest. "Al, Al, Al-"

"I hear you," I said, standing up. "You sure?"

He gave me a thumbs-up, eyes squeezing shut as Kali moved her hand further up his chest. She sent me a look but said nothing. I took a breath and murmured, "Okay, Apollo, if you're listening, I need you to come down now."

Nothing happened, no one showed. After a beat, I stopped and glanced around, my heart hammering in my chest.

Kali scowled. "We have now given away our position." She heaved Jackson up and over her shoulder. He let out an agonized shout but she ignored it, looking at me. "We should run."

** ** **

Maybe twenty minutes later, we peeled to a stop by an open McDonalds. Doing up Jackson's jacket, we stepped inside and dropped him into a booth. I slid into place while Kali walked up to the register, gloves pulled over her wet hands.

The store wasn't packed but it wasn't empty. A couple people hung around tables, talking low to one another. Behind the counter, the cashier blinked their eyes rapidly to stay awake as someone rattled off a long order in front of them. Kali pulled back her hair twice, fingers dropping to her side to tap out anxious messages against her thigh. Jackson winced and shifted, hand to his stomach.

"How long does it normally take to heal?" I asked, grabbing napkins from the basket in front of us.

He shrugged then bit his lip, tilting his head back and holding in a gasp or a groan. After a couple seconds, when the pain passed, he answered, "Depends on what they used."

He took the napkins and discreetly tried to shoving them under his coat, wincing all the while. I patted his arm reassuringly and then glanced over to Kali, finally at the front of the line.

What was the plan here?

Did we even have one?

Maybe I should just turn myself in.

I bit my lip, dropped my voice quiet and didn't look at him. "You know, if we go back, you guys probably won't-"

"Don't," he said stiffly.

I stopped and stared at him, annoyed.

"It's not gonna happen," he said.

"But-"

"No."

I gave up and he watched me, grimly, still shoving napkins up his coat to stop from bleeding through it. A few minutes later, Kali came back with an order for fries for all us. She ate them like she was starving, which fair, given she must've pounded out a heck load of power to break me through the barrier. Not interested, I passed her half of my own and nibbled at them, feeling sick in the pit of my chest.

"So what's the plan?" Jackson asked, undoing a napkin and putting it to the spot next to him. He pulled out his jacket just enough to pull out all the wet napkins he'd shoved up there and balled them all up into the nice clean one between us.

"Nick," Kali said. She shook her head. "We should get them and then we will run to somewhere we would not go."

"Bermuda," Jackson and I chorused. He sent a confused look. "Wait, how do you know that?"

"Lena told me," I said. "When I was telling her about the Boshinishan myths."

Jackson snorted. "Oh, I loved those ones."

Kali nodded, swallowing thickly. "We are in Albuquerque," she said. "We will catch a train from here to Los Angeles. Then we will go from there to San Francisco. By then, I should have regained my strength to transport us to New York where we will catch a flight to Bermuda." She caught my eye. "I have never transported there. I am wary of what will happen if we go direct."

I nodded. "Okay, okay, makes sense."

Why were you all hellbent on Nick coming?

Because Nick is our friend and if they found out we fled without them they'd hunt us down just to yell. On top of that, Nick is always good to have in a pinch. And also going back to the friend thing. Besides, Nick is my rock, right? I needed them, especially in a bad light like now. We all knew that.

Also, it was April and Jackson's birthday was coming up soon and frankly if they missed it, they'd riot.

"Yes. On the way, I will make up whatever we need to remain there," she went on, "until you both pass. Then we-" She looked at Jackson. "-will go back and tell them that we were forced to assist him."

"Sounds excellent," Jackson said. "Little terrible with that last part but alright. Sounds excellent."

We highfived one another and sat back.

I pretended like I wasn't going to die.

I pretended like hiding on an island was something I was really interested.

Like, I'm sure, I'm sure Bermuda is a fantastic place to live but I liked my Brokes. My parents, my family, old school friends I caught up with when we caught sight of each other. Familiar streets, familiar stores. My home. My neighbors.

My mom liked the island well enough. She told me that she remembered it being nice, peaceful. She liked the beaches, she enjoyed the vibes.

But still.

It wasn't home.

Plus I did not really feel all that up to living permanently in a place that only just recently dropped discrimination against sexual orientation[72].

Yeah, we're not the best place for any of that.

I know. Well, I mean, I knew then because I looked it up while we were gorging on fries, trying to figure out when the next bus was coming by or if we should just call a taxi. The more I thought about it, the funnier it was, though, that a place believed to be magic wasn't.

Or, at least, was a place where it went all haywire.

"Okay," Jackson said, sinking back into the booth, this time beside Kali. "I called a cab in the bathroom. Should be coming anytime now."

A fry hanging from her mouth, Kali looked at him, then narrowed her eyes. "You did not!"

"Look, he owes me like fifteen favours, okay?" Jackson gestured vaguely. "Like life-or-death favours. It's gonna be fine. Probably."

"I hate him," she growled, shoving another fry in her mouth.

"Apollo?" I glanced at Jackson. "One, are you sure he's not going to kill me on sight? Two-" I turned to Kali. "-why?"

Her face soured and she grumbled something under her breath. I only caught "...out a window..." so I assume it wasn't anything good.

"No, Al, he's not gonna do that." Jackson snatched one of Kali's fries. "He's just coming to give us a quick ride to Cali. He owes me because I'm one the few people who'll play games with him and instead of money, I take favours because money is worthless but getting someone to do things I don't want to do is forever."

"Jackson," I said slowly, hands clasped. "He can see the future."

"Doesn't mean he sees it when he plays," Jackson said. He leaned back and glanced at Kali then dropped and frowned at her. "Stop being a baby."

She scowled. "You are the baby."

He threw a french fry at her head.

We're such cool people, ya know? Me, an actual sixteen year old, and them, an ancient goddess and an old man.

"What's wrong with Apollo?" I asked again.

She scowled deeper and sank into her seat, nearly sliding out of the booth and onto the floor. "I hate him."

"Big chicken and a giant egg," Jacksons summarized. "'Nuff said."

"You basically said nothing," I grumbled, glancing back at Kali who was glaring at the door.

Twisting around, I caught sight of a young man pushing the doors open. He was tall, muscled, with dark skin and thick hair braided down in uniform dreads, which he had tied back in a loose ponytail. He had on a loose leather jacket and tight jeans. He glanced around the room once before stilling on us. Flipping his sunglasses to the top of his head, he grinned wide.

I wanted him to bone me into the ground.

"Hey, you guys," Apollo said, shifting over. He leaned against our booth, still smiling. "Ready for your ride?"

** ** **

"Your car is very nice," I said when we slid into his backseat. Jackson took up the shotgun seat and shot me a knowing glance.

Apollo's eyes, fucking browner than brown, glanced up to the mirror and grinned at me. "Thanks." Revving the engine, he dropped his sight back down to the road ahead of us. "The backseat folds down."

I choked on my own breath, digging my nails into the seat cushion.

Yeah.

This is how I die.

Imagining myself getting screwed in the backseat of a nice car by a god.

Sure.

Okay.

We took off at a very illegal speed. His eyes never strayed from the road once, grip on the steering wheel nice and relaxed. Kali refused to stop glaring at the back of his head and Jackson was busy fiddling with the radio, switching between what felt like a thousand different stations until he found one he liked.

I smoothed out the fabric of my pants. "So you're not driving me to my death, right?"

Apollo laughed. "No! Jack was very specific when he cashed in his favours. But-" He cut his eyes to Jackson. "-I do have to make a quick pit stop in Ceres before I take you into San Fran. Nothing terrible, just a couple hours." He made a sudden swerve that had me nearly crashing into Kali. "I'd lie low then."

"Let me guess," Kali started dryly, fixing my seatbelt as I sat back up. "You are doing something pointless."

"To some people, maybe," he said, voice breezy. "My son has a play in the morning. Leading role." He shot a wide grin to the rearview mirror. "Promised I'd help him rehearse."

"That's nice," I said, hand over Kali's mouth before she could say something rude, which, wow that was a first.

Well, not a first, she does dislike enough people, but ya know. Just so more used to doing it to Jackson. Nick usually handles her.

"Well, thank you," he chirped, sending me another quick grin that had my heart fluttering rapidly.

God of the sun, indeed.

Struggling to regain breath, I smiled awkwardly back and asked, "So how you do pair off? With like duties and stuff?"

"Oh, that's really easy," he said, weaving between the trucks and cars stretching out the highway with us. "We just divvy it up according to whoever you were paying attention to that month."

I blinked. Then released a strangled, "Oh."

He laughed. "Before you, we just split up every couple of years at random. I think, right before we inoculated you, Utu[73] had been doing it up for a while. And, of course, some us of - Ra[74] \- cheat at it but I mean, how else is he going to visit themlot in the Houses so-" He released a ragged sigh. "-we let them if they need to. Just gotta time it right, ya know?"

He peeled to a sudden stop behind a pileup, hand shooting backwards to throw a warm burst of air to keep my head from snapping forward.

"Sometimes," he continued on, peeling backwards and snapping the car out of reverse, "we buddy up though. As much as I do love my horses, I gotta admit. Ra's boat? Pretty sexy."

He gunned the car forward without pause. Kali steeled her hand over my mine, watching me carefully as my heart pounded up my throat. Jackson didn't seem perturbed that we were racing for the pileup and Kali was all too calm for someone who did not like our driver so I tried to rationalize it. They knew I was in the car. Jackson was specific. Apollo was not driving me to my doom. He probably wasn't going to slam his car into a pile of other cars, killing me and all the other unfortunate people in the road.

It was cool.

We were fine.

I keeled over and squeezed my eyes shut, waiting for the impact which never came, twisting me head up, I saw us, sliding right through the other cars.

Apollo tilted his head back and caught sight of my bewildered and panicked expression. "It's a ghost feature," he laughed. "I have no patience so Than put it on for me a couple decades ago." He glanced back to the road. "Pretty sweet right?"

It was pretty sweet, if not horrifying debilitating. "Than?"

"Thanatos![75]" He looked so much brighter, his skin actually glowing with uncontained happiness. "My boyfriend!"

I pressed a hand to my chest, trying to ease my heart from a stampede to its regular anxiety-induced double time. "Oh. Can I ask-"

"For a while now," he cut in. He sent me an apologetic look but I shrugged it off. Katelynn did that sometimes, knew what you were going to say and cut in before you were finished speaking. I was used to it. "It's difficult to love loudly like I do," he continued, "so when I was still moping because of Hyacinth's[76] death, even decades after, he showed up one day and asked me if I'd like to see him again."

We broke into the limits of a city, speeding through late night traffic.

"Of course, I said yes, why wouldn't I? And he took me down and let me see him again and it was so nice and after a while, we just happened." He smiled, loose, content, turning a corner and suddenly on another highway. "Apparently, P[77] was just tired of my moodiness because if she had to be torn from her husband[78] for half the year, she would've preferred better company than Sunshine Sadman, but whatever the reason, I'm glad. He's wonderful."

"Well, that's-" We passed right into another city, lights bursting suddenly against my eyes. "-great."

His head snapped up. "Too fast?"

I shook my head, sinking into my seat and squeezing my eyes shut. "No."

He slowed down just a touch anyway. "Oh, no," he said, voice airy. "He's smart, spilled a whole bunch of stuff about plans so we kind of can't kill him. And Lena's got nearly a whole decade of good behaviour on her side so there's that. Neither of them will die soon." At my confused look, he frowned. "That's a first."

Kali leaned forward. "I thought you could not tell the future without a given."

"I can't," he said. "But he was going to ask, now or couple minutes from now." A couple minutes from now. The thought only just started pitching through my head. "Hmm, interesting. Didn't get the alarm."

"Alarm?"

He gunned it down a dirt road, swerving out the view of a small town, brightly lit up, and into shaded darkness of grass and trees. "I know you've got that little kid with you. Katherine, Caroline or-" He shook his head. "Katelynn! But us gods, we follow a bit of a different ruling. Can't give the future unless allowed. But it's there, all the time, so fast and speedy. Never goes away."

"How do you know when you're allowed?"

"Well, my entire body doesn't start screaming in pain for one," he said, simply, shooting past a "See you soon!" sign so fast it shook. I stared at him in horror. "Used to be really annoying but I got used to it fast. Helps when your dad's a dick who'd rather beat you to near death than pay attention to the fact that you can't tell him which one of his kids is going to supersede him like he did with his."

My voice cracked. "What?"

He yanked to a sudden stop. "Cows!"

A clear-cut topic change and yet I didn't want to change topics. I wanted to remain on the same one, discuss what the fuck he just said. Both the pain thing and the abuse thing.

I looked out to the farm we were passing by and nodded jerkily. "Yeah, cool. Now, back to what you just said-"

"Hey," he cut in, voice loud, "Jack, did I ever tell you about the time I decked Hermes[79] in the face for stealing my cows a second time?"

Jackson shook his head. "No, you have not," he lied. He twisted his head a slight bit, just enough to give me a clear look. Don't, it said. Out loud, he went on, "Tell me about it."

With that, Apollo chattered on about the time he punched Hermes was stealing his cows a second time, went into a very long rant about why he doesn't understand why people want his cows, yes, they're cool but they're not that cool, and in under half an hour we were in Ceres, California.

But what he said kept burning a hole in my head.

I figured it couldn't be easy knowing the future. One of the reasons, Kaelynn refused to go to the Knight school was because she knew the other kids would get wind of her prophetic-ness and start asking her about the future and she couldn't stand it, without having even been put into that situation yet. But the idea that your body would be put in pain every time someone asked sounded horrifying.

And the idea that someone would hurt you for following a universal rule was just as sickening.

There was no way Katelynn would ever broach that without Nick hauling all ass and then, I dunno, pummeling the universe somehow.

Instinctively, I filed that under THINGS I'M GONNA FIX then winced as a mental knife slaughtered that file into shreds.

Couldn't fix it.

I was on the run.

Wasn't going to fix a damn thing ever.

Great.

Fantastic.

People were suffering, I could've done something about it but instead I had to be the world's biggest fuck-up and get myself placed on a godly hit list and had to flee the country.

But Jackson had known about it, Kali likely had too, and neither of them thought, hey maybe this isn't a cool thing to do? Or maybe someone, someone out there, had tried changing things but they were all so stuck in their ways none of it got fixed. Or maybe everyone just accepted it.

I really couldn't stomach that thought.

Apollo parked outside a small motel. After sliding out of the car, I ducked to his window and stuck my head in before he could drive away too fast. He grinned at me, half-pained, knowing exactly what I was going to say and not wanting to hear it.

"It's not a problem," he said. "We all deal with it."

"That doesn't make it any better," I pointed out. "No one should be used to pain."

He smiled, a little broken. "You sound like Hyacinth."

I drew into myself, still hunched over the driver's side window. "You know why, don't you?"

He gave a half-hearted shrug. Yes. No. Maybe.

But in the back of my mind, I wondered why I even bothered asking. He saw the future, not the past. Whatever occurred to make the universe hate hm, hate any of them like that, he wouldn't know.

Still, he seemed tense by my asking.

"It won't change," he answered my silent question.

"You sure you're looking at the right world?"

He smiled, crooked. "Yeah. Because this is the only one where we suffer."

I went still, glancing him over. He didn't look to be in any pain from revealing that but who knew. Did it even count?

Who knew.

I didn't.

Miserable for him, I drew back.

He shook his head. "Honestly, kid, don't stress it. Just pay attention and everything will work out how it should." He patted my side through the window. "Oh and check the mirror in about-" Quick glance to the clock glowing on his dashboard. "-twenty-three minutes?"

I nodded slowly and walked over to Jackson and Kali, bunched up near the door waiting for me. Apollo poked his head out the window as he reserved out of the parking lot.

"I'll be by at about eight-ish!" he called out before vanishing into the distance.

For a couple minutes, I just stared out to where he'd been. Then, "How did you know?"

"Eric," Jackson said, voice upset and angry and dead all at once. "I told you. He's a god of time. Which includes the future so he used to show up with bruises or bleeding a lot or sometimes, if someone asked him something, he'd start tearing up. One day, I asked him about it and he just spilled it all out there. But told me there wasn't anything I could do anything about. Apparently, it's a norm."

I swallowed. Well, explained how he fixed my apartment, I guess. "That's shitty."

"Well, when you live forever, you lose whatever compass would've let you have morality," Jackson said.

Kali let out a rush of angry breath and took my hand. "We should go in."

"Okay," I said because what else was there to do.

She pulled me inside, kept me tucked to her side, and we walked up to the front desk. A stocky guy sat in the front. He smelled like cheese. He took the money for a single night, passed a key to me, eyes narrowed up at Jackson who glared back just as intensely, and sent us down the hallway to the room.

The room wasn't anything spectacular for sixty dollars a night but it was relatively clean and didn't smell like bad cheese so that was a plus. Pulling off my jacket, I sat down on the edge of the bed.

Get picked up by Apollo. Get Nick. Run away to a somewhat homophobic and probably transphobic country to spend the rest of my days, where Nick would probably have to go back to being Nicole and Jackson would never be able to make another gay joke in his life. Never speak anyone I loved ever again except for the people who were coming with me.

Never fix anything.

It's happening. Soon.

What had that even meant? What was happening? The inevitable break of everything that was even close to normal in my life?

I closed my eyes. The creator that was not a creator. A man who'd come and helped the people he made. Help me out here, I thought.

No one answered.

Nothing happened.

Right, I thought bitterly. Because the guy was a murdering jackass who forced his own creations to do terrible things and then take the full rap for it. But how much of following orders was always following orders?

Nothing's inherently evil. But anything can be warped that way, I guess.

It was a miserable thought but all the thoughts were miserable. Lena, dying, Dylan dying, Apollo and all the gods of time and future getting pummeled or beat or forced into excessive pain all because someone asked a question the universe wouldn't let them answer.

The only world where we suffer.

But why?

What did that mean? Why was it the only one? What the hell happened to make it the only one? What the fuck was this happening and how did it relate to anything?

Why couldn't, just for once, things be clear and cut and made easy to understand?

And who was this guy? Centuries ago and still controlling the hell out of the Demons everywhere. So he was immortal but not a god. Or maybe he was a second god? Or maybe he was just some immortal dickhead.

I kicked off my shoes and shuffled to the bathroom, push the door shut and settling on the cool feel of porcelain.

I was going insane with thinking.

Jackson knocked on the door. "Al, is everything okay?"

No. No, nothing was okay.

Nothing was clear, nothing made sense and it all bubbled a rage in me that I didn't like.

Tilting my head back, I called back, "Yeah. I'm good."

"You sure?"

"Positive," I lied. "Just tired."

He didn't say anything to that, his footsteps trembling faint away. I stared up at the fluorescent bathroom light, bright and uncomfortable.

Nothing made sense.

Everything was changing.

And I didn't even get to know why.

Biting back a sob, I covered my face and sank into my knees and trembled in the quiet, so alien as it was loud.

It wasn't fair. I was a fucking kid! Just turned sixteen, which I didn't even know had actually happened when it did. I was supposed to be worrying about my future SAT scores for the English section, supposed to be planning a week out to the beach between work all summer. I was supposed to be doing normal shit, not wondering if a god was gonna come down skewer me into nothingness.

I wasn't supposed to be scared for my life.

I was supposed to be embracing it fully or embracing in the way I could.

But no.

No, I didn't get that.

The unfairness of it all, that's what I earned. Fifteen years of trying to be a good person, of trying to do the right thing and it'll blew up on me, raining fire and brimstone in a matter of a couple of months.

And you know? In books, in movies, in TV shows, they never talk about what that does to a kid. You see all these teenagers and little kids doing the impossible and it's cool and inspiring but never once does it broach how fucked up they get from it.

No, no, they like to gloss over that. It's not as fun to write about or maybe they don't know how.

But, nah, I got to sit there, on a toilet in the bathroom of some shoddy motel room, running away from the people who were going to kill me, who were gearing up to murder people I liked, who were probably laying the heat on my parents. Who knows? Fish was my friend too. Maybe this was a fucking great opportunity to get rid of him too.

I sank to the floor, hand clamped around my mouth and body shaking.

They were gonna die, they were gonna die, they were gonna die.

And it was all my fault.

It was my fault. My fault, my fault, my fault.

The words, the knowledge, I through my head so fast it made me sick. I threw up the toilet seat and vomited into the bowl, pulling back and gasping. I wiped the little bit of sick off my mouth and stood with shaky knees.

There was nothing I could ever do that would rectify everything that I'd caused.

I hunched over the sink and washed my hand before splashing water in my face. Sticking my mouth just under the tap, I rinsed my mouth out and spat it back into the sink, watching the water run down the drain.

Well, Alex, I thought. You did it. You finally screwed up worse than four years ago.

Taking a deep breath, I stood back and dried my face off with my shirt. In the mirror, my face still looked a bit splotchy, eyes reddened from crying, not just because they were red. I frowned and shifted back just a bit more.

Wait.

Were those-

I grabbed my chest.

Interesting.

I had breasts.

Like actual real ones.

Quick, I palmed my crotch then pulled my hand back fast.

Oh. Okay.

So I just- I had everything?

Dylan and the fire. Shapeshifters in general.

Had to get it from somewhere.

Letting out an awkward bark of laughter, I leaned back against the wall, trying to breathe as my heart tapped out my excitement in rapid succession. Inside, I was still feeling turmoil from everything else but it was burning together in happiness at this, my wonderful power of going back-and-forth between gender, creating unholy and awkward twist of emotions that trainwrecked their way through my head.

I didn't look all that much different, just fat in slightly different places than they used to be and new appendages, plus the sudden lack of one.

"Alex?" Kali called through the door.

I pulled it open. "So I got," I said.

She took me in then nodded. "I like it."

Jackson craned his head to catch me from the bed, then frowned. "Wait-" He rolled off to the floor then stood up sharply. "Are you-"

"Yeah," I said, grinning stupid wide.

"Well," he sighed, leaning up against Kali. "Not the coolest thing around but I guess it suits you." He reached out tentatively, then pulled back. "I just wanna-" He frowned. "How do you go back?"

I stared at up at him, eyes widening.

Oh.

Shit.

** ** **

After a couple minutes of practice and odd attempts, I finally got it to go back and then go back again. Where we fell on the lovely realization that I was on my fucking period.

Amazing.

Two minutes in and I decided I was not a fan.

Fair assessment.

Yeah. I reluctantly swapped back after all Kali could find from the nearby twenty-four hour Quick Mark was expired Tylenol. The restroom there was only stocked with tampons, which haha, not happening.

Squirming, I rubbed my lower abdomen. "I can still feel it," I muttered.

"Just in your head, Al," Jackson said, flipping through channels.

I tilted my head back. "So. How do you know they're not gonna locate me with fancy magic or anything?"

"Well, one, haven't done so yet," he started, "and two, your mom loaded you up with a fuckton of protections that even we can't break through. Nobody's gonna locate you with magic. They have to know where you are to find you."

"Like Dylan?"

Jackson shook his head. "Let's not, Al. Dangerous path lead to dangerous thoughts." He dumped the remote into my lap. "Optimism!"

Letting out a brush of a soft sigh, I glanced up to the ceiling. The noise from the TV, some rerun of a show that'd clearly been off air for a while, bustled through my head. In the bathroom, Kali was taking a shower. "You never told me why you didn't like Peter."

He was quiet for all of a minute before, "He just reminded me of bad things, okay?"

"What bad things?"

"Alex-"

"Jackson," I said, sitting up. "No offense, but I'm really tired of not knowing things so if you could just do me a solid and answer the fucking question."

He cut his eyes at me, not shocked or anything because, yeah, but annoyed. "Okay, fine." He sat up, getting comfortable against the headboard. "When I was thirteen, I was pulled up to the Heavens for my confirmation. It went fine. Shitty but fine. I missed called three times before I actually went up. It took me ten minutes to activate my godly form when everyone else could do theirs in under two. And before you ask-"

He shimmered a golden hue, almost melting into light. When it all faded and I looked back at him, he looked really stupid.

It was like the universe recognized he had three places of divine power but couldn't actually decide which one to use and threw them all at him haphazardly and then just walked off without making sure he didn't look dumb.

On the Greek side. A purple toga draped down to his knees and thick, boxy sandals, which in all fairness could've gone to either. Running over the Chinese side, he had long red silky coat, trimmed with black. It fell way past his ankles, sleeves falling way past his hands. And then, levelling it all out with Egypt, kohl edged black around his eyes. A small ankh hung from his neck.

Shooting me an odd glance, he shimmered again and this time animal form, duality, a cute dove with soft pink feathers. Then he went back to my regular black-haired, brown-skinned Jackson.

"You remember when we were eleven and you wore those hot pink pants for three weeks." I gestured to all of him. "Better than whatever that was."

He choked on a laugh, rolling his eyes. "Yeah, it's dumb as shit to look at it."

Which, true, but also not. Cohesively they tied well into one another but there was an odd sense of it just not being right that made it feel so off.

He rubbed his hands over one another. "Everything just sucked, really. Couldn't be near my family for six months while I learned my duties, didn't want it. No one really liked me because I was mostly an accident or because I just wasn't nice. It wasn't that I was trying to be rude, it just wasn't what I wanted.

"Eventually, a couple years into it, I made a couple friends. Ranj, Kali, Eric and-" He exhaled shakily. "-Anders. Second god, like me. Part of the same year and Norse. Love, like me. And he just didn't get it. Didn't understand why I wouldn't be grateful, why I wasn't excited, didn't understand any of it.

"So then, when I was seventeen, I moved my whole family here, to Brokes. It was easy and they were willing. With all the new responsibilities I had, I really couldn't go any farther than the city too often and they missed me so they came." He smoothed out his pants. "Then, after a year, they died in a car crash. And then the war happened and I decided throwing myself into it to avoid mourning was the best and smartest thing I could do.

"And then the war was over and I was still sad and Ranj told me that I was allowed to be sad and so I was. And Anders didn't understand why and we fought and then-" he fisted the fabric in his hands. "-and then he told me that he did it, it was his fault, he'd run the car into my family, timed it precisely to kill them all right while I was there waiting because he thought, just like all the rest of them, that having mortal attachments was the worst possible thing for a god. Which I never even wanted to be."

He kicked his foot out, voice thick. "So yeah, I know it's stupid but I just- I can't be around people like that because all I remember is them dying and it was his fault." He licked his lips, wouldn't look at me and scowled. "My fault. Because I trusted him."

I folded my hand over my lap while he sniffled, shaking. Then I put my hand over his. "I'm sorry that happened, Jack."

He let out an angry sad exhale, the breath shuddering out into the air. "I couldn't even do anything to him for it."

"Well-" I brushed his hair back. "-we can curse him into infinity?"

Jackson laughed and rubbed his eyes. "Already done," he said, sinking back to glance at me.

I smiled low then it slid off my face as I realized something. "You've never told anyone what he did."

He shook his head. "No. I haven't." He exhaled shaky and glanced up to the ceiling. "There wasn't anything I could do, anything anyone else could really do. He- he focused in jealousy, possessive type love. I knew he'd play it off like that somehow. Sticking to his type, to his focus. So I didn't- I didn't-" His voice cut strangled.

"I just- You asked me, when- when we were little." He laughed, the sound jerky, uncomfortable. "Well, when you were little and I was faking it. You asked why I stopped believing and- I just- I never really believed in it. But I did all the things because my family did so that's how I knew it all, that's how I could correct you, and I loved them so much so I did the things they did, I believed in the things they did, and then- God-" He rubbed his face, hands stilling over his jaw. "-I just couldn't deal with continuing on with it anymore. I believed in it all for them and then, without warning, they all just got swept out from under me and I couldn't even do anything about it. And then I couldn't- I couldn't keep with it anymore."

He tilted his head back. "Do you ever feel like that?"

"No." I shook my head, considering that. "No, the way I feel about my beliefs tie to my family, yeah, but if they were gone I think I'd keep believing anyway. It's been too long to stop. I'm too connected to it."

He grinned, the smile watery, thin. "You ass. You're supposed to agree with me right now. You're supposed to tell me it's chill that I gave up on a faith because I lost all reasons to believe in it. You're supposed to tell me I shouldn't feel guilty about forgetting it."

I shook my head. "I think the difference is that you never really believed in God or gods but I always believed there was someone watching me. Even when I didn't know any names." I bit my lip. "But I think it's normal, Jack. No, it is normal. Gramma doesn't eat eggs because Gramps used to make them for her all the time and eating them makes her sad. Sometimes things get linked to people and when those people leave, those things turn ugly and we can't deal with them in the same way. It's not your fault."

A distance look fell in his eyes, pained, angry, and for a moment I thought he was going to say something, something deep that explained the still hidden mysteries of his life I didn't yet know but instead, he just glanced away and took a breath. "Fair point," he murmured and fell quiet.

Sitting back, I folded my fingers over his and sighed. "You wanna hear a story?" He closed his eyes and nodded. Kali stepped out of the bathroom, toweling off her hair. She splayed out beside me, hand holding mine. I smiled at her. "You wanna hear a story, Kals?"

"Of course," she said.

I grinned and looked back up the curling. "Once upon a time there an Egyptian boy living in Suez in the early 20s. He was very gay and liked the colour purple. He didn't believe in God but it was chill because he believed in family."

Jackson laughed in my shoulder, shaking. Kali squeezed my hand and smiled with me.

And I went on.

Because that's how legends, how myths, how stories, that's how they all become truth.

When we tell them.

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# Chapter Thirteen

I woke up at six and took still being stuck in the shoddy motel room as a good note. Kali not fully recovered, we took to scouring the streets for food after a quick check of the vending machines in the lobby turned up zero offers.

Chewing my breakfast burger, I glanced around. Early morning in Ceres was quiet, a couple joggers and people already commuting for early shifts to work in the next city over. Ahead of us sat a row of buildings. The one in the middle was stark gray and kept pinging at my senses.

Wiping my mouth, I gestured at it. "What do you think's there?"

Kali gave me an odd look. "McDonalds?"

"No, Kals," I said, standing up. "Beside the McDonalds."

Go.

I paused, then, without really wanting to, started walking over.

"Al, there's nothing..." Jackson's voice faded before he suddenly yanked my arm and pulled me back, his voice now panicked. "Kali?"

She was at his side in seconds. "We should- Alex?"

I'd slipped out of Jackson's grip and was now at the door of the mysterious dark building with no name or signage. Then I pushed it open and walked in.

Those seconds had been a haze. Fully aware but not being able to stop myself and then, as soon as I passed through the doorway, everything sank in. I swung and my body hit a barrier. "Guys? I don't know what's happening but I do not like it!"

They both were at the door but their eyes weren't looking at me. Like they couldn't see me. "Alex?" Jackson yelled.

Kali swore, her eyes roving all over the space where I was. "Do not move! We will find you!"

Oh.

They couldn't see me.

They couldn't see the building at first and maybe, now that I'd walked in like an idiot, it was gone from their sight again.

Oh, this was not good. This was very not good.

This was the world exploding and imploding all at once.

They both ran off in opposite directions, searching for a way inside, searching for me, and I swallowed thickly. In my haste to flee, I'd forgotten a very key element.

There were other people out there who wanted me dead.

I know Kali said not to move but the building was basically just one giant room and had me shaking, uncomfortable to be there, out in the open and exposed. I took a step forward then another step, testing the ground, hoping it wasn't going to snap open and swallow me whole or something. By the time, I'd made it to the middle of the room, no one had shown.

My heart beat harder at that fact.

This wasn't right.

Something was supposed to be happening.

I turned around, back to the door I'd stumbled into and caught sight of a rather tall man standing before me. My tongue fell dead in my mouth

Now, despite never having seen his face, I knew exactly who I was looking at. Clean shaven, neatly cut black hair and brown eyes. He leaned against a sword, a patta[80] I guessed from a quick glance. The blade shimmered as he flicked it up, testing it in the air. He was tall, ridiculously tall.

"Ranj?"

His eyes, red, snapped at me.

I swallowed thickly.

He had horns, thick black ones weaving from the top of his head to the back.

A thick black band, like mine, was around his wrist.

Oh.

I guess, since no one knew that Demons didn't always look like Demons, no one had guessed that maybe the kids they were blessing every once in a while, kids who had no family, who were orphans, maybe they were Demons too.

Suddenly, it made sense why he attacked Jackson.

And it made a lot of sense why Jackson would've lied about not knowing the reason why.

He drew his sword to his side. "You know of me?"

Just like Jackson had said. Thick Indian accent but light, like he'd taken in other voices and cultivated his own tone. If it didn't feel so dangerous, I probably would've appreciated how pretty it sounded a lot more.

"Jackson," I started, and his eyes widened a bit at the name, "told me about you. And Kali." He scowled and stepped towards me. I took a step back. "You know, you don't have to do this. You don't have to listen to this guy."

He looked at me funny and then smirked. "You know nothing," he said. "And I do not serve you."

Then he lunged and I ran away.

My sword clattered to the ground as I changed it. I leaned back and scooped it up just as his blade passed over my head. Darting back, I wished there were obstacles to push in front of him or hallways to flee down. Despite three months of training, I still sucked greatly.

Falling back on Lena's advice, "Never stop talking unless it seems futile", I asked, "So who do you serve then?"

His lip twitched, like he was going to say, like he wanted to tell me, but then his face darkened and his grip tightened on the sword handle. "I can't tell you."

"Can't?" I breathed, backing up in the wall like a dumbass. "Kind of indicates that you do serve me then."

He shoved the blade toward me and I ducked it, rushing around him and stumbling back to face him again, at a better distance now, not that it really mattered. He looked furious I'd escaped but I couldn't tell if it was because he wanted to kill me or because someone else wanted to.

Someone who was not the guy who spoke to the little girl.

I swallowed thickly.

My thumb slipped over the gem in the hilt. My body shook and I pressed into it so that when he lunged again, sword slashing towards me, I swung up and sank it through his throat, eyes squeezing shut before I could even check to see if I had aimed properly.

My grip never eased up on the gem.

He let out a choked, squelching noise and I pulled away, stumbling back. I was- I-

Alex?

Sorry, sorry, I'm good. It's just... hard. I hate this part.

We can take a break.

No. We're in the home stretch.

Okay.

Yeah, alright. So I was stepping backwards, my body shaking, and eyes still squeezed shut, trying to process the fact that I had just killed a man and not taking any of it well. Like I knew. Logically. What had happened. What I did. Why I did it. It was in my head, very clear precise details, but it just wasn't setting properly.

No matter what I couldn't stop the noise he made from echoing in my head.

And just like that, whatever magic kept them from seeing the building vanished and they were tumbling through the door.

"Alex!" Kali rushed over to me while Jackson froze in the doorway. "Are you alright, what happened, why did you come in, what you looking-"

She stopped and I shuddered, my sword shaking in my grip. "Kali- I don't- I didn't- I- I can't-"

She grabbed my face. "Take a breath. It is fine. You were protecting yourself."

I tried to breathe, like she said, but my mouth wouldn't stop trembling.

Her voice was too calm. She didn't see who it was, just assumed another Demon, I guess, and I didn't know how to explain, how to tell her, couldn't stop shaking enough to do so. But it didn't matter. It didn't matter because he made a loud noise and stood up.

My eyes snapped open, catching sight of him standing, hand to his throat. when he drew it away, his throat was still bloodied but there was no wound there.

"But I- I-" My voice caught in my throat.

"Ranj?" Kali said, her voice so pitched in confusion. "But you are- you are dead!"

He grinned, expression morose and teeth bloody. "Think again."

Kali shoved me to the side the moment he attacked and Jackson caught me, backing up into the doorway. The barrier was back on now that Ranj was awake again.

We couldn't escape.

Kali pressed her foot to his chest and kicked in back in one quick move. He sailed through the air, back slamming up against the wall. He fell over, groaning.

"Jackson?" she snarled, glaring at him.

Jackson shook, holding me. "I-"

"Yes, Jackson," Ranj snapped, standing. "Tell her what happened, why don't you?" He pointed his sword at us. "I come to you for assistance and you tried to kill me!" His head cocked to the side, blade twisting flat, horizontal. "But you couldn't. Could you?"

Still shaking, Jackson backed up into the wall, pushing me behind him. "You were a Demon!" he hissed. "What else was I supposed to do?"

"You were supposed to come with me," Ranj said, voice testy. Kali threw one of her knives at him and he deflected it fast, eyes watching her but every word out of his mouth directed to Kali. "Tell them why you couldn't kill me. Why the Warrior-" And he hissed the word like it was vile. "-couldn't kill me."

"First gods can't die," I whispered, the understanding of it sinking it.

Ranj smiled cruelly, still watching Kali. "He's smart." His eyes snapped to Jackson. "Smarter than you were."

Jackson growled under his breath. "Yeah, because that was my first fucking guess, jackass."

So he'd tried.

He'd tried to kill Ranj and came up short but rather than confess what happened, let them all know that Ranj was a first, that Ranj was a Demon, he lied about it.

"Why didn't you say anything?" I whispered into his back.

He stiffened and Ranj smirked. "Oh, Jackson," he crooned. "You did always think too much with your heart. That's why they're dead."

Oh.

Low blow.

Jackson shouted, pissed and threw himself at Ranj, fisting flailing. He caught him, fast, unprepared, and got him square in the jaw. Ranj kicked him away, spitting blood. his eyes locked back on mine and I realized.

A ploy.

To get me free.

Kali saw it and shoved me out of the way at the last possible moment, Ranj slicing her chest at the last second. I fell into the ground, backed up on my hands, trying to crawl backwards away but to no avail. Kali shouted, throwing another knife, but Ranj deflected it, turned back one heel and swung his sword down to me.

Jackson appeared in front me, wicked fast, catching the blade with both hands. I watched in horror as he pushed back, hands cut into deep.

Golden-red blood dripped down his hands.

Ranj growled, angry. "Why didn't you just come with me?"

"Because," Jackson hissed, all effort going into keeping the blade from hitting me, "I'm not evil."

Behind them, Kali was struggling to shift but the power she hadn't yet recovered from combined with whatever power she'd drained trying to break in plus the wound across her chest left her less than able to turn much more than black.

"You are," Ranj huffed, pushing Jackson into the ground. "I came to you in good faith and you abandoned me in a second. I loved you! With all my being," he snapped, his voice desperate, and Jackson's grip wavered, "and you left me without hesitation."

"I didn't want to," Jackson grunted. "I didn't want to." His hands still stretched over his head as he fell to his knees. "Ranj, please."

Kali rose to her feet shaky, conjuring up a whirlwind of knives.

Jackson trembled in front of me, his body weakening under the duress.

Ranj's face turned miserable.

Time held its breath.

"You should've come with me," he said. Then he kicked Jackson out of the way.

Time let go.

He didn't kill me, just rolled me out of the way, grabbed my hand, and shoved my sword straight through Jackson's chest. Kali's knives fell to the ground beside her. My breath caught.

Our hearts snapped so loud I heard it.

Like a flash, memories shot through my mind, random points from every year that I knew him, every year that I loved him.

Seven years old, the first time we met, his face bright as he introduced himself, Kali at his side, both of them locking arms. At eight, throwing chocolate milk at someone making fun of me. Nine and he was screeching my name as I stood, terrified, at the top of tree, Nick cackling from the ground and Kali circling the trunk, concerned while we waited for the fire truck to come get me. We were ten and he was laughing as Nick clumsily surged forward to kiss my mouth on Kali's dare. Eleven, snoring like an elderly man into his sleeping bag, the four of us camped outside and the three of us drawing doodles on his sleeping face.

At twelve, screaming at me for hurting him like I had, Kali and Nick standing behind him in agreement, their faces just as angry as his. Thirteen and he was cheering for Nick as they read the terms of their scholarship, a full ride and everything we were hoping for them. Fourteen and whistling appreciatively from the audience as Kali did her bit in the school play, clapping the loudest when it was all over and she was bowing low. Fifteen, me on his back as he ran us through the woods, trying to get me to safety.

Sixteen, his arms tucked warm around me, trying to run me away while I slurred my words in exhaustion, body changed and not knowing why.

Sixteen, his body trembling as he held me close in the bushes, light shining over us.

Sixteen, his hands growing bloody as he gripped a sword, trying to force it away from, trying to protect me, always trying to protect me.

Blood bloomed over his shirt, the light failing in his eyes. The sword cut through him like butter, stabbing through his chest like stabbing a well-cooked chicken, so easy, so easy, too easy. Sliced through his skin like nothing. Too easy.

The world fell slow. My sword sluck out of his body. Golden-red wet stained the blade. He gasped.

He gasped.

He gasped.

The sound rang through my head.

Ragged. Wet. Pained. Shocked. Confused.

Gasping.

Gasping.

Then time snapped, Ranj vanished and Jackson collapsed to the ground. He didn't move, he barely made a sound and all I could see was blood, blood, blood, pooling from his chest.

No, I thought.

No.

No.

Please, God, no.

To be perfectly honest, I don't really remember what happened after he fell to the ground, not fully. I basically blacked out then woke up next to Kali in a house she'd broken into. Over the last month or so, as I've been retelling myself this story, bits and pieces have come back but it's nothing really full. What I know from that and from Kali is, I panicked and threw myself on him, screaming at him. I tried to give him CPR. I threw a handful of his powder on him, trying to heal him. I ordered Kali to heal him, which she couldn't. I did whatever I could think of to save him and none of it work.

So I turned quiet, stopped talking, just went empty and hollow, holding his hand, staring at him.

She said I wouldn't stop staring at him.

With the last bit of life, he told us that he was sorry that he lied and that he loved us.

"I just," he gasped because of course out of all the bullshit this what I managed to piece back together. "I didn't- I didn't want you to be sad."

"I would not have been," Kali said.

His eyes rolled to the back of his head. "Liar," he choked out, a twisty grin on his mouth.

"Jackson," she breathed, her voice cracking as she cupped the back of his head.

"I didn't want to kill him," he admitted, voice in pain. "He asked me to join him and- and-" He gasped, and his body flexed. "-and I said no. But I didn't want to kill him."

"Join him in what?" she pushed, brushing back his hair.

His body stopped convulsing. He fell still, gasping ragged. "I love you," he said, voice raspy but clear.

He stopped talking.

He stopped moving.

And every bit of us died with him.

** ** **

After Jackson died and I basically become a husk of a person, Kali broke into a car and drove back to the motel. Apollo never showed, leaving a message on Jackson's phone that he was going to be a bit late. Instead of waiting for him, she drove us out of Ceres.

Then she pulled over from the road into a long patch of grass, screamed into the air, all broken wails that would've had my body on edge.

She sank to the ground and screamed.

And she didn't stop screaming until her voice had run rough and ruined.

Then she got back in the car and drove us until she found some house near a small pond. The owners, it seemed like, were on vacation. The place was empty. She broke in and three hours later, I snapped out of it, woke up to her making a sandwich, Jackson wrapped up in a sheet on the coffee table.

She sat down on the nice plush couch. My voice sounded far away, like it wasn't coming from me.

"Kali? What happened?"

She told me.

"Oh."

Her eyes stayed hovering above Jackson's body, on the patterned china in the cabinet in front of us. It was blue, the intricate patterns adorning in a bright pink. It was pretty. The living room was clean, looked a bit like something that an elderly couple with no children would have in a movie. A painted portrait of two doves forming a heart hung beside the cabinet.

I remembered Jackson.

My heart collapsed back inside my chest.

"Kali?"

"Yes?"

"I'm sorry."

"Me too."

I pulled my knees to my chest and stared at vaguely mummified Jackson in front of me, wrapped up in a nice linen sheet. My vision fell hazy and I could feel myself finally dissociating out of my body, hearing us converse without seeing a damn thing, without being aware of anything. Just our voices in the air.

"We should bury him."

"I know."

"Kali?"

"Yes?"

"Please don't leave me."

"I will not if you do not."

"Okay. I won't."

"Then neither will I. Promise."

She didn't keep that promise.

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# Chapter Fourteen

Because there wasn't anywhere else we could do it, we set ourselves to bury Jackson by the pond. We dug a deep hole then Kali threw some powder on it and forced the hole a little deeper. We stood and stared at it. It seemed endless.

I didn't want to put him in it.

I didn't want him to go.

Finally, Kali drew back, her stance uneasy, her eyes miserable.

"I will get him," she said, walking back to the house.

New plan. Bury Jackson. Drive to San Fran. Get Nick, or at least tell them what happened. Move to Bermuda. Never speak of any of this again.

Pretend, pretend, pretend.

The wind shifted. A sour taste filled my mouth. I glanced at the house and waited. After a few minutes, when Kali didn't emerge, I turned around and stared at it. Then she burst out of the front door, yelling my name.

Behind her flocked a barrage of tiny Demons.

Oh.

Fantastic.

Protection magic meant nothing if I was continuously being found.

Following her lead, I raced towards the car, legs burning. She caught up to me in record time. Then the car exploded. We backed up, staring at the blaze. She swore under her breath and caught me around the waist, pushing me behind her.

She looked too tired.

I was too tired.

Still not in the right place of mind. Couldn't fully process things, didn't understand.

And they were kids, small and scrawny, reminded me of Katelynn, their faces pitched vicious but squishy, and they were kids.

Why did they make them fight?

She pushed me back as one of them, rounding around us, lunged. She caught him in the chest, threw him at another kid but there were too many and she was still exhausted and I couldn't fight, I couldn't fight, they were kids, who fights children? And I- I couldn't breathe and nothing was making sense, none of it made sense, why this happening and Jackson was dead, he was dead, he couldn't help us, couldn't fight and Kali was shouting for me and I couldn't do anything and suddenly she was gone.

She was gone.

She was gone.

They grabbed her and she was gone, vanished into thin air and I didn't know where or why or how or what was happening but I was tired.

I was so tired.

Angry, I stood slow, eying them all down. Every single one of them taking steps back, sudden cowards in the face of my fury. Rage hit me like a burst of cold water, coursing through my skin, my veins, every ounce of my being electric, alive, right, corrected, what is was mean to be. Sudden power rippled through all my chest, released in an outward burst that rocked the whole field we were tucked in, sending the car, still aflame, rocketing backwards out of the road.

And just like that.

They were dead.

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# Chapter Fifteen

We can stop, if you want.

I know. But if we stop now, I'm never gonna finish.

Okay. Keep going.

After I- I-

Heh. Just give me a minute. Please.

No problem. Go ahead.

Thanks.

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# Chapter Sixteen

So, I blacked out again and came to in San Francisco, close to where I knew Nick's school was. Vaguely, I remembered going back into the house. I remembered looking for Jackson's body. I remembered not finding him. I remember crying.

And then it all turned fuzzy and gray and suddenly I was conscious in a whole other city with no clue how I got there. Somehow, I had a bag. It was pink. I assumed I took it from the house. My jacket had been stuffed inside of it because it was April and I was in California, the sunshinest of places.

I walked the remaining three blocks, Nick's school looming at me. I walked through the field. I walked to an entrance. I walked in. I walked to the office. I walked to the front desk.

I felt like I was still walking as I stood hollow in front of the secretary. She smiled up at me, her face pleasant. As she spoke, she signed, courtesy of being around deaf students, I guess.

"How can I help you, young man?"

Not a man, I thought, staring at her. It took me a minute to find my words. "I need to speak with Nicole Hamazaki."

She paused, then asked, "May I ask the reason?"

"It's a little personal, ma'am."

"It's school hours," she said. "If you'd like to leave a message?"

"No thank you," I said quiet. "If you could just call them down, I would appreciate it."

She paused again, looking me over, then smiled low. "Okay. Please have a seat."

I sat down against the wall, legs crossed over one another and slowly counted down my mistakes. Warrior. Demon. Demon. Dylan. Lena. Jackson. Kali.

The likelihood of Nick becoming another one seemed high but I doubted they would've cared, given what we were to each other and how they'd thrown themselves into a dangerous situation just to save my life when we were fucking nine.

A few minutes later, they pushed in through the office door, gym uniform on and kind of sweaty. They glanced to the front desk then to me. The secretary watched us carefully. Nick's eyes narrowed but they shot a quick glance back to the secretary, still eying us, then back to me. They relaxed their stance.

They tapped their right index finger against their left, as though through to cut it quickly, then folded their fingers into their palm so only their thumb and pinky finger stood out and tapped their knuckles to their chin. What wrong?

I looked over to the secretary who was trying to act like she wasn't pay attention. I gave up, didn't bother trying to hide it. Kali and Jackson are dead.

The secretary made a noise and cut her eyes away from us.

Nick stared at me, then tapped their right index finger to their thumb rapidly. What, what, what, what-

I grabbed their wrist and stood up. Pulling my hand away, I fisted both my hands and pulled them down in the air, gestured to the two of us, rolled my index fingers over one another, then smoothed my right hand over my left hand palm like I was trying to grab something, shook my right index finger in the air before fisting my hand, thumb on top versus the side, and pressing the knuckle of my thumb to my lip. Can we go somewhere private?

Nick nodded rapidly and pulled me out of the office.

** ** **

In their room, they dug through their drawers, pulling out their hearing aids and tucking them on.

We not have to use, I signed.

Will go faster if just talk, they signed before putting on the second. They sat down next to me. "Now, explain the fuck you talkin' about, bub."

I swallowed thickly and relayed the whole story as best I could. Hiding Dylan, not telling Lena, getting caught, Jackson dying, Kali disappearing, not being able to remember how I got anywhere because I kept blacking out so bad.

The kids.

When I was done, they were staring at me. Then they pulled me into their chest and whispered, "Let go."

And I did.

I cried and cried and cried and didn't stop crying until I was all dried out. All the while, Nick pushed back my hair, kissed the top of my head and held me. They always held me. They were the first person I knew and the person I'd known the longest, including family.

Nick was rough hands and sharp words and a quick fist. They fought more than they stood still. Stagnation was not easy for them, they liked to shift, liked to move, always wanted to be doing something, even if that was just throwing themselves out on the couch playing video games with me and Katelynn.

They were steady, constant. Nothing about them was a lie. They listened to me ask them for the truth, always the truth, and gave it in full, forever.

But even in the worst of days, worst of nights, I could come to them, wanting comfort and they'd still themselves and give it to me.

"Alex, what you do in self-defense is not your fault," they said patiently, after my tears ran dry and my voice fell silent. "Well, it is but that doesn't make it terrible."

"They were babies," I sniffled.

"Trying to murder you." They pushed back my hair. "Stealing Kali, being rude like that old guy when we nine."

I shivered. His face, so angry, bloomed hot in my head. So many people trying to kill me and ruining the lives of other people

"I want Kali," I mumbled into their arm.

"Yeah, I know, bub," they said. "We'll get her back, okay?"

"You have school," I pointed out.

"Fuck school," they said. "Fuck it right to hell."

"Nick." I groaned, sinking to my knees and dropping face into their stomach.

They tugged my hair. "You didn't dissociate the whole fucking way here, just to wander off on your own. Now, remember when we were twelve and I punched you?"

I winced. "Yes."

"Good. Now remember how much that hurt?"

"Yes."

"Well, I can make it hurt worse," they promised. "And I will if you even think about walking out of here. Now tomorrow's Saturday. Spend the night here and we'll figure out how to find her in the morning, okay?" They flicked my cheek. "Al, don't stress it."

I smiled, crookedly, and they stood up and pushed me into their bed.

"You need me to stay? Only got like two classes left and I'm already missing most of one," they said.

I shook my head. "Go to class."

"Alright," they started, voice wary. They peeled the door open and slipped out before poking their head back inside. "Hey, remember, this is a girl's school so unless you can make yourself-" They stopped as I changed and gestured loosely at one very real boob. "You absolute fucker."

** ** **

That night Nick made a plan without any input from me and a lot of texts to Katelynn and in the morning, they packed a bag of stuff, "borrowed" a change of clothes for me from their neighbor and we left out into the city.

"Can I know the plan now?" I asked, as they pulled me through the gates after purchasing a couple of plane tickets.

"No," they said.

"How about now?" I asked, once we reached security.

They pressed their hand to my stomach, and smiled low, patting me pleasantly, magic caked onto their hand so they could get my tail to blend into my stomach or something. "Still no."

They bought me a pair of headphones and forced me to listen to heavy metal music on their phone, then dragged me to the line when our flight was called up a couple hours later. As we boarded the plane, I asked, "Now?"

They pushed me into window seat and repeated, "No."

Approximately four hours later we landed in Brokes and I decided that Nick was secretly evil.

"If I had told you," they said, hand heavy on my wrist for all they were small, "you would have run away."

"Mutant advised this?"

Nick made a vague noise and pulled me onto a bus into the city. We rode, got off outside a coffee shop and walked right into Katelynn, who was sitting inside her mom's car, colouring. She shot me a quick grin.

I walked up to the window. "You advised this?"

She nodded, her curls bouncing in her face. Trust me.

"Katelynn, Katie, Mutant," I said rapidly, "you have to know the people who live here want to kill me, right?"

Girlfriend, she signed. Boyfriend. Get them. Will be okay. She held up her piece of paper, rolled the index finger of her free hand in a circle in the air then pointed to the center. Go there.

She folded up the paper, gave it to me then kissed my cheek and patted my hand. Nick swore as their mom came out of the store and yanked me away quickly. I didn't understand but Katelynn rarely steered us in the wrong direction and she looked so sure of herself.

Unfolding the paper, I looked at it. It was basically just a picture of a grass and a brown door. Nick looked over my shoulder.

"I'll ask for more clarification," they said, digging their phone out of their pocket. Their eyes tracked to my hair. "You still haven't cut it."

My hand went to it instinctively. "Wanted to get it dyed at the same time." They gave me a look. "I've been busy!"

They frowned. "Good thing you're blonde."

Twenty minutes and I was drying off my hair in a public restroom with paper towels. Nick drained the green water and all the hair they'd snipped off down the drain and stepped back to admire their work.

No patience, no calm.

Always move, move, move.

And they remained ridiculously steady throughout it all.

"It looks great," they said and they weren't wrong but they weren't right either. It was green, like I normally went for when I dyed my hair, but a really bright green because they'd just bought the first colour they spotted. And they'd cut up my hair haphazardly because their hands are made for fighting and punching people in the dick, not artistically styling hair.

"Um-"

"Let's go."

Go, go, go, everything was going by so fast. I still didn't know what the plan was, what we were doing, what I was going to do until we were balancing in the trees just outside the school.

"Barrier's up," I said. "I can't go through."

Nick flexed their wrist. "Run if you hear screaming."

They jogged inside the bubble, slipped inside the front doors and vanished from view. I huddled outside, hiding in the bushes.

Run if you hear screaming. Run where, Nick? Run where? There was nowhere to go where I would be safe and, even if there was, there was no way I could get there fast enough to be safe.

Home, I thought, thinking of all my antsy behavior the last few years, the itching feeling inside myself. Go home.

But where was that?

I looked down to the paper Katelynn had been drawing on. Grass and a brown door. Was that home? Didn't feel like it. I examined every inch of the drawing and came up with nothing, nothing that felt like home, nothing that stood out to me beside the fact that it was really weird a door was just standing there in grass. But-

I traced over a symbol she'd done very carefully in white ink on the doorknob.

That was familiar, actually.

The letter "J" trapped inside a triangle.

I'd seen that before.

Hadn't I?

My phone buzzed in my pocket before I could fully think of where I'd seen this symbol. Nick. "Are you dead?"

"Fucker, you think I could actually die," they laughed. "No- just where's that magic door again?"

"In the office," I said slowly. "Nick, what are you-"

They hung up on me.

I frowned.

Why was I even asking? It was so obvious. Girlfriend, boyfriend, get them, will be okay, Katelynn had said. Girlfriend meant Lena. Boyfriend meant Dylan. And Nick was getting them. So it'd be okay.

Then why did it feel-

"What the hell are you doing here?" Fish asked, standing about a foot away, staring at me.

I laughed awkwardly. "Would you believe I don't actually know?"

He scowled. "Did you know about her?"

"I-" I exhaled sharply. "Yeah, I knew."

He shifted, angry, uncomfortable, looking from me to the school back to me, a thousand feelings of turmoil in his face. Finally, he repeated, "What the hell are you doing here?"

"I honestly don't know," I said. "Nick just took me here. I think they're getting-"

My phone rang again. At Fish's head jut, I answered. "Got them. Boy's really not that cute. Be there in five."

"HEY!"

"Make that two. Find car." They hung up.

I put my phone back in my pocket and stood slowly, looking at Fish. "You wouldn't happen to have a car, would you?"

** ** **

So Fish did not have a car but Ben did. A couple years back, he yanked it out of thin air to waste his resources before his test. It was a bright blue minivan, had no engine but ran fine. Which was a great upside, you know, it was guaranteed to never die. Downside was it was parked near the gym with all the other cars, which meant it was inside the barrier, which meant there was no way Dylan or Lena were getting out or I was getting in.

Luckily, we had an enby on the inside.

"Explain to me," Mary said, eyes darting from me to Fish. "Explain now or I'm not doing it."

Fish held his phone out to catch us both in the chat. "Mary, any minute now Lena's gonna be coming out of that door and I'd kind of like her to not die on sight, okay?"

Mary glanced at me. "You left her behind."

"Not on purpose," I said.

She bit her lip and took a deep breath. "Fine."

Then, right before she could do anything, Lena and Dylan ripped into view, Nick scrambling behind them. Mary's video tumble to the ground and I could hear a bunch of people swearing. Fish swiped the call off and dropped his arm.

"We're screwed."

We weren't screwed.

I stayed in the trees while the barrier came down seconds after Fish ran in. Alarm bells swarmed, kids filed outside, yelling at one another. Nick came busting out the side door, ducked under a hand, dodged a spell or two and sucker-punched some kid in the face before following Dylan who was following Lena who was bolting for Ben's minivan, it's headlights flashing, Peter at the wheel.

Thank the gods for loyal friends.

Somewhere in the midst of it all, I heard someone call Nick's name and then that same someone deck another person who was gearing up to throw something at them. The burst of fire deflected and evaporated fast in the air above everyone.

I'm only nine percent sure the person throwing fists was Elaine.

The car gunned it out of the barrier right before it came crashing back down. Peter swerved to the bushes and I hobbled in awkwardly, before he careened it around the school and down the hill.

"So what's the plan here?" he yelled.

"I don't know!" I yelled.

Nick grabbed the paper from my hands. "Door!"

After undoing Lena's cuffs, Alice took the paper from them and shook her head. "This doesn't look like any door I know. All of them are usually gold. Or obsidian."

Something thumped against the roof and Fish's face hung down over the window. An instant groan of relief slid through Lena's mouth as she hurried and pulled the van door open and tugged him in. Mary came crashing in seconds later.

"I'm never doing that again," she groaned.

Fish glanced around. "Where's Ben?"

Ben popped his head around the shotgun seat. "Oyin[81]."

Fish relaxed, stumbling over to get as close to him as possible while we raced down the hell, crossed the patch of sour lilies and gunned into the city.

"We're definitely illegal now?" Mary asked, looking wildly at everyone. "We just sprung criminals out of jail!"

"I'm not a criminal," Lena muttered as Nick scowled and said, "I did that."

"You're not illegal," I assured her. "Blame me. Also-" I turned to Alice. "-I think I know where that door is."

Peter glanced at me from the rearview mirror. "Where to?"

** ** **

The country house I had not been abandoned in actually existed. Of course it did, people would need to go back and verify just in case, and also what if I went looking for it. Awfully suspicious if it just vanished or went up in a pile of ash and smoke. I wouldn't doubt it if they actually staged my abandonment just to make everything seem more real.

The door was open when we walked in, the place stripped bare and empty. It was like no one had lived there at all.

I crossed through the kitchen to the living room to the backdoor. It was locked. It was wooden. I unlocked it and pushed it open. The grass behind it stood tall. I walked into it and waited for everyone to file through. When they did, I didn't turn around yet, just let the door fall shut behind me and stared out at the trees behind the house and kept my mind blank.

For once, my anxiety didn't crash through.

It's happening.

I took a deep breath and turned around.

Soon.

The outdoor handle had a symbol etched on it. The J in the triangle. My fingers shook as I gripped it, the knob rattling against the wooden door.

Please work, I thought.

And then I pulled it back open.

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# Chapter Seventeen

I couldn't see the inside of the house anymore, just an empty field and, in the near distance, a tall red building. It felt familiar but I didn't know why. Everyone piled around me, staring inside.

"Holy shit," Mary whispered.

I walked in. They followed.

The door swung shut behind us.

Lena and Dylan slid up beside me, staring at the building. Lena twisted uncomfortably. "It feels weird," she said.

"I know."

Dylan cocked his head, rubbing his wrists. "I have seen this place before." He frowned. "In my dreams."

It looked familiar. Like ridiculously familiar. But I'd never been here before. I'd never been how that I could remember and even if they did drop me off to fake my abandonment, I wouldn't have seen the back door.

I wouldn't know what it led to.

"How did you know this was here?" Mary asked, her question already burning a hole in my head.

"I don't know," I said. The building, immersed in power, seemed to ripple and I shuddered at the feel of it rolling over me. "I just did."

With that, I started walking towards the building. It smelled rich, strong, like coffee but not coffee. It almost beckoned me towards it but unlike with the building Ranj had been in, I wasn't forced into it but some unknown force. I knew exactly what I was doing and I wanted to go in.

We reached the doorway. Fish bounced on his heels. "This- What's if it's a trap?"

"It is," I said because, let's face it, what else could it be?

Mary drew back. "I think- I think we should go."

Nick slid up beside me, the only person interested in, or, at least, not afraid getting close. "I'll go with you."

There was a strange energy thrumming all over the building, forceful, angry, raging. On the tip of my tongue, I felt like I could name it. That I knew what it is was. But every time I tried to speak the words into existence, it vanished and I knew nothing.

The energy trembled in trepidation, in eagerness. I could feel it under my skin, settling deep and right.

Glancing back at Dylan, I saw his face, tilted back and staring at the top of the building. Unlike everyone else, who were squirming, eyes darting all over the place, he wasn't uneased. Like me, everything about him was settled, calm.

To his left, Lena was shifting in discomfort but not the same uneasy edge that everyone else was feeling. Something different. I could see it in her eyes. Now that I could focus on her more, I didn't see anything different about her appearance. Then she twisted just a slight bit and, like Nick had done with me so I could get through security, her wings, golden shimmering black, were etched into her skin, almost like a tattoo, half-hidden by the tank top she was wearing.

There was something strange about them.

Like I'd seen it before. In a photo, in a dream, in a memory.

She cut her eyes to mine and her fingers drew to her back, touching her skin.

"I like them," I offered and she smiled then looked back to the building.

"It feels strange," she said, walking up to the door. She pressed her hand to the wood of it. "Like good. But not good." She glanced at me. "Does that make sense?"

"Yeah, I-"

"Alright!" Ben yelled behind us. When I turned, he had manifested an actual giant cannon. "Let's blow it down!"

My heart jumped to my throat. Lena slapped her forehead. "Ben, no!"

"But the door!" he gestured rapidly from the cannon to the door. "Get it open!"

"We don't need a cannon for that!"

"Then why are we just standing here?" He threw his hands up in the air. "It's clearly evil!"

I frowned. That sounded wrong. But also right. But also not.

It was confusing.

Alice squinted from the cannon to Ben. "How do you know that?"

"Random door leads to magical land no one knows about," he pointed out then, as though disgruntled, his face fell and he glared up to it. "And it just feels-"

"Wrong," I said, my heart hammering, but for a whole other reason now.

Wrong.

It felt wrong to Ben. It felt wrong to the others. But not to me, not to Lena, not to Dylan. We were put off by it, not used to the energy but it was ours. It was ours and we knew that in our gut. But we'd never felt it before, not in large quantities like this, always used to the shuffling incorrectness of everyone else's magic.

Our creator who was not a creator. Made our souls too large. Split them up.

I was made here.

That's why it was home.

I shoved open the door. It didn't stick, didn't not budge, just fell wide open, and inside that energy that sat in my core, that felt like mine, radiated and washed over me like a dream.

Lena shuddered. "That feels-"

"Bad," Peter said. He was backing up, eyes concerned behind his glasses. "It feels bad, Lena. We should get out."

"It doesn't feel bad," she huffed back. "Well, it does but not-" Her hand darted inside the doorway, fast, quick, passing through with no effort. "-not terrible."

"Not terrible isn't great," Peter hissed back, pulling on her arm and tugging her back. "Come on, you didn't get sprung from prison to die in a weird building in a weird place."

Her eyes faint, she went with him easily, still staring inside. The open doorway didn't reveal anything, was just pitch black, and I could see why Peter would be uncomfortable, why anyone would be uncomfortable. And yeah, it radiated a strange chaos but nothing terrifying.

"Oi, dog boy," Nick said, snapping their head to stare down Fish. "You know what Kali smells like?"

"Little bit," Fish said, half in front of Alice, eyes nervously raking over the building, too busy and too on edge to get mad at the term.

"Is she in there?"

Fish bit his lip before taking a step forward. Then another one. Then another and another until he was at the doorway. He ducked his face inside, it actually vanishing from complete sight, and yanked it back out, exhaling harsh.

"Yeah," he said. "She's in there."

"What happened?" Alice said, suddenly gearing up to the doorway. "Why is she-"

I didn't listen for the rest of her question, just immediately ducked in. The hallway I stepped into lit up bright with black flames. Behind me, I could see everyone, even if they couldn't see me. Nick's hands beat against an invisible barrier, their voice muffled but calling for me.

Ducking my head back out, I asked, "You can't come in?"

They huffed, grit their teeth together, and tried to push in but couldn't. The barrier kept them out.

But it let me in. Let Lena in. Let Fish in.

Because we were Demons. Or at least half-Demon.

"So it only lets in Demons?" Peter said. He clasped his hands. "Fantastic."

"Yeah, not the best sign, Alex," Alice agreed. She rubbed her hand over her arms. "Maybe we should leave? Get someone to come back with us."

"There's no one else besides us who could get in though," I pointed out and she scowled.

Fish bumped his hands against one another and looked back at his sister. "He's right. Even if we could get another hybrid, I'm the only Warrior. They wouldn't trust anyone else."

Ben grabbed Fish's hand and tugged him back. "But they're not going to trust you, if you go in there. Especially with-" He looked over at Lena, who shook her head.

"Yeah, no, Fish, don't go in." Her voice turned a bit strangled, kind of wary. "I'll go in."

Dylan twisted and caught her gaze. "Or I could?"

I stepped out of the doorway, back into the grass. "No," I said firmly. "I'll do it alone."

Nick scowled up at me but said nothing. They couldn't come with me. They couldn't do anything about it and we were here to get Kali and the only way to do that was to let me go it alone. Which I didn't want to do but I wasn't going to take Dylan in. Wasn't going to take Lena or Fish.

My mistake, my fault, my causing of all this.

No one was stepping into a place of possible death with me. No more deaths. No more dying.

Not for me.

"If you need me," Nick started, grabbing my hand, "you come right back, drag whatever danger's in there out and I will murder it into pieces, do you get me, bub?"

I laughed, squeezed their hand. "Okay."

Stepping back inside, Nick caught my hand one more time. Their eyes levelled on me, solid, steady.

Scared.

"Don't die, dumbass," they said and I nodded slowly.

"I won't," I said.

And then I vanished into the building, leaving everything and everyone behind me.

** ** **

The hallway wasn't endless, led to a well-lit room. Like the hallway, the walls were adorned with torches carrying black flames and overhead, hanging down from the ceiling, was a giant one, the flames burning. Without thinking about it, I passed my hand through it, an idiot move for someone who panicked themselves into a heart attack at the mere thought of a papercut, but it didn't hurt, didn't make me feel any which way. It was actually kind of warm, felt more like a breeze, and familiar just like everything else about this building.

I turned, back, took in the rest of the room and froze, my breath stilling in my throat.

Kali was there.

So was Jackson.

Both were somehow and amazingly alive.

Trapped in a white cage which seemed to be made of rocks but alive.

No hesitation whatsoever, I walked, quick and quicker, toward them, ring turning into a sword as I caught sight of the lock that kept them in. Jackson lifted his head groggily. "Alex?"

Kali's head snapped up and she shot to her feet, grabbing the bars. "No, no," she said. "you have to get out. You have to leave. This is a trap!" She ducked little to look at me from eye level. "How did you even get in here?"

"I'm amazing," I said. I drew my sword up. "Step back."

She drew back and I tried to cut the lock through but it didn't work, just clanged uselessly. Swearing vehemently, I hefted the lock up and started trying to saw through it. All the while, Kali was pushing against me.

"Alex, I am telling you right now, you need to go. It is not safe."

"Kali, I did not dissociate all the way to Nick's school, spend an entire plane ride in a weird haze, kind of help break Lena and Dylan out of actual jail and drive all the way here on a gut feeling only to abandon you now," I said. I tried to stab the lock because cutting it wasn't cutting it. "Why isn't this working?"

"Because life's not a movie, al," Jackson hissed, finally sitting up. He shooed me. "She's right, you gotta leave, he's been waiting for you and if he realizes you're here-"

"If who realizes I'm here?" I grumbled, struggling.

"I don't know his name!" Jackson hissed. "All I remember is being dead and then suddenly I'm alive again and he's telling me that Ranj was one of his favourites so I guess that's why I got brought back, not that it matters since the bastard fucking murdered me, and then Kali's here and we're in a cage and then he said some bullshit about not wanting to hurt you but she was making him and then he left!"

I stared at him then gave Kali a "you hear this fuckery" look. She did not respond in kind, her eyes wide, mad, scared, angry, terrified.

"Alex," she snarled. "Get out. Now!"

"Not without you," I snapped, stepping back and eying the lock over.

"This is not a debate!" she shouted.

"You're right!" I yelled. "It's not a debate. I'm leaving with you, no ifs, ands or buts about it! I'm not leaving you to be the toy of some crazy man!"

"Oh," a voice drawled, fake offense littering its tone. "l wouldn't call me crazy."

Jackson wilted, his face gone sick, and Kali sank to her knees, shaking because there was nothing she could do and I was probably, most definitely, no question about it, one hundred percent going to die.

My pulse pounded in my ears, blood soaring. Panic slammed in heavy in my chest, catching my breath and freezing me solid with unwelcoming and frosty dread. After a beat, I turned around slow.

The man behind me was tall, bordering between Kali giant and Ranj humongous but nothing like Dylan's ridiculous length. He had on a single eyepatch over his left eye. His right eye was red, stared at deep at me, a slow grin fanning over the stretch of his face. From the top of his head, through his inky black hair, grew four horns, two on either side, shaping outwards just back behind his head. A tail, thin and the same colour as his hair, like mine with me, swept out from behind him.

He spun a key on his forefinger then threw it to the side. It clattered to the ground. In his other hand, he lifted into the air his sword, red and warped. It seemed to change as he moved it up and when he twisted it quick through the air, it screamed.

My stomach dropped. Fear clawed its way into my chest, burying deep into my heart.

He levelled his sword flat towards me. "Hello, Alex," he said, voice patient, familiar. "Are you ready?"

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# Chapter Eighteen

Ready? No, gods, no. What even for? Who knew. Still. I wasn't ready.

I backed up just a bit, feeling Kali's fingers brush my back. "Why are you doing this?"

"Because I must," he said.

Stupidly, I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to ease the thump-a-thump-thump in my chest. "Who are you?"

He opened his mouth, his voice ready, but the sound fell strangled and twisted and he clamped his jaw shut. Finally, he drew his blade down. "I can't tell you. But how about-" and he stepped around, easing close, and I slid in the opposite direction, wanting to avoid, desperate to evade, shooting nervous looks at Jackson and Kali all the while and trying to calm my erratic heart. "-you guess it?"

He paused, eyes fluttering up, like he was thinking. Then he smiled again. "Yes, guessing works well."

"Give me a clue," I breathed. His sword swung through the air, voices echoing, begging from the blade, screaming, pained, in pain, suffering. It swung again. My heart twisted up.

His tongue swept out over his mouth. He seemed to be listening for something. Then he sighed and darted, fast, towards me. His wailing sword echoed loud as he brought it down over my head. I deflected, poorly, and just barely managed to duck out of the way, sliding over and around, always on the defense, always running.

"Starts with an A!" he called out after me.

He was on me again. I barely shifted out of his way as he tried to slice through me, a short hop backwards. the sword came so close, so close, I nearly went paralyzed with fear, my body heavy, exhausted, and then I was backing up, fast, trying to get away. Just enough to grab the key, set them free.

Let them deal with him.

"I am a lie!" he said, marching for me, a man determined. "A fable your mother told you!"

He winced, a whole-body convulsion that shook him to his knee, then he glared at me, a good seven feet away.

A lie? A lie my mom told me?

But my mom didn't lie. Yeah there was the whole thing about being a Warrior but that didn't count, not really, and then stuff about me being a demon was just classily avoiding the topic. And fables? My dad told me those, not Mom. She focused on the myths, real stuff, not morality tales lined with cutesy animals.

I exhaled sharply, trying to think, to come up with anything.

Starts with an A. Is a lie. A fable. Has horns, has a tail, has a screaming sword. My creator who not my-

The creator who was not a creator.

Not a creator.

We were incorrect.

A lie. A fable. Untrue stories. A lie because they were real, a fable because we didn't know that.

I stared at him.

The creator who was not a creator.

It made sense suddenly. He looked like the book said. A horned man with a tail as black as sin, as dark as chaos. Not a god of creation, he made his beings wrong because he didn't know how, because he forced the issue.

Lena talking about it being bad, feeling weird, but not like me, not like Dylan, who felt settled somewhat. She was made here but she wasn't his, not technically. Wings. Not of him, a gift to his brother, a promise in exchange for power.

I took a step back.

"Achil?"

He doubled over laughing at my whispered question. "Oh, good," he breathed. "I didn't think you'd get it."

"You're not- you can't\- I checked!" I spluttered, pointing my sword at him. "You aren't real!"

But it was clicking, so rapid-fire quick in my head. Warriors, the way they were, what they were, what they did, could so easily be derived from Champions. Jackson's words, laughing, about how it was like someone had an idea of a person but messed up, because he did but he wasn't a creator. He couldn't make us like that and he had to be torn. We were of him.

Tom fucking Peoples. Tom was the god of people.

How did it never click, why didn't I see it?

Because they weren't real, they weren't real, I checked.

But they were.

He was right in front of me, swinging his sword of souls, looking like he was written out to look. But how? How? How was he-

Ranj. I don't serve you. Can't tell me.

Because someone else was in charge, Jackson saying that he said someone was making him such a throwaway comment that it didn't click.

Another Warrior.

Another Warrior of the Gods.

One who knew about him, knew about the seconds turned Demons and brought them to her side. One who was controlling them, why Ranj couldn't tell me who he was following, why Achil couldn't just come right out and say who he was.

And that made sense why he would try to kill me.

See, Achil is the god of chaos, of evil, but he's not himself an evil person, more like a holster for it. Not to say he's good or nice but he's not unwittingly cruel. But the big thing is the things he loves are the things he would never hurt. His siblings, his wife, his people, us, me, Dylan, Lena. The first Demons were made from his flesh and bone. He nearly died to build us but immortal beings, at least in their stories, can't die.

So he suffered and suffered until his brother, Poln, found him and brought him back to life, nursed him to health.

And it didn't matter what it cost him.

He loved us. We were of him, his creations, molded in his image, wrong, not like Tom's people but his own and it was fine because we were what he made.

Because only a creator could make new things. And Achil was not a creator. But he'd made us anyway.

"I don't- I don't want to hurt you," he whispered as he walked towards me. "She made me hurt so many..."

The kids! Children were more pliable, their own person but easily swayed, easily why there were so many of them.

My stomach churned at the thought.

"You don't have to?" I offered up, still backing up, the keys so close, just a mere foot away.

His eyes leveled at me. Then dropped to the floor. To the keys.

Fuck.

I spun around, dove for them but they flew another couple of feet away. Gasping, I rolled out of the way as he tried to spear me through my head, stumbled up to my feet. My sword held tight in my hand, a fisted grip that shook as I trembled, terrified out of my mind.

There was no way I could win.

He was a god.

He couldn't be bested by mortal men!

That was written into the fucking book.

A sudden thought overcame me. Wait. If he was alive, the others were alive, real, living, somewhere no one could find, stuck on an island. And if he was here then-

I dodged his swing, slid across the floor and tumbled to my knees, bent over praying, because if this didn't work I was screwed and Nick would rush the Underworld to kick my ass and I didn't need that.

Digging my thumb into the gem, I thought, rapid-fire, Hello, is this on? Okay cool, I don't know if you can hear me but I'm going to die and I would appreciate your help not letting that happen, Poln, sun god, surveyor of order and whatever else is needed to get this to work and-

I scrambled away as screams erupted behind me. The air sizzled where I'd been kneeing.

I REALLY NEED YOUR HELP.

Achil, face twisted a combination of misery and anger, was at me, his sword arcing down over my head. My arm snapped up, deflected the blow, pushing back up against him. My arms strained.

I wasn't going to hold this forever. Wouldn't even be able to hold it for five more seconds. I squeezed my eyes shut as he growled, my body dropping, knee hitting the floor as I strained against him.

With one last desperate push, I remembered, voice, thought of Poln, all dark-skinned and beautiful wings, order, light, peace, and yelled, "PLEASE!"

My voice echoed, rasped, throughout the air. At once a warm feeling burned through my body and a soft voice murmured, Hello?

I choked out a quick gasp. "Help!"

With wha- oh. The warm feeling paced up my arms and suddenly Achil was being thrown backwards, straight across the room. From my fingertips, soft golden light emitted. So this is where she sent you.

Behind me, Jackson yelled, "THE FUCK IS HAPPENING RIGHT NOW?"

My head snapped around and, as though through hazy film, I watched Jackson for a bright moment. Then Kali for another. Then I spun back around, my body in the full possession of someone else.

Achil stumbled to his feet. Blood dripped over his mouth and he wiped it away.

"Achil," I said, not the one speaking, "what is going on?" My hands held out, eyes tracking as though looking me over. "Isn't this one of yours?"

"Yes," he said, his voice pained. "He is."

"Well, that can't be right," Poln said through me. "Why are you trying to hurt him? What-"

A burst of black flames shot from Achil's hands. My panic shot to the top of my head but easily Poln deflected the flames with a soft shield of sunshine, all the goodness and life in the world flowing through me. Without meaning to, I felt calmed immediately.

"She's forcing you?" he whispered as the shield fell back down.

Achil pressed a hand to his face, body trembling. "I didn't want to," he whispered. "She's- she's-" His voice went faint. "I-"

"You need to come home." With more confidence than I had ever mustered in my entire life, I strolled right towards the danger.

The danger who swung his sword at me, without wanting to.

The key, Poln explained as he fought on my behalf, moving my body expertly, is the sword. All the world's chaos, all the world's sin is embedded into it and it is where and how he draws his power.

I thought that was his eye.

Poln stepped back and easily dodged the jab like a man with all the time in the world. It is. He cut my sword up and pushed back against Achil. The eye is in the hilt.

And I remembered that. Not the eye being in the hilt but the eye in general.

Before humanity, before dinosaurs, before time, when all that existed was the universe, a plot of grass and three children, Achil was a nasty piece of work. The theory worked that he was not cruel without intention but with nothing to cascade terror upon, the future evils of the world burned bright within him and he reigned it on his brother and his sibling instead.

In order to stop him, Tom crafted a sword of pure order, of pure virtue for Poln to wield in battle against him and crafted a sword that would drain the evil from Achil's being and let him be maintained. But the sword didn't work the way Tom intended, having to be spurred fast in the process of its creation and wound up missing the container that would hold Achil's sin.

So Poln cut out his eye and used all the energy he had to force all the world's evil inside.

It's one of the reasons why the sword screams.

The story went on to explain that Tom, while often conniving and, in some cases, cruel, was the idea state. Both their brothers were opposite ends of the spectrum and Tom, the final sibling, fell easily in the middle. Pure holiness was not as good as one might think and pure evil was obviously not the best thing. Both weapons harnessed their excess and let them be.

Content with the events unfolding before us, Poln evaded and attacked with expert ease. Everywhere he stepped, I stepped and light bloomed golden. It flowered over the floors, spreading soft and fast, imbuing the air around us with a happy energy.

So, um, not to rush you, but like, what exactly is the goal here? I asked. Because, like, well, I'm not immortal so we can't do this forever.

I am aware, he said. Separate him from the sword and then I will take it home. He will have no choice but to follow.

Right, because Achil was drawn to where the most amounts of chaos or evil was, which was basically in his sword. In the stories, he either carried it on him, in the form of a ring, which, seriously, how the fuck did this not sink in earlier, or his wife held it for him because, aside from Poln and Tom, she was basically the only other person who could control his crazy.

There were some stories where it'd been stolen and he was forced to do the bidding of whatever nutjob had it until the hero swooped in.

Achil lunged and I sidestepped, catching him around the waist with one arm. My hand held my sword at his throat. Bundles of light held him in place, squeezing his arms tight to his side and forcing him to buckle onto his knees to the ground. But he didn't drop the sword, just tightened his fist over it.

Luckily, he couldn't move.

"You cannot harm your own creation, Achil," Poln said softly.

"I can," Achil growled in turn.

"You broke yourself to make them," Poln sighed. He traced a hand over his brother's horn. "Why is she doing this?"

"I can't-" Achil shook his head. "I can't remember. She keeps-" His eye fluttered. "She's erasing things."

Crouching down, I peeled his sword from his grip. Hot burst of warmth shot up my arm, enveloping the sword from my hand and it melted right into the sunlight, vanishing. Achil let out a slow sigh of relief, looking me over.

He didn't want to hurt me.

Someone was making him.

Someone who didn't want her plan to be found out, who was erasing his mind, forcing him to forget so he couldn't spill the beans.

But before I could ask who, his breath hitched and he was gone.

"Where did he-"

Home, Poln said.

"Where is that?" I asked. I mean I knew but. Had to be sure.

I think they call it the Devil's Island now, Poln said. A rushing feeling burst through my head, as though he was trying to shake his own. I don't know why.

Devil's Isles. Just another term for Bermuda, right?

Yeah. Because of our birds.

"Who is she? This girl that was making him-"

Making him control little kids, making him hurt them, making him watch them die as they were prosecuted for actions they wouldn't have committed on their own.

My voice cut silent and Poln fluttered, his voice sounded pained, agonized. I have to leave. We will explain. If you find us.

She was making him leave, I realized.

Why doesn't anyone know you exist? I begged, one last question.

We are trapped, he said, voice fading. We are dying.

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# Chapter Nineteen

In the grass, I laid down, my voice echoing a thousand trains of thought all at once. A book of unreal gods my mom picked up at marketplace was real. No one knew they were alive. No one believed in them. They were trapped on an inhabited island so the question was how were they trapped? How had no one noticed them? Why were they forgotten?

But one thought in midst of all the collisions stood out to me.

We're dying.

They were immortal. For them, immortals couldn't die. But it was easy to see why they would be now.

No believers. The island was taken over, had been for a while now, and if they had any trinkets keeping them the stable like the rest of the forgotten, it'd likely been destroyed, removed or thrown out because no one ever mentioned the idea that people lived in Bermuda before settlers were crashed onto it.

Which meant-

My hand shot up, blocking the sun, the bright golden sun of the man who essentially saved my life.

It meant we were the only thing keeping them around. We were their stabilizers, the last bit of what they had left and even then, we were ruined and incorrect, misnamed, misappropriated. Demons and Warriors. Two of the same, directed from the same place.

I guess one of the reasons it didn't hit me right away was because, well, first, I didn't know it was real to even point out and secondly, Demons weren't called Demons and Warriors were not called Warriors. They were called Champions and their duties were vastly different.

See, we have Warriors of Magic, Warriors of Earth, of Air, of Water, Fire, the Dead, Death, etc, etc. But they had Champions of a specific god. Lena, made from Achil but to befit his brother, would've been Poln's Champion or, if her death factor played in, Grinate's. Fish probably would've gone to Kempa. Me and Dylan to Achil.

But Achil's Champions were bringers of chaos and I was definitely not one of those and Dylan, who Lena kept calling soft boy, was very clearly not one. And I'd seen her throw a punch so hard the kid she was working with blacked out for a long minute to know she was not a being of pure goodness.

We were incorrect, Dylan had said Achil told someone a million years ago. We weren't born like we should've been.

Centuries, maybe even millennia, had passed by. Eventually a limited line of blood gets overrun. In the stories, we were born as we were, but not all of his Champions, not all of Poln's Champions, were bringers of what they stood for.

The ones that interfaced as the book put it, basically code for sexing it up with the neutral grounding of the other Champions, the people Tom initially built, they were as they were.

Like us.

But not incorrect.

We were incorrect because he wasn't there to keep making, to keep us going right, to stop us from being born blonde only to go brown without warning, ya know? Could only carve out a soul and split it up when it was too big and maybe even that had just become somewhat an automated system at this point.

So we changed and we suffered for it when we weren't supposed to and we were just like the others, falling under his rule, but we didn't stand for what he stood for. Our lineage had worn out

We'd forgotten where we came from.

I sat up and peeled a piece of grass from the earth and rolled it between my fingertips. In the distance, everyone was camped out in Ben's minivan, waiting for me. After Poln and Achil vanished, I sprung them out quick and we hurried everyone out of the place as it begun to break down around us, barely making it to the doorway.

After that, I just splayed out in the sun, in the grass, trying to regain myself, the energy Poln had accidentally dragged out with him, trying to come back and figure this out, identify what had happened. I gave them the quick version, let Kali and Jackson fill in what they understood then tuned out everything while I tried to make sense of it all.

Instead of badgering me, they all filed out to Ben's minivan, driving up close to where I could see them but not so close, I'd be disturbed, and kept their chatter low.

Nick didn't talk with the rest of them, kept their eyes low on me.

As I watched them, I considered that thought I had bubbled onto. The Demons we knew of know were the cause of generations of Demons mixing with Warriors. It explained why we had powers, explained why Lena was thought to be a Warrior. We weren't just beings of chaos, beings of order anymore.

Which meant people like Fish, like Jackson's vampires friends, like Katie even, they were, in the truest sense, the product of those Demons and Humans. Non-Warriors. People with no ties to Boshnisha, Bermuda, whatever you wanted to call it.

Because in their myths, everyone was a Champion. Champions were people, were humans.

I glanced to Jackson, who was leaning into Kali, his face tired. My accidental anomaly of a friend.

Apparently, I was an accidental anomaly too. So was Fish, Katelynn, Dylan, Lena and just about every Demon and hybrid out there. Mixed when there was no intention for that to have happened. When we probably wouldn't have happened in any other way.

And when you forgot where you came from, dilution of your beliefs, of your understanding of self, of your history, the spans of generations that linked you to a place, the dilution of all that made you you occurred.

And you'd forget everything that created you.

It was easy to see. Every place a Christian took over, the gods held to that place warped to fit a concept of God, of a devil, until we could barely piece back what they used to be.

What they stood for.

Of course, even though I was trying to avoid it, my thoughts finally drew back to a calm close on the final fact. There was another Warrior of the Gods.

Made no sense. There was only one of us at a time, not because that was the rule but because that was the only amount they could do. I was imbued with their power, with their belief, keeping them alive, keeping them real.

They couldn't do any more than one person at a time. There was no other belief to give.

Another Warrior who knew that they were real. Maybe they made her somehow and she was a Champion?

But that made no sense either.

They didn't have Champions of the Gods. They had individual Champions. That's how they maintained belief in themselves. Who needed avid worshippers when you had a person who stood strong in your name?

The only person who didn't have one was-

Tom.

Because they were an initial being, like Poln, like Achil, and as a mouthpiece of the universe, they weren't supposed to have one. It's why it was so bad when Achil made us. Yeah, I mean, Tom did make people but those people directed to different gods and "people" still included us among the crowd.

But I guess, if everyone has someone, you'll eventually start wanting someone too.

So it was plausible.

But until I found them, wherever they were, I'd never know.

I sighed and stood up, still rolling the piece of grass between my fingers.

Nick sat back. "You ready?"

The grass dropped from my fingers and disappeared into the green. I took a deep breath and tried to muster all the confidence Poln had exuded from me. It had to exist in me somewhere, hidden. I found a couple remains and walked strong to the van, climbing inside. "Let's go."

Peter revved engine as Lena pulled the door shut behind me. "Where to?"

I caught his eyes in the rearview mirror and smiled grimly. "Heaven."

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# Chapter Twenty

They rioted, they tried to fight me but when I got out and started walking towards Brokes, they picked me back up and drove me to the city limits, dumped me, Nick, Kali and Jackson off and then left with their fugitives. I promised to give them a heads up if it was all safe but Fish's eyes tracked me over and Alice looked as equally uncertain.

They were thinking of their dad.

Running, running, running, never not running.

Because no one listened.

If my shitty, not at all thought out plan worked, he wouldn't have to run anymore. And if it didn't, well, now he'd get some people to run with him.

Kali looked at me while I fidgeted in place, running over my explanation, then asked, "Are you sure? Once we go in, it is unlikely we will get you out."

"I'm sure," I said.

Nick's eyes roved over me. "You're an idiot, Alex. I want you to know that."

I grinned, stupid. "And yet you're following me in so who's really the dumb one here?"

They snorted and bumped me with their arm. "We're all pretty stupid, I guess."

"No duh," Jackson said, squeezing his hands together. He looked up from the groan, dead in my eyes. "You ready?"

No, no, no, never ready, never ready, always scared.

But I smiled low and took Nick's hand, searching for my rock of support. They held me tight, always ready to walk into the lion's den for me, with me. I took Kali's hand with my other one and she grabbed Jackson's arm, watching him, her face all kinds of terrified but all sorts of brave. He nodded once, eyes wary.

"Let's do this," I said.

** ** **

Once we got there, they didn't notice us right away. Then they did and let me tell you, having a bunch of gods ready to murder you on sight, or at least pummel you half to death before interrogating you, is a horrifying experience. But despite being a five foot nothing scrawny twig, Nick slid in front of me, hands fisted, content and ready to deck whoever the hell came at them first, and Kali stared them down, Jackson holding me tight.

And I blacked the fuck out.

Somehow, I don't know how, I can't remember, I got them to listen enough to hear me out and explained all the bullshit that happened. Until they started yelling. Then Kali shouted something and they piped down.

And then they listened.

They didn't believe me of course, who would, but then Nick, I think, pointed out that I'm stupid but not that stupid and wouldn't just show up with a lie when they wanted my head on a platter. Someone recognized them as that kid who broke Lena and Dylan out and there was a weird squabble about that and I vaguely remember them shouting something about people who screw their moms shouldn't talk shit and then there was a chicken or something flying across the room

I dunno.

It got weird.

Somewhere between all of that, Kali excused us out and I was bound to a bench in the pavilion, a couple of seconds designated to watch over me so I couldn't run off. Nick sat beside me, enjoying the sun.

"So you were possessed by a sun god?" I nodded. "How does he do that?"

My mind emptying out, back on familiar ground, I cleared my throat and explained. "They thought the sun was always in the sky. So rather than bring it up or bring it down, Poln would just fly up and shield the light with his wings until Chrona, the moon god, came to take over. He would dust each part of the sky with nighttime and hoist a rounded block of limestone into the air until it blocked the light." I pushed back my hair. "The various phases of the moon were represented by the different shape of the limestone and were supposed to explain different times

"Anyway, as the dust settled, Poln would fly down to the ocean, which was also his wife, Kempa, to cool off his wings, which is why sunsets look like they're happening, and in the morning, he'd come up from the ocean and move the limestone out of the way. The sun would begin to burn all the dust of the night until it was day."

Nick frowned. "No offense, Al. But that's really dumb."

I snorted and grinned at them. "I mean, they're all dumb when you know the sun exists in space."

Nick nodded and leaned up against my side. "So how does science and the stories play into each other then?" They waved vaguely. "You told me once, but I can't remember."

"I told you once and you said, "No offense, Scott, but I could care less" and then dared me to go hug Brenda," I pointed out. They snorted softly into my skin. "Science is the truth but stories are a truth too. They're the belief of what we see, the constant of it. Springtime comes because Persephone emerges. The earth exists because Pemba[82] was impatient, wanted to leave too early and Faro[83] gave himself up to make it pure, to create life.

"Just because they're stories doesn't make them any less real than fact," I said. "Things are allowed to exist in harmony, even when they oppose one another. Yeah, I know the sun exists in space. But that doesn't mean Ra doesn't bring it up every morning, doesn't mean that the reason night happens isn't because Amaterasu[84] wants to avoid Tsukuyomi[85].

"Maybe the breakdown of people is different depending where you were made, you know, but that doesn't mean God didn't make humanity somehow. Stories are just another way of seeing the world. It doesn't matter if science explains it away or if it sounds stupid. It's what someone believed, what someone believes, and that makes it real. Even if only for that person."

Nick smiled into my shoulder. "You know, I don't get it and I probably never will but I love that you do."

They brushed back my hair and I smiled. "I know."

So maybe my logic isn't sound and, you know, invites some immoral opinions but the important thing is it's fair. We all needed reasons why things happened and sometimes stories were easier to determine than science. When you think the sun revolves around you, why would you ever think that it's just a ball in the sky?

We're stupid and strange and funny and like to explain things we don't understand. Why does it get cold for a period and then hot again? Why are the stars there? Why is the earth here? Why do we exist? What happens when we die?

Where do we go?

Like I said way at the start, it's appealing to know that no matter where we were, we looked around, saw something, heard something, felt something and asked why.

We asked why a lot.

But sue us, we're curious.

Standing stiffly by a pillar, the second god watching me shifted uncomfortable and I smiled pleasantly at her. Maybe we're all curious.

Quietly she walked over and sat down. After a moment, she asked, "What did they call the ocean?"

"Kempa," I said. "They believed her form stayed with the tide so at low tide, she was a child. In the kind of middle ground, she was in that young adult but still kind of learning how to be range." Nick snorted. "And then at high tide, she was an old woman." I looked down to my hands. "She had a son and she could only give birth to him by flooding the world for three days."

So many stories about the world flooding. Even if there was no science to explain that, it led to something pretty clear. The world did flood. Otherwise how else would they have all known, when they were separate, believed in different things, different people, different reasons?

The goddess made a vague noise and sat back. Then she stuck out her hand. "I'm June. Gaelic. With the ocean."

I took it. "Alex. American. I don't know what I'm with anymore."

Nick lifted their hand without looking up from my shoulder. "Nick. Japanese-American. I'm with stupid."

I swatted Nick's side and they smirked up at me blearily. June cleared her throat. "So you- you really believe these people exist?"

"Well, either that or I'm hallucinating like crazy," I said.

She frowned, her head partially raised to the sky. "I don't think you're crazy," she decided after a while.

"Thanks."

"Alex!"

I turned to the voice. Gods, some looking content, some looking disgruntled, were filing out of the meeting room. In the middle of it all, Kali and Jackson, both looking very happy, stood on either side of Morgan Freeman.

--------

What?

--------

Yeah.

Nick tilted their head up. "You see him too, right?"

I nodded vaguely as the three of them walked over. Morgan Freeman knelt down in front of me. I looked up at Kali and Jackson, looked at June, looked back at Morgan Freeman then back to Kali and Jackson. "Morgan Freeman is a god and you didn't tell me?"

Morgan Freeman laughed. "No, no, no," he said. "I am God."

"Can I still have your autograph?" Nick asked.

I stared at Morgan Freeman who was smiling at the two of us. "Morgan Freeman is God?"

"I told you not do this," Kali said immediately, glaring down at Morgan Freeman's head. "I told you it would confuse him."

Jackson gestured loosely to Morgan Freeman. "No, Al, this is God, pretending to be Morgan Freeman because he thinks he's funny."

I stared at all of them then said again, "God is Morgan Freeman?"

"Jesus fuck, you broke him," Jackson said.

Morgan freeman, God, laughed. "If that makes it easier for you, yes," He said. "I am Morgan Freeman." He smiled gently. "I just wanted to thank you for bringing this to our attention and for rescuing my comrades."

"Yo," Nick cut in. "Autograph?" God, Morgan Freeman, blinked then grinned wide and flicked His hand. A shot of paper landed on Nick's lap. They looked it over and nodded. "Awesome." They clapped His shoulder. "Thanks man."

"Classy," Jackson muttered.

"Atheist, bub," Nick said, dropping back against the bench. "You people mean nothing to me."

If anything, Morgan Freeman, God, smiled wider at that, as though amused and happy. Free will, I guess.

"So, in return for making us aware of another stretch of our forgotten brethren and for saving your friends, we have agreed to give you two wishes," He said. "Anything in absolution."

I rubbed the back of my neck. "I mean, I didn't really do anything. There's a bigger threat out there."

"Yes, but you made us aware of her and that is helpful enough," He said.

I bit my lip, not sure what to say. I didn't feel like a savior.

I just trying to do the right there. If I told, more resources could be expended and then they could be found easier, faster than if I kept to myself and tried looking, ya know? And Kali and Jackson, well, they were my friends. Why would I want to get them out?

But still, He deposited two glowing white orbs into my hand. "You don't have to use them now," he assured me and he stood to leave. "Whenever you need to is perfectly-"

"I know what I want," I said without fail.

Staring at the orbs it really hit me, the feel of all their power radiating through it, all their granting.

I mean, I wasn't going to die, that much was obvious. Jackson and Kali exited happy so clearly everything was alright. But no one said anything about proving that Demons were not in the wrong for existing.

And looking around, it was pretty easy to see that that was not a concern for them.

"Demons are still bad to you guys, aren't they?" I said. None of them said anything against that, just went kind of stiff and uncomfortable, and I sighed.

She couldn't use him anymore. Not like how she did. And maybe, a few that didn't know any better would stick around but for the most part I doubted they all wanted to kill Warriors, destroy gods.

And Fish's dad was still running.

God cleared his throat. "Well, we have made the decision to let your friends-"

"No," I said. "All of them." I dropped the first orb back into his hand. "All of them get to stay. No more being afraid for no reason."

"Alex," Kali started but I looked at her, quiet and determined, and she went silent.

"It's not fair," I went on, "that I get to be here just because I got lucky. It's not fair that they get to stick around just because they know me. It's not fair that people like Fish have to stay hiding just because of one factor when Katelynn gets to walk around free. So either all of us or none of us. Because we're all that's keeping them around. If we go then maybe..."

God glanced at the orb in the middle of his palm. "Are you sure?"

"Positive. Let them stay, let them exist, let them be." I scuffed the ground with my foot. "No one should be afraid to live."

He watched me for a moment before nodding sagely and crushing the orb in his hand. Like a solemn call, all the other gods, seconds and first, stiffened up, shot me strange looks but it didn't matter.

I did it.

If it all went south, that was on me and, you know what? I was fine with that.

Unfurling his fist, soft brushes of dust falling from his palm, he asked, "Do you have something in mind for the second one?"

I glanced at Nick who grinned at me, all teeth and squeezed eyes. I laughed and glanced over at Jackson, who was scowling.

He used to smile like that for pictures when we were small.

I handed God the second one and nodded discreetly at Jackson who was still glaring at Nick, not paying any mind. Kali relaxed, shooting Jackson a soft look.

Yeah.

None of us were letting him die any time soon.

God nodded, understanding, but didn't crush it right away. "This one," He said, taking in the scape of the people around him, "will take a few days. Paperwork and all that."

I smiled, bobbing my head soft as I stood. "That's fine. As long as it's done soon."

"Walk with me?" He asked and I followed.

As we ventured out of the pavilion to a quieter spot, I looked over my shoulder. Kali was watching me, partly patient, partly nervous. Jackson was yelling at Nick for being mean and Nick was grinning wide, uncaring.

All was as it should be.

He was alive.

She was alive.

They were alive.

I was safe.

Stopping under a stretch of shade, God regarded me. "You are a very interesting person, Alex Scott Johnson."

Smiling low, I said. "Yeah. I get that a lot."

He looked over my head, thinking. Finally, he said, "We've given favours before you, singular or multiple. People always ask for something that will benefit them." He shot me a sly look. "How does this benefit you?"

I glanced over my shoulder and watched them, laughing together. "Jackson is important to me. I don't want him to go again. And as for the first part, well, people are people. Everyone deserves a chance. And, besides, it's the right thing to do." I looked back to him. "There really isn't anything else to consider."

"And what would you have picked," He asked, "if there was only one choice?"

A sharp laugh fell from my mouth. We were all curious beings.

"The right thing," I said. "Jackson's important but I can tell his story. I can make people believe in him and from that he becomes real, a first. But prejudice and hate, that's harder to dispel. In school, there's a thing we get taught. Save as many as you can, even if it's only one person. Even if it's only you. And in this case, I can save much more than one. So, logically-" I shrugged. "-I should."

He nodded calmly. "That's a very good answer."

"Thank you."

Then I was dismissed. I went home, cried with my parents because it felt like I'd never seen them in years and with all the stress of everything I needed a good cry, went to sleep in my bed in my apartment. The next day I had about a dozen calls from Fish, from Alice, from Lena. The new rules had gone out and Dylan was taking a couple seconds to go find some kids he knew, who were on their own, afraid and desperate for help, so he could bring them back.

It felt like everything was speeding by. Nick got an earful from their parents, who then called me up to tell me off because savior be damned, right? We went to the movies, got ice cream, celebrated Jackson's birthday early because no way their parents were letting them leave for another weekend.

Sunday night, Kali took them back to school.

Sunday night, Jackson sat down at the edge of my bed, fidgeting with his fingers.

Finally, he looked up at me and smiled. "Thank you," he said.

"Did you get to see them?" I asked.

He nodded. "Yeah. I did." He laughed and he sank back into my pillows. "Sometimes I used to debate it. I mean, we're not really supposed to talk to the dead, at least the ones we know or knew personally. Some bullshit," he grumbled, waving his hand in the air, "about yearning for something you can't have but I'd think about sneaking down, ya know."

He gave another short little laugh. "Going down and looking for them. But I'd get scared. What if- what if they blamed for what happened? I mean-" He rolled onto his stomach. "-I knew they wouldn't but... They were so happy. I don't think they even realized I was dead."

"You should introduce me," I said.

He grinned. "Yeah. Okay."

I twisted lightly in my seat, and after a beat, sighed, finally accepting, that, yeah, it was time to ask. "Jack, why didn't you tell anyone?"

His smile slipped and fell away. Understanding and ashamed, his eyes dropped. "I didn't want anyone to hurt him," he admitted after a few seconds. He let out a dreary sigh and sat back. "He was important to me and, yeah, he did try to kill me but he- he didn't, and I- I couldn't- I couldn't imagine someone hurting him. But now..." His eyes levelled on me, firm, steady, serious. "Now I think I'd rather see him burn to the ashes I said he did."

The next week Jackson got his first certificate and we celebrated with ice cream and fireworks and sneaking Nick out of their school for the night and Mrs. and Mr. Hamazaki did not call to yell so I figured we were good and hopefully, you know, they're not gonna yell now because it's been a month and a half and the statute of limitations should run out on that.

Dylan managed to pick up a couple kids who panicked on sight at the gods but came with him willingly. With them, he starts school in the fall and so far, he's been going back and forth on learning what he missed and finding hiding children. It's been pretty easy for him since he met so many on his travels.

He came back last week so we could have that date because May twenty-third has always been my birthday and I'm not changing it now. It went about as well as it could and me, Lena and Dylan are pretty happy with this thing. It's awkward some days and some days it's really nice and feels like it's been going on forever. The concept of soulmates is still kind of funny because I know in a heartbeat I'd pick my friends and I know Lena would do the same and I know Dylan would understand right away why but I guess that just shows the in sync-ness of it.

After a couple meetings, some Warriors have been dispersed to go find the hidden gods on Bermuda. None of them have turned anything up but we're still looking. Now that we know what to look for, the lack of magic makes more sense.

We're guessing that the power that would've been there is being drained to keep them trapped wherever they are and that's why everyone else's goes haywire when they try to utilize it. It's trying to drain towards their prison or whatever but still get used in the way it's meant. And we think that's why the gods avoid it so heavily because somehow something tells them not to go, not to enter into a prison of their own free will.

They're still avoiding it. Kali says the island just feels wrong, always has. Jackson won't grace it either. So we're on our own here. But we're doing our best and I'm optimistic that we'll find them and we'll save them.

And I guess that brings us back to the present or at least five days ago when your number appeared from nowhere and I took that as a sign and contacted you and you agreed to listen.

I'm glad you stuck with me and I'm not stressed if you believe it or not. The important thing is telling the story and keeping our stories told. That's how belief works.

And I need people to believe in us, even if they don't think it's true. Because I can't let these gods die. Not when they're not supposed to.

And that's fine with me. Happy to share in a succinct manner that doesn't sound dumb as shit and need constant explanations or run backs of the little and important details you keep forgetting.

Haha, yeah. Sorry about that. English is not my forte.

Believe me, I know. So what about this other girl? This other Warrior of the Gods?

Well, Jay, that's a story for another time.

* * *

[1] Greek constellation myth

[2] Mi'kmaq constellation legend

[3] Hindu constellation story

[4] Alex and his parents are all pagans. He and his mom worship all and any deities that exists, whereas his dad prefers to focus on the Greek/Roman gods.

[5] Roman equivalent to the Moirai in Greek mythology and the Norns in Norse mythology. Called the Fates in English. Considered to be personifications of destiny, who control the strings (or thread) of life for every mortal and immortal being. Nona spins the thread, Decima measures the thread and Morta cuts the thread.

[6] Nick uses they/them pronouns as they are genderfluid, a non-binary gender wherein a person fluctuates between the different genders. Note that genderfluid people do not always use they/them pronouns and pronouns are not a specific depiction on a nonbinary person's gender preference or alignment

[7] Meaning to see the future

[8] Their mom miscarried for a third time and pitched into a deep depression and become unable to care for her child, as well as struggling with thoughts of infanticide

[9] American Sign Language

[10] Using the alphabet to sign words in a conversation

[11] An overly intense fear of pain. Common in the sick or elderly

[12] Charles, Alex's dad, is a trans man. His family did not approve

[13] About a decade prior to Charles coming out, he and Anna fell deep in love. After separating for a few weeks, they both came back to each other because neither one could consider life without the other. Publicly and especially around new people, Anna refers to herself as bisexual, not wanting anyone to doubt the validity of her husband and not wanting to out him before he can choose to do so himself, but after a while, and only among close friends and family, she started calling herself a lesbian once more at Charles's behest because he considered the circumstances wonky and also his fault and didn't like his wife ever seeming uncomfortable with a term that didn't fit her. He happily refers to himself as her one and only exception and she makes many jokes about being the world's worst lesbian. Both of them are content with the terms they live by and neither one considers it an offense to the other.

[14] An Egyptian god

[15] A Hindu goddess

[16] Alex is bigender. In his case, he alternates between feeling like a girl and feeling like a boy. In other cases, a person may feel like both a girl and a boy at the same time or simply alternate between two other genders

[17] A Greek god of thunder and sky

[18] A Japanese god of fisherman and luck

[19] A Norse god of thunder. Note that the Marvel Comics interpretation is not exact to the actual mythology

[20] A Celtic war goddess

[21] What citizens from Brokes call themselves, like New Yorkers or Texans

[22] He speaks English, French, Spanish, Italian, Mandarin, Japanese, German, Latin, Greek, American Sign Language (PSE dialect) and Japanese Sign Language. He understands (for the most part) how to read ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics and is currently trying to learn the proper grammatical structure under ASL and Polish. He has been trying to get his friends to teach him Hindi and Arabic for about seven years.

[23] Gender neutral term for god or goddess

[24] A Greek god of the sun

[25] Followers of Christianity, another Abrahamic monotheistic religion

[26] Aka murdered/colonized the hell out of a location and basically attempted to completely destroy the local's ties to their own religion

[27] A Mayan snake deity

[28] A Greek god of the Underworld

[29] Greek god of the ocean

[30] Egyptian goddess of protection and cats

[31] An Egyptian sky god

[32] Greek goddess of love

[33] Chinese god of love

[34] An Abrahamic monotheistic religion

[35] Arabic term for God. As Jackson's first language is Arabic, when he refers to God, he calls him as such instinctively

[36] Term for non-binary persons. Used in the same sense as girl or boy

[37] Nick prefers sister over brother or sibling and when prompted, Alex decided he didn't care which term was used for him so Katelynn decided to follow the rules of her actual sister

[38] A Māori god of war

[39] Mi'kmaq term for father. Alice uses this term to differentiate between him and Apollo as they both consider themselves to be her dad to some regard

[40] Apollo is also the god of truth

[41] A First Nations people originating within Canada's Atlantic Provinces (Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island), as well as some of Quebec and Maine

[42] Norse goddess of wisdom

[43] There are not thirty-three million.

[44] For some, all deities, including Kali, represent another aspect or form of their ultimate god, Brahman. For others, the consideration of millions of gods is because they believe there is a deity for everything and every person. There's an accepted thirty-three core gods.

[45] Mary is agender, a kind of paradoxical non-binary gender wherein a person is without gender, which is what makes it paradoxical. She prefers she/her pronouns.

[46] A Hindu god and Kali's husband

[47] Ace meaning asexual, which is to lack sexual attraction.

[48] A figure in Christian mythology. He is the son of God and the virgin Mary

[49] Meaning bisexual/biromantic, wherein a person feels attraction to two or more genders. Incorrectly believed to be the attraction to only male or females, but this is wrong.

[50] Meaning pansexual/panromantic, where a person considers themselves attracted to all genders or to people without regard for gender. Occasionally used in congruence with bisexuality as they're pretty similar in terms. However, whichever one a person choose to use is up to them and preferences differ

[51] Meaning heterosexual/heteromantic, wherein a person is attracted to the opposite gender

[52] One of the Norse planes of existence. Acts as a heaven for some people who die in valiant combat

[53] Hindu goddess of fertility. Kali is sometimes considered one of her aspects

[54] Greek goddess of springtime

[55] One of the upper Hindu planes of existence, considered to be a heaven

[56] A five-trunked white elephant that guards Svarga and carries the god Indra

[57] A Hittite goddess of healing, medicine, and magic

[58] The only deity in Christian mythology

[59] A type of backsword that has a curved blade

[60] The consensual act of being with more than one person at a time or being in a relationship where one party is actively involved with more than one person with everyone's knowledge and awareness. It is not cheating

[61] A Hindu fire god

[62] A Zulu creation god. After the arrival of Christianity, his name also became the word for God in the language of the Zulu people

[63] A small population combined of people who moved to Brokes following their prime years and therefore don't have the general understanding of acceptance that the rest of the population has and people who grew up in Brokes but are still rude because for whatever reason the lessons and history never actual set in and they learned nothing

[64] People who do not believe in deities

[65] A word Alex made up when he was young to replace aunt or uncle. It is derived from "Pibling in Law" as Marshall is married to his Aunt Helen but not directly related to him to be called Pibling (Parent's Sibling). Marshall before then was referred to as Aunt Marshall but Lawbling stuck because Alex thought it was funny and now all her nieces and nephews and niblings (gender neutral term for the prior terms) call her that. She thinks it's cute.

[66] Egyptian god of magic

[67] Hindi term of endearment for someone shorter or younger than you. Means small.

[68] A Native American tribe inhabiting Pennsylvania, where Brokes is located, among other states

[69] A Norse god. Please note that the actual god is somewhat different from the Marvel Comics interpretation, but the shapeshifting part is pretty much the same

[70] Japanese god of the wind

[71] Inca mother goddess of fertility, who also taught the Inca women the art of spinning thread

[72] The law was passed in 2013. This story begins in December 2013 and has, at this point, moved into 2014.

[73] A Mesopotamian sun god

[74] An Egyptian sun god

[75] Greek personification of death. He works for Hades.

[76] A lover of Apollo. In the stories, he is struck by a discus and killed. From his blood, Apollo created the flower version of his name to memorialize him

[77] Referencing Persephone, who is also his sister

[78] Hades is her husband

[79] A Greek god of thieves and travelers, among other things. He is Apollo's brother and once stole Apollo's cows before kind of tricking him into giving them up

[80] A type of gauntlet-sword originating from India

[81] The Yoruba word for honey. Ben uses it as a term of affection towards Fish.

[82] A Mande god

[83] Another Mande god and Pemba's twin

[84] Shinto sun goddess

[85] Shinto moon god, Amaterasu's brother and husband, though she later left him following his murder of the goddess of food, Uke Mochi

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# About the Author

Jay Jackson is a Bermudian-born and raised author. He has been writing since the tender age of ten and enjoys crafting stories to the confusion of the people around him. Being mixed race and falling under the LGBT banner, Jay has always preferred to include the diversity of the world around him in his stories. He has also been an avid enjoyer of mythology for many years, starting with his childhood fascination with ancient Egyptians.

He resides primarily in Bermuda, where he has lived the last nineteen years of his life, and is currently finishing up his final year at university in Canada. Jay has an Associate's in Business Administration and is looking forward to attaining his Bachelor's and CPA designation in the near future.

Read more at Jay Jackson's site.
