HYDRA in swamp

Mahmoud Schahed/Dial

We walked through a swamp. Yeah, I know. Swamps in Greece. I'd mentioned earlier that Greece was a place that just seemed to summon myths around it. The sheer breadth of locations within the country was one of the reasons why.

They were low, with no trees or anything. It sort of reminded me of the Dead Marshes from Lord of the Rings, the Two Towers one. Just not as spooky. Still wet though.

Ares was leading us. Then Bucky, Jen, me, and Steve, in a straight line following the tall Olympian.

"Ugh," Jen mumbled, walking through the watery swamps. She'd exchanged her jeans for galoshes, but was still glaring at the water. "Mahmoud, sweetie, when you said you were taking me to Greece, this isn't what I wanted."

"Don't blame me, the tour guide's the one that brought us here," I said with a nod at Ares.

"You should have paid extra if you wanted to stay dry," Ares was apparently old hat at banter. He gave us a grin before facing forward again. He'd strapped that giant sword from earlier to his back next to a grenade launcher, and was carrying an assault rifle in his hands.

Steve gestured for me to come closer to him as we continued to trudge through the swamp. His eyes were still on Ares as he spoke, keeping his voice low. "What do you think?"

"That my multiversal knowledge is useless here," when Steve gave a look, I shrugged. "Steve, Ares is Ares. He's the God of Soldiers in War. That means guys like you. Honorable men fighting for a good cause, fighting for their nation. But it also means the guys who enjoy it. The monsters who fight just to spill blood, man," I sighed. "Ares isn't a bad guy in the universe through the dimensional viewer. Dangerous, and does some messed up things. But he fights for good. So, keep an open mind."

Steve chuckled. When I looked at him, he smirked. "That's what I would have done whatever you told me."

I chuckled as well. Yeah, Steve wasn't the type to judge someone without knowing for a fact they were assholes.

"So this isn't the first monster you all have had to deal with recently?" Bucky was asking Ares.

"Not at all. The first that I had to deal with was a catoblepas."

"A what?"

"It's a bull. A magical one, right?" Jen stumbled as she spoke. I caught her mid-fall and helped her to a more stable section of swamp.

"More or less," Ares shrugged. "It has a gaze that can turn mortals to stone, and breath of fire. Nothing too dangerous for those like us, but troublesome for normal men. Once I took care of it, more seemed to rise from the underworld. A manticore, some Stymphalian birds, a wyvern, even a bilgesnipe from Thor's lands."

"Why haven't we heard about this?" Steve asked behind me.

"Because we kill them," Ares looked over his shoulder. "Captain, you know as well as I that no beast, no matter how monstrous, can match the evils men and gods can bring upon themselves."

Steve frowned.

"Well, at least we all know how to kill this thing," I said idly, slapping a mosquito coming at my face. "Cut off the heads and burn them, right?"

"Like Hercules did?" Jen asked.

Ares scoffed. "Please! That blowhard would have been lost if it wasn't for Iolaus. 'If I cut it enough times it'll work, right!'"

"Is that a little bit of sibling rivalry I hear?" I teased.

"...No."

Heh.

"We aren't going to get attacked by PETA for this whole thing, are we?" Jen asked.

"First of all, I'm given to understand they kill more animals than they save, so they would be hypocrites if they did decide to make a complaint," Ares scoffed. "Second, hydra's are not animals. They are in fact, magical monsters. They do not kill because they are hungry, they do not fulfill a role in the environment around them. They destroy all life around them, poison the waters of their homes, and make the areas they live in uninhabitable for miles around if they are given the slightest chance."

"So… they don't make cute pets?" Bucky said.

"If they did, I would take them in to the zoo, along with the others."

"Others?" Steve asked.

"You thought I was just killing everything I found?" Ares asked.

"Aren't you the god of murder?" I asked with a chuckle.

"Yes. Not the god of animal cruelty."

"Wait," Jen stopped walking and stared at me as though she'd come onto a sudden realization. "Mahmoud. This is a swamp."

"Yeah?" I asked, confused.

"A swamp full of plants. So why don't you just turn into Swampfire?"

"...I'll be honest. I kinda forgot that was an option," I admitted.

"You could have been making bridges for me," Jen said.

"...Sorry?"

"You're on thin ice."

I looked around. Ares coughed and looked away. Bucky was grinning. Steve chuckled a little.

Traitors, the lot of them.

With a sigh, I raised the Omnitrix up and twisted the dial. You know what happened next.

"Swampfire!"

"I have trouble remembering all the options I have sometimes," I admitted in my slightly nasally voice.

Ares frowned thoughtfully about that. "Truly? Has it been an issue in the past?"

I tossed some seed pods into the swamp water and reached out in that telepathic void I shared with all plant-life, spraying my pheromones across the area as well. As my seed pods cracked open and started creating a path of wood for the others, I thought about Ares' question.

"Not really? Usually I'm in the right form for the fight, and I always think of the one I need if I really have to change."

"Bah!" Ares shook his head. "That is not enough. A soldier needs to know every weapon, every tool at his disposal, perfectly. When you fire a gun, you aim. When you swing a sword, you aim. Nothing in battle should be a matter of 'it might be good for this situation.' You don't win, lose, or die by percentages. It is a warrior's duty to remove chance from the equation."

That surprised me, if I'm being honest. Not what Ares was saying, but how he was saying it. I mean, I didn't disagree with what he was saying. It's not like I wasn't thinking the same thing. Part of the training I wanted for myself was to learn to instinctively reach for the right form for every scenario.

The fact he was trying to guide me the same direction was interesting though.

"Is that like a, 'God doesn't play with dice, and neither do I', kind of thing?" Jen snarked.

"If that's what you want to call it, yes," Ares said gravely. "I will say, there are pantheons of gods who attempt to play games of chance with the lives of the mortals in their realms. But a smart warrior makes any game of chance a useless endeavor. He takes pains to be sure nothing will stop his assault. Because while you cannot plan for everything, you can at the least understand your own options and abilities. It is something the greatest soldiers do well. Something even I have sometimes failed in, for all my experience."

We continued walking over the bridges of wood I was making for us, before we finally came to a spot where I felt something through my connection to the plants around us.

"Wait. Just a sec," I frowned, looking at one specific section of swamp. I raised a hand and closed my eyes, reaching out mentally for the plants. "There's something in that swamp."

"The hydra," Ares said with relish, chuckling. "Well then. According to reports, it's already on three heads. I have no wish to waste time cutting more and more off, so we stick to our plan."

"Fine by me," Jen said with the same relish in her voice.

"I'm already in Swampfire form, so I'm good to go," I said with a shrug.

Bucky and Steve didn't say anything, just raised their own weapons.

"Then it is time to unleash hell," Ares chuckled, raising his assault rifle in one hand and reaching over his back to take his grenade launcher in the other. "Jennifer. If you please?"

Jen's teeth flashed with glee. There was absolute joy in her movements as she pulled her hands back, then brought them forward. "THUNDERCLAP!"

The air erupted from around her, sending us all back a step while the plants were bent by the wind. The majority of it smashed into the water, parting it like Moses had decided to join our little posse.

And there it was. The monster we'd all been waiting for.

It was a big boy. Weren't they all? Around the size of a school bus, with scales the color of mud, it was shaped like the brontosaurus' I'd seen in the Savage Lan. Smaller, but built with a lot more muscle, like it was the shorter and buffer little brother.

It let out a sound like gas escaping a propane tank when it realized the waters it was hiding in had been blasted back. The waters fell back to surround it, but the jig was up.

"There you are," Ares whispered.

The HYDRA, I mean, the hydra, let out that sound like hissing gasoline again, lifting its heads high into the air. One. Two. Three… four. Five? All of them ringed with fringes of scales.

"That's more heads than you said there would be," Steve pointed out to Ares.

"Hey, who's surprised a situation we're involved in got worse. Because I'm not," Bucky said, raising his sword.

"That's why the plan accounted for up to nine heads," Ares chuckled.

"Avengers!" Steve shouted, his iconic shield raised high.

The hydra roared, and we leaped into battle.

Ares, being a consummate professional, had given us the breakdown before the fight. The plan was the usual plan when you fight a HYDRA, I mean, hydra.

Cut the heads off, burn the stumps.

Simple plan. Not about to waste time making any changes to it.

A reptile head as big as a couch, the leftmost one, snapped towards us. Steve jumped in front and parried it with his shield, teeth clashing on vibranium. Bucky jumped forward, sword in hand, and sliced forward, catom blade cutting through scaled flesh. He got about halfway through.

The hydra screamed, blood pouring out from it. It tried to pull back, but I jumped forward and grabbed that head, using my strength to hold him in place for another slice from Bucky. The other four heads, realizing what was happening, moved to surround us, but Ares and Jen jumped for a head each.

"Raaagh!" Jen punched one head, sending it snapping back in a shower of teeth.

"Have at you!" Ares roared, jumping on top of another head and shooting it in the eyes with his assault rifle. His grenade launcher was aimed at the main body of the hydra, and explosions surrounded its feet and chest.

"Ha!" Bucky sliced the head off with a vicious blow. I immediately let go and raised my hands, unleashing plumes of flame, burning the stump into a crisp. The smell of burnt reptile rose in the air.

Another head tried to bite into Bucky, but a shield came crashing into it. Steve caught the shield in the air and brought it up in front of him.

"HYPER CHARGING STAR!"

Steve shield bashed one of the heads, teeth smashing on his shield, and looked over at me in confusion for a sec. "Why did you yell that?"

"Because you never call out your cool moves," I said with a grin. Another head snapped at Ares. I controlled the plants near the head to snap upwards and wrap around that head, vines as thick as a wrist holding it in place.

"SHEEEEE!" the trapped head screeched.

Ares, not one to let a free shot go, shoved his grenade launcher into the hydra's right nostril and pulled the trigger. The grenade exploded in the nose of the hydra, sending the head back a step. It screamed a nasally scream, the other heads shuddering in response to that explosion. Ares, in a smooth motion as fast as Pietro ever did, switched his assault rifle for his sword and sliced the head off while the hydra was confused. I unleashed hell, blasts of flame cooking the bloody stump, liquid sizzling.

"Fall before your betters, you bastard!" Ares barked. "Jennifer?"

"I got one ready!" she jumped into the air, flipped around, and kicked outwards with both feet, smashing the middle hydra head like an emerald cannon.

Jen's job in this whole thing was the same as Steve's. Jen's strength and Steve's shield would beat the heads of the hydra, forcing them away from Ares, Bucky, and me. Both of them were fast and strong enough to daze the heads, and leap from one to another before they could recover.

Bucky and Ares' jobs were to slice the heads off. Simple enough, if only something people with super-strength like theirs could pull off.

I controlled the plants around us to wrap around another head, more vines grabbing the main body. Ares cut off another head, which I burned.

Three long necks lay limp, heads removed and ends turned to ash. Two more stared at us with rage, snarling and spitting.

"Dial, if you could," Steve asked politely.

"On it Cap," I reached out mentally again. The plants around use exploded. It was like nature itself turned on the hydra. Which, you know, was exactly what happened.

The vines wrapped around and around its body. The hydra, panicking, started biting and clawing at the bonds that surrounded it.

"Captain!" Ares shouted as he rushed towards Steve.

"Jen!" Bucky said at the same time.

"Right!" Jen and Steve called out.

Ares jumped up and landed on Steve's shield. Bucky's boot landed in Jen's cupped hands. Together, Steve and Jen heaved upwards, sending their cargo high into the sky.

Bucky Barnes and the God of War flew through the air with swords raised.

"DIE, DIE, DIE!" Ares laughed, his sword still dripping, Bucky silent in his wake.

"GRAGH!" I shouted, struggling with my bond over the plants. The vines twisted and pulled the last two heads into position for my allies, keeping the necks in place. Bucky and Ares slashed out with all their strength and cut through the necks of the hydra at the same time.

As soon as the blood was spilling, I created two balls of flame and tossed them, the flames exploding on the stumps. Then I kept pouring it on, over and over. The body of the hydra shuddered. Ares and Bucky landed, rolling to their feet and spinning to face the monster.

For a tense moment, we watched. Then the necks finally lay on the ground. The body shook. I stopped unleashing fire, Jen and Steve walking up to my sides to watch the hydra for a moment.

"...It is done!" Ares shouted in satisfaction. "And now I have hydra blood to add to my bullets! YES!"

"Nice!" Jen called out with a grin. "Except that blood thing, I don't know where you're going with that."

"That was fun," Bucky added.

"Indeed, it was," Ares looked around. "Um… thank you," he said hesitantly. It was like he wasn't used to saying it. "I don't often fight with other heroes at my side. This was a good experience."

"Hey, no need," Steve grinned up at the taller man. "I'm glad we could help with this."

I watched as Steve patted him on the shoulder. Ares was… well, interesting to see in action. He wasn't how I would have expected him. Still very eager for a fight, but it was like he'd spent his whole life with people shitting on him, and only now was getting any positivity thrown at him.

...Ah. Yeah. That's exactly what had happened to him, wasn't it?

"I can't guarantee anything, but I can at least say I will speak on your behalf," Steve said earnestly. "We'd love to have you help us. If you'd like."

Ares blinked. "That… yes. I would like to continue my work here, however. My son goes to school here, and I'd like him to stay with his friends."

I blinked, walking over. Alex… He existed. The son of the God of War. In the comics, he was the reason Ares would eventually become a hero. Maybe this version had taken the same path.

"You have a kid?" Jen said, blinking. "So, he's like a demigod? Or did you and Aphrodite-"

Ares scoffed. "No. Thank god. Sophia has taught me the term toxic relationship. Truly, I wish I had known of it before that whole mess centuries ago," he shook his head. "Alex is a normal boy. And I'd like to keep him that way. Understood," he growled, looking around at us.

"Fine by me," I looked at the hydra. "Man. I almost feel sorry for it."

"Don't," Ares eyed me. "A warrior has no time to feel sorry for an enemy like a hydra. They have no feelings beyond rage and fear. They deserve no more sympathy than you would give a mosquito. Heed my advice."

There were those dad vibes. My own father talked the same way sometimes. I missed him.

"Ya. Ya, I get that," I said thoughtfully, staring at him.

Nat had said he was the best guy for what I needed. Granted, she hadn't told me who to expect, but she said I'd understand once I met him...

Ares took out a bottle and kneeled next to the hydra's nearest stump. He ripped out a section with his sword to let the blood flow out, the liquid dripping into the bottle.

"What are you doing?" Steve asked.

"Hydra blood is poisonous to even demigods," Ares said. "That's how my idiot brother died. I would rather have it available."

"Just in case, huh?" I said.

"If this thing is poisonous, should we really be leaving its body out here-" Steve was interrupted when the hydra began to dissolve quickly.

"Oh, looks like he was self-cleaning, and/or magical," I said while staring at the giant monster turning itself into goop. Gross.

"A bit of both. It'sextremelycorrosive," Ares said with a smirk. "Only its life force protected it from it's own blood. It will destroy its body, then fade away."

"Uh… good?" Steve placed his shield on his back. "Let's head back then."