28 A Mandatory Vacation part - 2

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Another group of Amazons stands waiting at the mouth of the cave, an equal number of those "escorting" you. The leader of their group is a raven-haired woman, helmet tucked into her side. She looked to be older than the unnaturally youthful Amazons you had so far encountered, though no less beautiful. Though she wore nothing to mark her out from those around her, the way the others stood just behind and the regal bearing of how she carried herself, she is clearly someone of importance.

Your assumptions are only confirmed when you come to a sudden halt and the Amazons around, even Wonder Woman and the two Amazons holding you up, fall to a knee. Luckily, you're able to steady yourself from stumbling down. It would have been a bad first impression to fall flat on your face.

Wonder Woman rises from her bow and the two women embrace in an intimately familiar way. Lovers maybe? Then they turn to you, and you discard the idea.

Standing side by side, you can see the resemblance between the two of them. They share the same shape of their lips and eyes, the way they carry themselves and the cool gleam in their eyes are all one and the same. Definitely mother and daughter.

"I presume this is our new guest?" the queen asks.

"Pleasure to meet you," you try to wave and make a show of failing because of the chains. Every single Amazon glowers at you with barely-restrained fury. "You're the one in charge here?"

Her expression remains frozen like it's etched from marble.

"Show proper respect to Queen Hippolyta," An Amazon snaps, prodding you with a spear. Hippolyta waves a hand in dismissal. The Amazon ducks her head and backs up, suitably chastised. The queen's gaze on you, waiting expectantly.

Wonder Woman rises from her bow and the two women embrace in an intimately familiar way. Lovers maybe? Then they turn to you, and you discard the idea.

"I presume this is our new guest?" the queen asks.

"Pleasure to meet you," you try to wave and make a show of failing because of the chains. Every single Amazon glowers at you with barely-restrained fury. "You're the one in charge here?"

Her expression remains frozen like it's etched from marble.

"Queen Hippolyta, it's an honor." Your tone cuts a fine line between sincere and mocking.

A single refined brow rises in question. "Oh, is that so?"

"It's not every day you get to meet a living myth. Your daughter was a footnote until the 1940's, but you, you're legendary, right up there with the greatest of them all, Achilles, Theseues...Heracles."

You smile inwardly at the subtlest of flinches you catch from the Amazons around you. Hippolyta, however, is unfazed. She's made from sterner stuff at least.

"The daughter of Ares, and consort of Zeus. That makes us family twice over does it not?" You look pointedly at your binds. "Is this how you treat family on Themisycra?"

Hippolyta smiles tightly. "Our family can be both a curse and a blessing."

She examines your bleeding gash with cool grey eyes before turning to Wonder Woman with a slightly disapproving eye. "I assume this was warranted?"

Wonder Woman shrinks back just the slightest bit. "He was goading our sisters." She omits the fact that it was her who rose to your very effective goading.

"And your sisters are trained warriors who shouldn't rise to the taunts of this...child."

You open your mouth to respond but decide better against it. Hippolyta gives you one last glance before turning to the cave. "Bring him inside."

A pair of Amazons remained on guard as you enter the cave, oddly having large mallets resting against the sides of the cave. Then, you notice the two supporting beams of wood that hold up a collapsable gate. You're led through a series of labyrinthine walkways, each marked by a pair of stalwart Amazons, and deep into the depths of the cave. You walk and walk long after the sunlight had disappeared.

Finally, the cramped tunnels open up into a wide sweeping area with jagged marble flooring and walls made of old weathered stone. In the center stands a protruded pedestal almost like an uncomfortable seat. Faint glimmers of sunlight drift from a small glass panel high overhead, illuminating the stone seat.

Beneath the pedestal lies a yawning chasm that seems to sink the very center of the world. A cold blistering wind howls from its depths. The very sight of it fills you with a existential dread and drowning unease, as though something is staring back out at you from the inky black.

"The entrance to Tartarus," Wonder Woman says. "One wrong step and there's no going back."

Your blood runs cold and you avert your eyes from the entrance to the mythical Pit. You decide to look as far away as possible, and instead, look up and see a series of small balconies lined with Amazons armed with swords, bows, and spears. Each and every one of them is watching you with hard and implacable gazes.

"So these are my new digs," you say with false cheer. "Any idea how long I'll be here?"

"Maybe a day," Hippolyta says. "maybe eternity."

"Don't take offense if I'm hoping for the former. Themiscyran hospitality doesn't exactly agree with me."

Hippolyta looks at you those you're a curious animal she's just come across.

"Because you are not a guest, you are a prisoner, given into the custody of the Amazons with the blessing of the gods of Olympus. Do not confuse my pleasantness for familiarity, son of Kronos. It's but the manner by which a queen comports herself."

"Glad we're on the same page." you glower. You feel a flicker of apprehension when you turn back to the stone pedestal.

Hippolyta raises her hand, and you're suddenly brought forward and forced to your knees in the center of the cavern. The Chains of Hephaestus unfurl from around your chest and shoulders, catching your forearms and wrists, and then lengthen unnaturally.

Teams of Amazons drag the chains high towards the cavern's ceiling, attaching them to a system of hooks and chains. Your arms are extended to their maximum and pulled far behind. You bit back a hiss of pain as your muscles scream in discomfort and the chains around your chest tighten painfully, making each lungful of air laboriously difficult.

Hippolyta and Diana watch the scene impassively, and Amazons around the cavern remain tense and ready even after the binds are in place.

The room is deathly quiet, aside from your slow harsh breathing.

Your eyes bore into Wonder Woman's own, channeling every last piece of hate and anger into it, making a silent promise to deliver a humiliation a thousand times more than what they've done to you.

Without a look back, they depart, leaving you alone with your silent invisible guards. The barest hints of sunlight slowly gutter out, bathing the cavern in complete darkness. And so begins the rest of eternity.

Eternity is a deceptively short amount of time.

You'd like to say time blurred together, seeing as you were forced to stare mindlessly into the marble cavern floor. That'd be a lie, though.

Every minute change in the cavern, the odd indecipherable creak, the nondescript arrhythmic dripping of water, and even the muffled footsteps overhead interspersed with the quietest murmur breaks the monotony and drags you back into the stark clarity of your situation. The cavern is bereft of even a hint of light and you can only make out the vague silhouettes of the stone surroundings. You look down and see only unrivaled darkness, and you can swear you hear the howl of the wind emanating from far below.

Everything is branded into your mind with vivid clarity, every single moment. Even closing your eyes and praying for sleep only brings the rest of the world into a heightened state of hyperawareness. It's a nigh unbearable sensation, torture of a different and incomparable kind.

Darkness slowly begins to encroach at the edge of your vision and your breathing slowly settles into a vaguely rhythmic cadence. And then, you're overcome with the sensation of falling, floating weightlessness that removes the chains from around your body like you're flying.

It suddenly comes to an abrupt end as your back makes contact with a very soft surface. Blinking blearily, you immediately avert your eyes from the sun glaring overhead.

"You must really find a different way to visit that doesn't involve wanton herbicide." An oddly familiar voice says.

Turning your head, you see a grey-haired man dressed in a long black toga that pools at his feet kneeling in the dirt. In his hands are a pair of small shears and a water bucket rests beside him. Though he had addressed you, his eyes are fixated completely on the brightly-colored flowers in front of him as he gently prunes and waters each one with almost paternal care.

Was it wrong that you're jealous of the flowers?

"Dad."

He regards you cooly.

"Son, how kind of you to visit your elderly father." He then returns his focus to the plants.

You get the oddest feeling he's angry about the flowers.

It's with a small groan that you lift yourself to your feet, wincing as the feeling of pins and needles rushes through your extremities as you force your limbs out of their blood-deprived sleep. Looking down, you see the smashed petals and broken stems settled in a vaguely Cadmus-like shape.

Regret presses incessantly at the back of your mind. It isn't exactly your fault, but neither was it the plants. With a wave of your hand, the broken and dying flowers wilt and turn gray and black before slowly sinking back into the soil.

Stark green buds pop out in their place, growing to maturity in the blink of an eye, revealing a brilliant kaleidoscope of petals. They're not the same as the ones that had been there before, but beautiful nonetheless.

Kronos gives a hum of approval from behind you, and the very soil beneath your feet reverberates almost pleasantly. It's a slightly unsettling realization that the very soil is technically your grandmother. Does that mean every time you'd seen someone litter they'd been assaulting your grandmother?

Your breath hitches as the beginning of an existential crisis and a righteous fury against litterers begin to brew in your thoughts.

The Titan of Time sighs, leaving his plants to move beside you, "Don't think too hard about it," He advises, patting your shoulder in a way that he must have thought was comforting.

Pulling yourself out of the veritable rabbit hole that you'd been spiraling into headfirst, you turn towards your...father, truly looking at him for the first time.

The Titan King stands of a height with you - perhaps an inch or two taller, his face cragged with faint bone-white scars and lines from the age of untold millennia. His hair falls below his shoulders, knotting into unkempt threads and a long beard tumbles down to the middle of his chest. Crows-feet mark the edges of his eyes, and you can't help but wonder, given his less than stellar reputation, just what had been the object of Kronos's amusement.

A certain ethical regalness peers out through the old Titan's visage and his very form exudes an imposing presence that presses down on your shoulders. You can't help but feel the need to avert your eyes as you meet his gaze.

Twin pupilless pools of molten gold gleam in the artificial sunlight of Elysium, almost iridescent in their intensity as they pierce your own.

"I am to understand, a certain misfortune has befallen you," he says softly. "there is little other reason for your presence here."

You bite back a derisive scoff. "Misfortune doesn't begin to cut it," you shrug off the hand on your shoulder roughly, only to find that you're unable to dislodge it. Your father's expression is placid and nigh serene even as the pressure on your shoulder tightens, bordering on discomforting.

"I am not your enemy, child."

Do not make me one. The specter of the unsaid words hangs heavily between you.

Realizing that the man in front of you has literally thousands of years of experience more than you in sheer stubbornness, you finally relent.

"You'll forgive me if I'm not behaving properly. They stuck me in a fucking hole," you growl, bitterness and anger lacing your every word. "and threw away the key."

Instead of reacting with shock, or righteous fury on behalf of his son, the Titan Lord simply scoffs, much to your undisguised surprise.

"Yes, it's quite impossible for anyone to understand what the prospect of eternal imprisonment is like." A small smirk appears on his face. "Present company included."

You scratch the back of your head in embarrassment, before returning to a scowl.

"You don't look exactly displeased with my current situation."

"On the contrary, I am overjoyed."

"Why?"

He gives you a smile that would put a shark's to shame. "Because now your training can finally begin."

A cold shiver of fear runs its away down your spine at the Titan's predatory look.

"What's that supposed to mean, exactly?"

"Even now, trapped as I am here," he gestures to the idyllic landscape that surrounds you with hateful eyes. "your presence here has never been stronger. I am to assume the servants of my children hold you captive?"

"The Amazons of Themiscyra."

"I do recall Hades muttering some choice words about them during his last visit, one of them...a Diana had apparently done much to his pride. You will have to thank her for me. It's always a treat to see my oh-so-dour and stern son so flummoxed."

Your mood turns even fouler at the mention of her name.

"Oh, I will, right after I pay her back for stringing me up like a pinata above Tartarus."

The Titan's face hardens at that.

"You will also have to thank her for imprisoning you where she has," he chuckles enigmatically turning back to his plants.

"What do you mean?"

The Titan Lord slowly parts a hole in the soil with his hands, drawing out a seedling from beneath his robes and placing it within the crevice.

"You forget child that I am also the Lord of the Harvest, and the Amazons have but sowed the seeds of their demise."

"You know, this doesn't seem like a bad place," The sky was a rich pale blue without a cloud in sight, a slight cold wind blew from the north, rustling verdant grass and teeming gardens of flowers and plants. "definitely not the worst place for eternal damnation."

"It is a gilded cage," Kronos grumbles under his breath. "Tell me, Cadmus, why do you think I am imprisoned here, in Elysium?"

"I thought...this wasn't a prison for you? Zeus took you out of Tartarus and placed you as King of the Elysian Fields as an example of his mercy."

"Mercy? No, child, my placement here is but a shining example of my youngest's proclivity for cruelty and mockery. Cocoa?"

The sudden juxtaposition between your father's embittered words and the sudden appearance of freshly brewed cocoa throws you for quite a loop.

The Titan King waves a hand and a pair of wicker chairs apparate into existence. With a long-suffering sigh, the Titan falls back into his, nursing a cup of steaming cocoa with both hands.

"Sit, sit," he motions towards you. "this will be a long story."

"At the end of the war," the Titan begins. "I and my brothers were cast into the Pit, but not before I was subjected to the same fate as Ouranos, my physical form and rent unto pieces by my very own scythe. It was a....trial reforming within the Pit. It took tens upon hundreds of millennia before the scattered fragments of my consciousness finally coalesced."

You leaned back, shaking your head slowly in confusion. "How could you possibly have healed within the Pit?"

Something gleams in your father's eyes. "And that is the key to why I am here. My sons were under the incorrect assumption that in such a weakened state I was in when they first threw me into the Pit, I would have been inevitably subsumed by Tartarus. A thesis that may have been correct had I been alone in my suffering."

You take a long draught of your cocoa, savoring the flavor the rich and deep flavor. "I have no idea what you're talking about." You deadpan.

"How do gods gain power?" Kronos suddenly asks, looking at you intently. "And I do not mean their domains. How does one of the divine truly become more powerful?"

The answer pops to the front of your mind like lightning. "Worship."

He smiles thinly. "Indeed. The faith and devotion of a devotee are what truly sustains and gives strength to one of the divines."

"But you must have had none left after the Titanomachy. Surely, Zeus and the Olympians would have wiped out any of those left loyal to you."

"They were remarkably thorough, in fact. But I had something greater than the simple offerings and sacrifices of mortals within the Pit. I had the accumulated suffering and pain of all the denizens of Tartarus to gorge myself upon.

"In their eternal suffering, an unending state of fear and loathing, and pain, all of those entombed within Tartarus wish for a simple thing, a time when they may be freed from their torment."

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