LXIX: Maybes

If someone were to ask Amy – or any of the others - to describe what they saw after Medea’s creepily-cheerful ominous declaration, they would focus primarily on the fact that there was heat, as though the very air around them was filled with static. Lightning might have flashed overhead, or perhaps it shot out from the ground at their feet, it might have been blue, or red, or green. It hit nothing, but swirled, or maybe danced, around Medea’s body. Medea may or may not have looked young, or unchanged, she may have flickered or warped or stayed still. She raised her hands and spoke words that none of her companions could recall afterwards, but the heat intensified to the point where Amy could do nothing but cling to Medea’s leg and coat; she didn’t realise she was crying until she noticed that her tears were evaporating from her face.


The demon hurtling towards them incinerated, or maybe he evaporated too, it was hard to tell. Ashes were born upwards on a wind that seemed to sweep out of nowhere. One after the other the demons were crisped and singed to their end and the evidence lifted skywards.


There were more enemies, of course, demons rarely came in small numbers – they gave ‘horde’ its meaning afterall. The newcomers hesitated when they glimpsed the now one-sided battlefield. It was obvious that they had not expected much resistance, let alone resistance of the Witch-Queen’s calibre. She turned to face them, drawing Amy with her. Her hair whipped around her youthful face, the red business dress she had been wearing earlier now resembled something like a red toga; red like swirling blood.


“Tell your Prince he will have to do better than this,” Achilles shouted across at the paused demons, “much, much better.”

LXIII: Playtime

Amy, in all her childish innocence, did not fully understand the danger that she was on – or perhaps in her child’s wisdom she knew that Medea could destroy the creatures that sprung out of those humans that a moment ago had seemed threatening but otherwise normal. She could burn them where they raised themselves into the air. Gunfire from Achilles forced them to stay low as Hector sprinted forward. Amy quite liked the strange weapon he suddenly held; a long sword with a gun built into the long hilt. At least, she thought it was the part called the hilt. Daddy had called bits of the sword the blade and the hilt in his story; the hilt was where you held it.

Jessica screamed behind her, and Amy twisted under Medea’s coat, lined prettily with mink fur and red leather, to look. The other girl was kicking madly, one of the demons had grabbed her by the ankle and was trying to fly up into the air with her. Amy wondered where it had come from. It had big leathery wings. Michael was in the air next to them, and he had a big sword in his hand, just like Hector, only Michael’s sword was on fire.

“I’ve got the Cassandrian!” the demon who had Jazzy shouted.

Michael raised his sword and cut a demon down. Jessica fell awkwardly, hitting the tarmac with a whimper.

“I will take the child!” Achilles half turned in reply to that call and Hector took a blow to his shoulder, falling. Now Amy was scared. One of the demon creatures rushed towards her and she cringed against Medea’s leg.

“Come, little one, play with me,” Medea laughed, and lifted a perfectly-manicured, child-like hand to beckon them closer, “play with me, children, come and play.”

LXII: Weaponry

Michael felt the air snap around him as though a thousand whips rushed by his face. The power crackled into his hand, took shape, he could feel it there: Purpose given to him by his Father. Power that came only when it was needed.

“They come,” he told the others, “I can feel them.”

“Let them come,” Medea whispered, and Michael glanced at her.

The power he felt was nothing compared the power that surrounded her now, the crackling he had felt had been her doing. She looked so young now, like the young girl who had commanded Jason to cut her brother into pieces and throw him into the sea. He could see it in her now. Her hair moved of its own accord, twining around her and upwards like some living cloud of darkened magic.

“There!” Achilles exclaimed, pointing.

Michael had often wondered how Zeus’ agents fought, three of them as they were, and today that question was answered. Even as Achilles lifted his hands there was a crackle of energy and then his hands were filled, handguns, but somehow with blades as well. The air was thick when they came into sight, to the naked eye human men and women, armed to the teeth.

“Stay with me!” Jessica hissed, clutching at his arm.

“I will keep you safe,” he swore and let the Sword of God form in his hand, “stay low.”

Jessica crouched, on hands and knees.

“Give over the Sighted and the Dreamer and we will let you be!” the leader of the Horde called.

“How about...‘no’?” Hector retaliated, “return to your master, demon.”

“Or what?”

“Or I will render you back into the dust,” Michael shouted.

“We will not bargain. Give us the girls or you die.”

“Give it your best shot,” Achilles suggested.

LXI: Unease

“I’m still not sure about this,” Hector said as they stepped out onto the icy tarmac of the landing strip, glancing at his lover.

“Eh, the girl said she Saw it this way? Why argue with the Fates?” Achilles told him, squeezing his shoulder as he looked around him.

“Because the last time we did not argue with the Fates we ended up knee-deep in blood. D’you remember?”

“I’m not likely to forget the ten-year-long war that made us who we are today, love,” Achilles murmured.

“Keep your wits,” Hector put in, motioning as Medea made her way out of the jet, “I do not trust this.”

“You were ever wary of open spaces.”

“I’m more wary of the Prince’s minions, he’s more resourceful than I’d like,” Hector muttered.

Achilles nodded and looked up into the sky.

“You’re right.”

“He’s very right,” Medea said as she came down the steps, “the air is heavy with magic.”

Amy stepped out of the jet then, holding Bast’s silent form. Jessica followed her, Michael at her side.

“Come here, child,” Medea instructed and gathered Amy to her almost absently. Long-lost maternal instinct perhaps? Or long suppressed?

When Amy was sheltered in the scarlet curve of the length of Medea’s fur coat, they started to cross the tarmac to where the cars were waiting. They had gone two steps, maybe three when Hector raised a fist and they stopped.

“What?” Medea asked.

“Miss Medea...I’m scared,” Amy whispered.

“It’ll be alright, child,” Medea murmured, her eyes were scanning.

“Do you see anything?” Jessica asked, her voice nervous.

“Quiet,” Achilles hissed and Jessica pressed herself again Michael.

Medea glanced at the couple, and sneered at the energy that was taking shape around the young man. Ah, Arcs. Pitifully chained and thus, limited. Luckily, she was neither.