by Tim Waggoner
The gods didn’t immediately start fighting. Instead they stood looking at one another intently, brows furrowed, jaws clenched, hands bunched into fists, their combined power building until Sam could detect a distinct hum in the air. It was like standing close to a huge generator while someone slowly increased the power. Paeon’s caduceus pulsed with black light, and tendrils of electricity curled around the gauntlet Adamantine wore and raced up and down the spear she carried.
“Looks like she’s some kind of lightning god,” Dean said.
Sam nodded without taking his eyes off either of them. This situation reminded him of the way wild animals sometimes faced off against one another, displaying signs of strength and aggression in an attempt to intimidate their opponent while at the same time trying to determine which was the most powerful.
The energy pouring off the gods continued to build until it became painful for the humans gathered on the sidewalk. Sam winced as the tingling sensation on his skin intensified to a point where it felt like he had been hit with one of Flare’s fireballs, and from the looks on everyone else’s faces—Dean’s included—it was clear they were experiencing the same thing. And then, just when it felt as if all that power might be released in a single unimaginably powerful explosion, it dissipated, gone so swiftly that the suddenness made the gathered humans gasp in surprise. The burning sensation was gone, and the air was clear and still again, although Sam thought he could detect a lingering smell of ozone, like after a lightning strike.
“It appears we are too evenly matched,” Paeon said with a slight smile. His caduceus no longer glowed, and electricity no longer coruscated along the length of Adamantine’s spear.
“Yes, it does.” Adamantine smiled as well.
“Get a room, you two,” Dean said, and a number of worshippers from both sides glared at him. Neither god reacted, though.
“If we fight now, it is likely neither of us would win,” Paeon said. “We would only be wasting energy we shall need for the final battle.”
“Agreed,” Adamantine said. Her smile broadened. “And I think it is clear now that the two of us shall be the ones to fight in that battle.”
“Perhaps. You are the strongest of my kind that I’ve encountered. But there are still others who remain. I can sense them. Perhaps one of them shall meet me in the end.”
“Or meet me,” Adamantine said. “But there are only a mere handful of others. They will be gone in a few hours, and I wager that you and I will be the only survivors in the end. Can you not feel it? It is inevitable.”
“One thing I can feel is that you have her,” Paeon said. “Our progenitor. She is not with you at present, of course. I would sense the Mythmaker if she were among your people here, but you do have her.” He inhaled through his nostrils then slowly exhaled. “I can smell her on you.”
Mythmaker, Sam thought. You mean someone created them? This could be exactly what he and Dean were looking for. If they could find out how these new gods had been born, maybe they could figure out how to kill them as well.
Adamantine bristled at this, and her eyes literally flashed with anger.
“I warn you, Paeon, do not attempt to take her from me.”
Paeon held up a hand. “I have no intention of doing so. I have no doubt that you shall keep her safe until such time as she is needed.”
Sam and Dean looked at each other. This sounded like another piece of the puzzle.
Paeon continued. “I assume you are holding her at your temple. Please, don’t bother denying it. Where else would you keep her? To make matters simpler, perhaps we should meet there for the final battle. It will save you the trouble of having to transport her elsewhere.”
Adamantine narrowed her eyes, as if she were inwardly debating the merits of Paeon’s suggestion.
The assistants of both gods—Dr. Nguyen and the man in the worn clothing—stood near their respective master or mistress. They’d been watching the conversation between the gods with close attention and more than a little trepidation, but now the man stepped over to Adamantine, a worried look on his face.
“I beg your pardon, my lady, but I’m not sure this is a good idea,” he said.
Adamantine didn’t look at him, but she flicked her gauntleted index finger and a small arc of electricity leaped from the metal and stung the man on the cheek, instantly charring a small patch of his skin. He yelped and covered the injured area with a hand.
“Quiet, Geoffrey,” she said softly, as if she were too busy thinking to yell at him.
He shut his mouth, but he didn’t move away from Adamantine.
“Brave man,” Sam said.
“Or maybe a glutton for punishment,” Dean said.
“Meeting later will give both of us time to increase our power,” Adamantine said. “Then we shall be able to complete the Apotheosis at last.”
Dr. Nguyen stepped to Paeon’s side then.
“One of you may be stronger than the other by then,” she said.
Paeon gave her a grim smile. “Precisely.”
“But it could be her,” Dr. Nguyen said, concern evident in her voice.
His smile became gentle. “I appreciate you looking out for me, Lena, but you know that this is how it must be. In the end—”
“There shall be One,” Lena finished wearily. “I know.” She turned to Adamantine and glared at her. Given the intensity of her look, Sam thought that if the woman had been a god, Adamantine would’ve been dead on the spot.
Despite Adamantine’s earlier admonishment for Geoffrey to remain silent, he said, “All he wants to do is kill you. Please don’t make it easier for him.”
Adamantine didn’t bother to reprimand him for talking out of turn this time. She ignored him and continued looking at Paeon for several more moments, considering his offer. Finally, she nodded.
“I am in agreement.”
Paeon grinned. “Excellent! When shall we meet?”
Adamantine considered. “As I said earlier, only a few of our brothers and sisters remain, and they will seek us out just as we seek them. Our work should be completed before dawn.”
“Then we shall meet at dawn, the birth of a new day.” Paeon seemed pleased by this. “How appropriate. I need know only one more detail…”
“The location of my temple,” she said.
Geoffrey looked as if he were going to protest once more, but in the end he said nothing. Not just a brave man, Sam thought, but a smart one, too. He doubted anything Geoffrey said could change Adamantine’s mind. He wasn’t sure that Adamantine’s mind could be changed, even by herself. What was happening here was part of an ancient mystical cycle, as inevitable and unchanging as the movement of the Earth around the Sun. Not that the Winchesters weren’t going to do their damnedest to stop it, though.
“There is a place of commerce not far from here called TechEdge,” Adamantine said. “Do you know it?”
Paeon looked to Lena, who reluctantly nodded. Paeon turned back to Adamantine.
“Yes,” he said. “I shall see you there at dawn.”
Then without another word, he turned and began walking down the sidewalk away from Adamantine. Lena hurried to catch up to him, and his followers stepped aside to let them through. When they had passed, the worshippers followed. Adamantine watched them go for several moments before turning and walking in the opposite direction. Geoffrey followed several steps behind her, and just as Paeon’s followers had done, hers let the two of them pass and then trailed after them. Sam and Dean remained standing on the sidewalk, and soon they were alone.
“Fact-finding mission accomplished,” Dean said. He held up his bag of donuts. “And I still have some crullers left. That’s a win in my book.”
They both had coffee as well, but by now it had gone cold. There was a trash can close by, and Sam tossed his cup inside. Dean did the same, but he kept the donuts.
“One good thing about this mess is that Dr. McDreamy and the Silver Diva are going to do most of our work for us,” Dean
said. “They’ll kill the rest of the surviving gods before their grudge match begins at dawn.”
“Yeah, but by that point they’ll both be so powerful that we may not be able to stop them,” Sam said.
Dean shrugged. “Maybe they’ll take each other out and save us the trouble.”
“I doubt it. Remember the words they spoke before fighting? ‘In the end there shall be One.’”
“So you’re saying that there’s going to be a clear-cut winner, no matter what?”
“I don’t know for sure, but yeah, that’s what I think.”
“If that’s true, then at least we’ll only have to deal with one god.”
“One god who’s absorbed the power of all the others that were born in this town,” Sam pointed out.
“Yeah, that’ll suck.” For a moment, the brothers were silent, but then Dean continued, “What do you make of that Mythmaker talk? You really think these gods had a creator of some kind?”
“They had to come from somewhere.”
“I suppose. You think this Mythmaker is another type of god?”
“I don’t know,” Sam admitted. “But from the way they spoke about her, she has some kind of role to play in this final battle of theirs.”
“Maybe if we can find her, we can throw a hell of a big wrench into this cycle of theirs and stop them,” Dean said.
“Maybe. Did you notice how their two assistants acted?”
“Yeah. They both didn’t seem too thrilled about their guy or gal going up against the other. I figured they didn’t want to see their god die.”
Sam shook his head. “It’s more than that. I’m not sure either of them is comfortable in their role. Especially Lena.”
“Man, for a minute there, I thought she was going to kick Adamantine’s metal ass. Good thing she didn’t try, or she’d have ended up a crispy critter. Speaking of which, we now know it was Adamantine who killed those two people we saw when we first got to town.”
“She seems a lot more ruthless than Paeon, doesn’t she?” Sam said. “He showed that he can use his powers offensively when he hurt Flare, but overall, his archetype is a god of healing, while Adamantine’s archetype is a god of lightning, or in modern terms, electricity. Even if he increases his strength in the next couple hours, if I had to bet who would win in a fight between them, I’d put money on Adamantine.” Sam thought for a moment. “Maybe we can use that. There’s a good chance that Lena’s already figured out that Paeon will lose. And from the way she acted toward Adamantine, my guess is she’d do just about anything to protect him. If we can get close to her and get her talking…”
“She might tell us what we need to know to stop Adamantine,” Dean finished. “And we can use that knowledge against Paeon, too. That’s a good idea. Devious, but good.”
“Let’s go then,” Sam said. “They can’t have gotten far. We should be able to catch up with them without too much trouble.”
“You go, Sammy. I think one of us should see if he can get to this Mythmaker they talked about. Paeon said Adamantine was keeping her at TechEdge, which is evidently her ‘temple.’ Although personally I can think of way cooler places to use as a temple than a cheap electronics store.”
“If you were a god, your temple would probably be a diner that serves the greasiest hamburgers in the world.”
“Or the spiciest chili dogs,” Dean said. “I’m not picky. But if we can find the Mythmaker and get her away from Adamantine, we might short circuit this process of theirs. What did Adamantine call it?”
“The Apotheosis,” Sam said. “It’s a word that means ascending to godhood.”
“Right. If everything goes the way it’s supposed to, then the winner gets to graduate from baby god to great big grown-up god. So what we need to do is give them a bad case of Apotheosis Interruptus. If we make it so things can’t work they way they’re supposed to—”
“Neither of them can win,” Sam said. “And if that happens, then maybe they’ll both die.”
Dean nodded. “So you go see what you can learn from the good doctor, and I’ll slide on over to TechEdge while Adamantine and Geoffrey are still out hunting down the other gods, and I’ll see what I can do about the Mythmaker. With any luck, one way or the other we’ll nip this Apotheosis thing in the bud.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Sam said.
The brothers turned away from each other and, just as Paeon and Adamantine had done, went their separate ways.
* * *
Sam caught up with Paeon’s group after two blocks. The god stood in the parking lot of a twenty-four-hour pharmacy, surrounded by men, women, and—despite the cold and the lateness of the hour—children, and he spoke with each of them, smiling and touching his glowing caduceus to their chests one by one. Sam made his way to Lena’s side and watched Paeon work for several moments before asking, “What’s he doing?”
Lena turned to look at him. “You’re Unbound?” she asked.
“At the moment. But I was impressed with the way Paeon dealt with that fire god, and I’d like to learn more about him. You seem to be his…” Sam spread his hands. “I’m not sure what the term is.”
“I’m not altogether clear on it myself, but priest seems to be the word most people use, including the gods themselves. Not that I feel much like a priest.” She smiled. “But I’m happy to answer your questions. Paeon is Binding these people, and in so doing he’s also…” She paused, searching for the right words. “Well, I suppose you could say he’s upgrading them.”
Sam frowned. “How so?”
“He’s giving them perfect health, but more than that, he’s raising them to the upper limits of what the human body is capable of. Wait a second.” She reached into her coat pocket and brought out a ring of keys. She had a small multi-purpose tool attached to the ring as well. She took hold of it and unfolded a knife blade. “Watch,” she said, and then she used the blade to slice open the tip of one of her index fingers. The wound sealed before a single drop of blood could emerge. She held up her finger to show him the smooth, unmarked flesh.
“That’s amazing,” he said.
“Isn’t it?” She folded the knife into the multi-tool and put the keys back in her coat pocket. “That’s the reason I follow Paeon. He has the ability to help humanity realize its full potential.” She scowled. “Unlike the others.”
“You mean Adamantine?” Sam asked.
“Yes. What does a god like her have to offer? Nothing. She only wants to dominate humans and use us to increase her own power. She’s like a leech.” Lena practically spat this last word.
“So Paeon doesn’t need people to make himself stronger?” Sam asked.
Lena didn’t answer right away. When she finally did, she said, “In his case, it’s more a matter of symbiosis. We share our strength with him, he shares his power with us.”
It sounded to Sam as if she were rationalizing her support of Paeon. She seemed more than a little doubtful, and he wondered if deep down she truly believed what she was saying.
“He can do more than heal, though. He did something to the fire god, twisted her insides around or something.”
Lena paled as she looked away from him, and Sam knew he’d touched a nerve. Lena was a doctor, someone who’d dedicated herself to helping people, not harming them. Seeing Paeon use his power to hurt and potentially kill someone had to be difficult for her. More than that, from the strength of her reaction to his words, he sensed that she might well have had a taste of Paeon’s wrath herself. After all, if she was his priest and she displeased him, wouldn’t he punish her? And if he had, it would be hard for her to reconcile her idea of Paeon as a savior for humanity with the reality of him being a monster who happened to be wrapped in a pretty package. Those kind of monsters were the hardest to recognize.
“I can see he’s using that wand of his to change people,” Sam said. “Is that where his power comes from?”
She turned to look at him once more, eyes narrowing in suspicion. “You ask a l
ot of questions, don’t you?”
Sam shrugged and did his best to appear innocent. “Binding yourself to a god is a big step. I just want to understand everything I can about Paeon before I make a commitment, you know?”
Her expression eased and she smiled. “I understand. After all, I expect patients to ask about my qualifications, so why wouldn’t you ask about Paeon’s? Honestly, I don’t know how his power works. It can’t all come from his caduceus, though. If it did, it would be too easy for another god to take it from him and render him powerless. And I’ve seen him fight gods—not just Flare—and win. When the defeated gods vanish, their weapons vanish, too. If the weapons held all the power, wouldn’t they remain, and wouldn’t the winning gods be able to use them to add to their overall strength? But the weapons are important. As near as I can tell, they’re the only way to…”
She hesitated then, and Sam knew she was about to say: The only way to kill them. Instead, she said, “…channel and focus their power.”
“I see. Interesting.” Sam understood that Lena was Paeon’s priest, and as such she had to protect her god’s secrets, regardless of whatever ambivalence she might feel toward him.
Paeon had finished with the rest of the crowd and now approached them, a kindly smile on his face. “Who’s this young man, Lena?”
“I didn’t get his name.” She turned to Sam, a questioning look on her face.
“Sam,” he said. He tried to appear calm and relaxed, but inside he was nervous. If Paeon found out he was a hunter, the god would most likely kill him instantly by rearranging his internal organs, as he had done with Flare, or maybe cause him to have a fatal heart attack or devastating stroke. There were so many ways that a god who possessed the power to alter the human body could kill, and none of them were pleasant. But Paeon gave no sign that he thought Sam was anything but what he presented himself as—another potential worshipper.
Lena turned toward the god. “Sam’s been asking about you. I believe he’d like to join our family.”
“I hope you’ve only been saying positive things, my dear.” Paeon’s smile broadened, and he winked at Sam. There was a cold undertone to his voice, though—a very slight one—and Sam knew it was a warning to Lena. Paeon was giving her a message: You’d better have been saying positive things, if you know what’s good for you.
