Alex Anderson The Last Son of Zeus (6 page)

BOOK EIGHT

A GODLY TEABAG

Zeus killed Salvador
Boster
.

Then tea-bagged him.

"Dude! No way did that hit me!" Bos threw down the Xbox controller.

Zeus placed his controller down. "You're dead aren't you? This is my guy tea-bagging yours isn't it?" The act of tea-bagging--
squatting
your game character on top of another dead character--had become a social norm in the Xbox community years ago. Game designers, of course, could do something to prevent its execution within the game, but the only people who ever complained were the players who lost a lot.

Bos stood and pointed at the screen. "How do I know you're not cheating? Using some sort of weird, wacky god-power on your controller. Or better yet," Bos furrowed his brow and looked down, "on my controller."

"You don't."

"Fair enough. I'm hungry. To be continued."

Bos passed Alex on his way to the kitchen. "Alex, you want something?"

Alex kept staring at the screen.

Bos cupped his hands around his mouth. "ALEX! I'M GOING TO THE KITCHEN! DO YOU WANT--forget it." Bos continued into the kitchen.

Alex didn't know what freaked him out more: the fact that an actual god was in his living room or the fact that Bos seemed totally okay with it. So okay with it, they sat down and started playing Halo an hour ago.

After telling Alex who he was, Zeus fixed the house. At least Alex assumed Zeus fixed the house. Both he and Bos passed out shortly after the god's arrival. When they woke up, everything was repaired. Not only was it repaired, but it was repaired in such a way that didn't look like it had been repaired. Nothing looked new.

Every mark, dent or scratch the walls and ceiling had before the whole two guys with a shotgun thing was still there. There were no paint or plaster smells and even the furniture and windows were once again intact. It was as if nothing had ever happened. After waking up, Alex asked Zeus how he fixed everything.

Zeus had held up a hand. "It is of no importance and would probably bore you anyway. Let's just say that I have my ways."

Later, Alex put on a pair of cargo shorts and
an
Xavier Institute t-shirt, then they all stood there for what seemed like forever. An uncomfortable silence passed. Standing eventually turned to sitting, which eventually turned to Bos looking at Zeus and asking, "Hey, you
wanna
play some Halo?"

Zeus smiled. "I would
love
to play some Halo."

"Right on." Bos retrieved the controllers from the TV stand.

Alex watched them the entire time.
Boster
had lost every match to the god--Jesus, the
god
--Zeus seemed to have a sixth sense for the game. Every time Bos started to do something, Zeus turned it around on the hapless teenager.

"Alex, did you not totally see me get away from Z's rocket?" Bos stood in front of him with an armful of tortilla chips, salsa, and a two-liter of Diet Coke.
When did he come back from the kitchen?

"Z? You're calling him...Z?"

"Yeah." Bos looked at Zeus. "You don't have problem with that, right?"

Zeus, keeping his eyes on Alex, shook his head.

"Cool."

Alex ran to the bathroom and threw up.

Or rather, he tried to throw up. He went through the motions of throwing up. His stomach
convulsed,
his mouth and throat opened up and he clutched at his midsection like it was trying to implode. All that came out was air.

Alex kept dry heaving for three minutes.

"You want me to get something, man?" Alex turned to see Bos standing in the bathroom doorway.

"No. I don't--" Alex spit in the toilet, "I don't want anything."

Bos disappeared into the living room and Zeus entered. He made a sour face at the contents of the toilet then sat on the tub. "A bit much for you?"

Alex leaned against the wall and put his hand over his forehead. "A bit."

"Well, you'd best cowboy up. This is just the beginning."

"What are you talking about?"

"That man earlier. He wasn't here by accident. He was looking for you." Zeus wet a towel under the faucet and handed it to Alex.

"What? Why me? Why do they
wanna
kill me? "I'm just--

"My son."

Alex put the towel over his mouth and stared at the floor. It took everything he had to stay in that moment. He could feel his mind slipping away, desperately trying to hang onto something, something safe.

"There's more you must hear."

Alex bolted up. "No! No! I don't have 'to hear' anything. I-I won't hear!" Alex threw the towel and stormed out of the house.

"Well that was certainly the mature thing to do," Zeus muttered to himself.

Bos finished cramming four salsa covered chips into his mouth and ran after his friend. Zeus grabbed
Bos's
arm. "No. He needs time."

Bos wiped salsa off his stubbly chin and watched his best friend run down the street.

~ * ~

Alex walked for...for he didn't know how long. He just walked. By nighttime, he ended up downtown. Or rather, what passed for downtown in Athens,
Tennessee.
The entire area covered about nine blocks, four of which were mostly abandoned buildings. There was no sound around him other than the hum from a nearby streetlight.

A police siren cut through the silence and Alex Anderson jumped.

Why did he jump? The siren was at least a few blocks away, and he hadn't done anything wrong. Alex's gaze darted around. The alley and abandoned buildings produced shadows everywhere. Several trashcans fell over in an alley, and Alex heard two cats hiss at each other.

He started breathing heavily. He had to get out of here. He had to get somewhere that had lights. Somewhere safe.

Two more blocks and one minute later, Alex opened the door to
Del's
Diner. The door hit a bell and made the restaurant's five occupants look up. They stared at Alex with mouths or forks full of food. For some reason, Alex felt more alone here than he did in the street.

"What can I get
ya
,
hon
?" A waitress from behind the counter asked. She popped pink bubblegum between her teeth.

Alex looked at her then back outside. "Um, a cheeseburger. Bacon. Make that a bacon cheeseburger and a coffee and
a water
."

She popped her gum again. "Bacon cheeseburger, Del!"

Del, a fat, bald guy wearing a white t-shirt turned and looked at her. "Jesus Christ, Becky, I'm standing right here."

Becky shrugged her shoulders. "You told me to yell the orders, so I'm
yellin
' the orders."

Alex put his hands in his pockets. Becky popped her gum again and looked at him. "
Anywhere's
fine, hon. I'll find
ya
."

Alex slowly walked past the other people. He felt them looking at him until he slid into a booth in the back. He rubbed his face with both hands.
Jesus Christ. A god...a god is my father? How am I
suppose
to…

"Here's your coffee."

Alex jumped and let out a yelp.

Becky shoved the gum inside her cheek. "You okay?"

"Water. Just my water. I'm hoping you didn't forget that I needed and wanted water." Alex's fingers drummed the tabletop. "That's all."

She stood there for a moment. "Uh-huh."

Alex slid back in his seat after she walked away. He had to get a grip on things. How did Bos do it?

He did it because his father isn't a god.

Alex rubbed his face again.

He slid out of the booth and walked to the bathroom. He jerked the door open and it bounced off the hallway wall before shutting him in total darkness. Alex palmed the wall for the light switch, found it, and flipped it on.

A fluorescent flickered to life above the mirror. Alex slowly walked closer to his reflection. He looked for some sign on his face that would mirror how different he felt. He found nothing. His reflection looked exactly the same as it did this morning, before he found out Zeus was his father.

He pressed his forehead against the mirror. The whole thing--his whole life--was fucked up.

Alex twisted the faucet's lever to the right. It sputtered a few times before splashing cold water in his open palms. He splashed it into his face. He left the water running and watched the drops fall from his nose in the mirror.

His life wouldn't change if he didn't let it. All he had to do was forget this ever happened and plan on ignoring anything that came up again. When--
if--
Zeus shows back up, Alex would just ignore him too. The harder the god tried to get his attention, the more Alex would ignore him. He could even ignore Bos if he needed too. Alex smiled. He finally figured a way to fix the craziness that was today.

Then a
minotaur
crashed through the wall and tackled him.

BOOK NINE

ONE HELL OF A BULL

The Bull of Minos was not, at the moment, a happy being.

Truth be told, he was
never
a happy being. And why would he be? He was the result of an insane union between man and bull. A union that was not exaggerated about even in the slightest by all of the tales that had created the religion of the Greeks. Other tales survived to be certain, but they were always exaggerated about in some way. Apollo's abilities somehow made him ridiculously responsible for the sun rising each morning. The wars of man were blamed on one god. A god even had power over something as powerless as the sea. One would think that with all of the exaggeration being thrown around left and right, Minos' story could somehow be cleaned up, improved upon, or at least toned down in some way.

But it wasn't.

Mankind had gotten every detail--at least every excruciatingly embarrassing detail--about the creature's origin absolutely correct. His mother--cursed by Poseidon--fell in love with one of her husband's bulls. She fell so in love with the beast she decided to have relations with the accursed thing.

She approached it on several occasions. At first, she would just sit with the bull for hours at a time. Not getting too close but not wishing to walk so far away as to lose sight of it.

Eventually, Minos's
wife become
braver. She walked within touching distance of the beast--then she touched it.

And then she
really
touched it.

The bull, not knowing what the fool of a lady was doing but knowing it sure as Hades wasn't right, did the only thing any self-respecting bull could do in its situation.

It kicked her.

The creature spun so fast and kicked so quickly the queen was on her back before she even realized the beast's distinguishing attributes were no longer in her hand.

Knowing approaching the bull again could possibly end with the same result, she went to her husband's chief engineer,
Dadelous
, and contracted him to build a--and there was no other way to say it--a cow suit.

Dadelous
thought the request strange, but he was in no position to question
the queen nor
her desires. He built the suit, and that night the queen rushed out to pasture wearing it. She hoped her scent was enough to lure the creature.

The bull never came. It just looked at her from across the field. She walked closer to it--a very hard task--and turned her tail a little just to get its attention, which she failed at miserably. She did, however, attract the attention of two other bulls. Bulls that had been upset since the arrival of Minos' new prize bull. Bulls that decided it was nigh time to get their groove on. Bulls that almost broke every bone in her body doing just that.

The wife's weakened condition barely allowed her to survive the nine months it took to deliver the monstrosity. She survived until the horns came out then perished, never able to see her newborn or think about the horrors she had unleashed up on it and King Minos.

There had been other stories about what Minos did after seeing the Minotaur. Some of them said he imprisoned it, others say he fed it prisoners. Both of them were wrong. King Minos killed it.

Right on the spot.

The Minotaur didn't even have eyes open before Minos ran to the nearest axe, yanked it off the wall, and cleaved the creature's skull in twain.

And after that, the bull was sent to the underworld were Zeus' brother, the mighty Hades accepted it. For what reason, the Minotaur never knew. All Hades ever said regarding the subject was the beast matched the underworld's decorum.

Hades somehow aged Minos then put him "to work." Minos guarded certain levels of the fiery pit that were prone to escape. To make things even more dreadful and slightly confusing, Hades named the Minotaur "Minos" after the king. If Hades intended it as an insult, Minos the Minotaur wasn't sure if the insult was directed against him or Minos the King. Perhaps it was Hades' humor at work, since he also named the underworld after himself.

Minos wasn't sure how long he lived within the fiery pits. Days became months. Months became years, and years eventually became centuries. All he did know was his life--if one could call it that--was absolutely horrible. He hated breathing, he hated walking, he hated thinking--he hated simply existing.

So what could he do about his predicament? It wasn't as if he could kill himself. He was already in the place beings such as he went after they died.

He had accepted his fate long ago, but that didn't make his hatred of it any less. In fact, it made it worse.

Then Aphrodite came.

She just appeared in a cloud of pink smoke one afternoon. She looked around, taking in her surroundings and crinkled her nose. "Oh my god, it smells like crusty crotch down here."

She attempted to wave the smell away from her nose then spotted Minos, who briefly considered attacking her...But what was the point? It wouldn't bring any brightness to his day. He would attack her. She would escape in the same manner she entered then things would go back to the way they horribly were. If he didn't attack her, it might prove to be a longer distraction.

She grinned. "OMG, you have GOT to be Minos."

Minos considered attacking her again.

She held up her hand. "Yeah, I know, stupid thing to say. Thing of it is there are a
buncha
' you guys running around, so I wanted to be sure."

"A bunch? How many? Where are they? How did they--"

"
Shutup
, I don't have a
lotta
time." Aphrodite looked around. "Somebody's
gonna
feel me out pretty soon. And if they don't, there's still,
y'know
, that whole crusty crotch thing."

Minos opened his massive mouth to say something else, but Aphrodite cut him off. "Here's the offer, Minnie. I'll get you out of here. You, in return, have to do whatever I say, whenever I say it or I'll send
ya
right back,
'
kay
?"

Minos shifted his hooves. "What do you want me to do?"

Aphrodite rolled her eyes. "Oh for
cry'n
out loud, does it really matter? We both know you
wanna
out of here, hon. I don't have to remind you how shitty your life has been, is, and will continue to be. We both know you'll do whatever it takes to get out of here."

Minos' eyes fell to the ground.

"Tic'
freakin
'
toc
, sweetie. Haven't got all day."

Minos blew a massive breath out of his snout and lifted his gaze. "Alright."

Aphrodite nodded. "Damn
skippy
."

She waved her hand and they both disappeared in a puff of pink smoke. Minos realized later just how fortunate his life in Hades had been.