I Am Zeus

Pressure pushed out from the giant hand as if there was a physical wall.

It wasn’t wind, not really, not in any way that the gods could define.

It was something else... Some sort of presence, thick and crushing and all-consuming, that devoured everything else in the chamber to even exist.

Zeus’ knees buckled for a fraction of a second before he forced them to lock.

Chaos pressed heavier around his body, keeping him upright.

Across the chamber Athena went to one knee, her spear shaking in her grip, while Poseidon’s trident dragged along the stone floor to keep him from following her example.

Hades coughed blood that hissed and bubbled where it touched the ground, while Persephone’s green light flickered like a candle in a gale.

Even Kratos was forced to take a step back, the chains binding him clinking and clattering.

Far above the chamber it pushed further into the outside world.

Outside souls in the Underworld screamed as the very air thickened around them, flickering out like candles snuffed in the wind.

Rivers that had only just cleared of ice promptly froze solid, then cracked.

On Olympus the heavens themselves groaned and split.

Long, jagged lines of marble ran through the palace’s great halls, and across the mortal realm the earth shook so violently that people were thrown from their feet.

Oceans surged in wild, unpredictable swells and mountains crumbled.

The very fabric of existence trembled and buckled at the sheer force of this alien pressure rolling through the realms like a tidal wave, and all because of a simple hand.

Zeus turned his gaze to the limb itself, the fingers splayed impossibly wide against the broken floor, each one stretching from tower to tower, and realization struck him like another blow.

Whatever the Father had called forth, whatever power had answered his plea, was no god.

It was no Titan, no being from their world or even beyond it.

It was something else entirely, something that threatened to crush entire realms simply by existing within them.

A white-hot fury burned within Zeus’ chest at the thought.

He spun away from the hand, turning towards the Father instead, and loosed a blast of chaos from his fingertips that sent the older god staggering back, his wounds bleeding great streams of light across the stone.

The look on the Father’s face as he watched the chaos magic devour the broken pillars and the debris-strewn floor, the sheer look of triumph as he took in the destruction, was the final straw.

Zeus ran the distance between them in one bound and drove a fist into the Father’s face.

The older god’s head snapped sideways with a sound like tearing silk and a great spray of light erupted from his mouth and across the chamber.

Before he could recover Zeus was upon him again, hammering into his ribs with a rain of blows that left the Father gasping and wheezing great clouds of light from his lungs.

Each punch was pure raw chaos, the full power of Zeus’ might pressing down upon the wounded and broken form before him, but the Father did not relent.

The Father’s form cracked and split under the onslaught, ordered beams of light bleeding from his body with every stagger.

Zeus roared in fury, his other hand closing around the Father’s throat.

"You damned fool," he growled, his voice rough with rage as he drove another set of blows into the older god’s ribs, "what is it that you have opened?

What did you call?

What have you done?"

Yet another punch sent rib bones snapping, and another, and another, as the Father writhed and struggled beneath the blows.

"You will tell me!" Zeus demanded.

"You will answer me!"

The Father tried to lift a hand, but Zeus shattered it with a downward strike and sent him sprawling with a heavy uppercut to the gut.

As the older god climbed to his feet, his hands opening to press against Zeus’ chest, the Father’s neck snapped sideways under Zeus’ grip, the chaos magic burning bright as it tore through the man’s throat, and he sent the Father flying, his own momentum carrying him back down onto his knees, sending fresh cracks racing across the chamber floor and through the very foundation of the realms themselves.

Light bled from the cracks, great rivers of it, and as chaos poured from Zeus’ hands it drank deeply of it.

"What have you brough into my world?" Zeus growled, shoving the Father back to his feet, "what is that thing?"

He loomed over the man, eyes burning, his whole body tense as he prepared to strike again.

"What did you release upon us all?" he demanded, his voice a snarl, "what is that thing?

What is it that you have doomed us all to?"

The Father’s head lolled from side to side as he stared up at Zeus through bloodied eyes.

"Something that does not care for your sky," he rasped, "something that does not care for your dead or your petty little wars.

I called upon what waited beyond the walls I built.

You damned the realms for a reason of spite."

Zeus struck him again, again and again, his blows falling upon the same spots, over and over, each one seeking to break the Father, to break him utterly.

"It doomed every realm in this universe!" he growled as he pushed the man back against the gate, pinning him there with a hand to his throat, "for your damned pride!

Tell me what it is!"

The Father’s eyes locked onto his own for a long, lingering moment.

"Something that does not care for your sky," he repeated, his voice rough and strained, "I called what was always waiting just beyond the walls that I built.

If I cannot rule it, nothing will."

Behind them the great hand shifted, its fingers folding tight against the very floor of the chamber as the pressure rolled outward once more.

Cracks snaked along the floor from Zeus’ blows, but those were nothing compared to the sheer force being exerted by the being beyond the gate.

It was enough to send several gods reeling and most of the realms further damaged.

In fact, it was enough to make the very Underworld quiver.

Outside, mountains cracked and crumbled, and entire ranges split down their centers.

Even in the mortal world people saw it and feared it, thinking that the end had truly come.

Athena was the first to react, shouting some frantic command as Poseidon and the others fed their power into the hand, trying desperately to drive it back, to push it out of their realm.

Their attacks landed true and hard, but they struck something that refused to fight back.

Zeus heard none of it.

His attention was fully on the battered form before him, and the words he had yet to say.

He drove the Father back against the gate with one hand, his other lifting and falling in short, sharp jabs.

"Talk!" he demanded, his voice rough and filled with barely restrained rage, "tell me what it is you opened the door to!

Tell me what it is you called down upon us all!"

The Father’s eyes moved to meet his own, his mouth twitching in something of a smile as his broken, bloodied hands gripped Zeus’ wrist.

"It is coming," he said quietly, "it will be here soon enough.

You will see it for yourself."

The ground beneath them shook and quivered as if in agreement.

The massive hand that Zeus had seen moments ago was no longer alone, for behind it and nearly twice its size stretched another giant limb, its fingers splayed impossibly far across the chamber.

As it pressed forward the very light behind it bent and twisted in strange ways, the beam growing wider with every step, and the next wave of pressure sent several gods to their knees and cracked the realms yet again.

Zeus turned his head, his eyes narrowing as he stared at the limb, his mind whirling.

The very presence of it was overwhelming and unfathomable, but he was no stranger to the sheer force of something beyond comprehension.

It was the light that burned from behind it that finally stopped him, and when he turned from the limb and met the Father’s gaze one final time, it was with something akin to understanding.

With finality.

Zeus turned towards the gate, his gaze fixed on the approaching hand, and saw the light pour out from behind it with an almost will of its own.

It flooded the cracks in the gate, widening them impossibly, and stretched far beyond the chamber as cracks raced across the realms.

The true weight of what the Father had opened had only just begun to make itself known.

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