Matters of Blood and Connection

"For us it's a matter of charging the gates
For you it's a matter of blood and connections
So where will you be when you tire of the fun
The escape, the charade, and your time in the sun
I know everyone does their own reinvention
But yours has a taste that's hard to swallow

And what will you tell of your tenure with us?
Will you build yourself up, like the size of your hunt?
If they're anything like what you've been telling us,
Those stories will make true believers
Of the chumps and the fools.

So why do you speak with that accent now?
Everyone knows you're not from the streets."
Dashboard Confessional, Matters of Blood and Connection

After I got off the phone with Nate I decided to pray to my uncle Dionysus. How does one do that? With alcohol, of course. So I found some booze - much less difficult since Gunnar came into my life - and poured one out, calling on my uncle.
He didn't knock either, just showed up in my house like everyone else does, but I just wasn't in the mood to be mad at him. It would've been hard anyway, since he was family and he'd been at my wedding.
"What," he started indignantly as he just showed up behind me, "is that perfectly good vintage doing on the floor?"
"Uh..." I turned, slowly, stalling. Well, crap.
"Oh, congrats, by the way!"
Well, fuck. I guess that saved me the trouble of stumbling over an explanation, at least.
"Thanks," I responded instinctively, "I-... Wait, what? You know??"
"Sweetheart," he cooed in that thick Jersey accent. "All of Olympus knows."
"What??!!"
"Well, yeah, your dad told Zeus and he issued a proclamation and called for a feast and -"
"DAD!!" I yelled at the ceiling. I hope he heard me. No, I didn't wanna talk, I just wanted to yell. I just wanted him to know I was mad.
Dionysus then tried to explain on my dad's behalf that they had to tell Zeus because Hera's apparently got all of Olympus pussy whipped.
Great. Whatever. Being mad wasn't actually going to accomplish anything here, so I just dropped it.
I filled him in on our refugee situation, and how we needed help feeding two hundred people. I could do it with money, I explained, but I'd rather not. I want to help humanity, but I think we're going to be a better help if we can move around on a whim and for right now I need money to do that. He asked why I didn't just put them on welfare. If we're uprooting people, we owe them better. Yeah, the Band got them away from Nazi werewolves and a goblin war, as I understand. But we can't just tell people, "Exodus!" and send them off into the desert. We don't have the power to back that sort of command up, we have no right yet to just expect that sort of faith. We haven't earned it.
So he asked me how long I wanted to feed them, and I asked how much he could do. His response was that he could set them up for life, or he could give them just a single plant. I was hoping for a happy medium. It took me a while to get the words out right, but I eventually got it across that I'm not going to be the type of person, the type of god, who just gives handouts. My people (and it sounds so weird to think about the fact that I will have people) will have to work for it, but if they do work for it, I will see that they are taken care of.
That's how we came up with the idea for the commune. Well, that and the fact that Dionysus figured that one central commune would be better, and easier on his part as far as his own resources and potential fatebinding, than several different farms. Also, somewhere in that conversation he said, "Bingo, bango, bongo." Little creepy.
Then I was giving him my secondhand account of how we even became responsible for the refugees, and I said something about a machine that cut the village off from the outside world. Something about that knocked the Situation right out of his Situation-ness. When he spoke next the accent was all gone. I can't remember exactly how he said it but he said he wanted the machine. The machine sounded like something Nikola Tesla might build.
"Well Tesla probably did build it," I said and I described that letter Nate had told me about. It was addressed to some guy named Albert (probably Einstein) and was signed "Nikola." I mean, I didn't even need Gunnar's amazing detective skills to figure that one out.
Then the deal changed. See, at first Dionysus said we as a Band would have to help him out with any potential complications arising from his support of these people. He also wanted the people to build him a temple or a shrine. He wanted the worshippers for this. There was something else he'd wanted, I can't remember what now. Once I told him about the machine, that was all he wanted. Well, that and the shrine. He still wants the worshippers. Maybe I could toss our names in there too, it'd be nice to get a little bit of recognition for all the work we've been doing.
Anyway, he also explained that Zeus had really high hopes for Nikola. And then it kinda clicked that Tesla must have been one of Zeus' kids. I mean, I've seen those hokey PBS shows that called Tesla "The Master of Lightning." I guess Zeus expected that Tesla would even outshine Hephaestus, before something changed. Now they're looking for Tesla.
So all I have to do is go to Wolfsheim, get the machine without pissing off or killing the Ragnarok wolves (especially since I'm about to go talk to their aunt) , pray to Dionysus and then the villagers are set. Piece of cake, I guess.
Um, Dionysus did tell me that someone actually had to drink the alcohol, next time. So I guess I should call Gunnar and see how Mexico is going.