Magdalena, Part Two

I got to spend like, six hours at Jack's.
I did tell Jack the short, kid-friendly version about why I looked like the hell I'd been through, about how Gunnar and I were wandering the wastes of Duat. I told the story without swearing at all. I think Gunnar would be dismayed. And glad I wasn't teaching our sons how to swear like sailors.
When the story was over, I was kinda done talking. I just wanted to play with my sons. I chased them, they chased me, and then they showed me how to spin around in circles like a helicopter until I fell over.
It started as a lesson of, "Mommy, Mommy, watch! This is how Uncle Jack showed us how to punch things."
And then Alex told me about how yesterday he fed Waffles a worm. But I had to promise not to tell Uncle Jack, because Uncle Jack says that Waffles isn't supposed to eat worms.

We were on the 97th "Mommy, look what I can do!" when I had to go.
"I love you, babies, Daddy needs me," I kissed them both quickly and nodded at Jack before I let myself be pulled to wherever Gunnar was.

I was in midstep, like somehow actually running would get me faster to... wherever it was. I was in the corner of a room, and I had a hand reached out for Gunnar, and I saw a guy who looked very much like a mummy with his hand wrist deep in my husband's face. It was nowhere I'd been before, which didn't really narrow it down. It was a large chamber, like a clay burial chamber. Gunnar was there, and the guy with his hand in Gunnar's face, and a woman who didn't even deign to acknowledge my arrival which was totally okay with me.
The room was torchlit and even though it was large there wasn't really room for me to be running around, and it looked like I might be interrupting something really fucking important. So I put my hands behind my back, stood very still and tried to be very quiet.
I mean, Gunnar didn't look hurt.
He didn't look scared.
Yeah, his heart was beating a little fast, but that was probably because some guy - who it turns out was the Lord Osiris - had a hand in Gunnar's brain.

I slowly withdrew my outstretched hand and placed it firmly over my mouth, and put my other hand on top of that, because the last thing I needed was to be the one who ruined a god's concentration and fucked this up.
Osiris took his hand out of Gunnar's face, pulling something bright and silvery out of Gunnar's head which he then shoved into the body on an altar. The body had been wrapped up like a mummy, except that the chest and abdominal cavities were laid open.
Gunnar blinked a few times before he saw me, then we ended up standing next to one another in the halls of the palace of Osiris, watching a god bring the dead back to life.

Osiris called out for Marie's ghost and suddenly she was there in the room, was floating over her body asking where she was and what was happening and hey what was that below her. Then Osiris shoved her into her body, which promptly began screaming about being shot in the fucking face.
Isis made her sleep and Osiris began rooting around in canopic jars, putting all of the pieces to Humpty Dumpty back together. Isis is a backseat practitioner, it seems. She was staring over his shoulder telling him to sew the spleen here, and make sure the liver went there, and to connect those two things, and to attach the soul... I don't know where.
I mean, I could see the soul, and I could see the body and I still had no clue what the fuck was going on and yeah it was fascinating from both a metaphysical and biological point of view, I still found it a little hard to really care what was happening more than the fact that it was happening.

Osiris and Isis told Gunnar to return to his room, that they would need time to prepare Marie for questioning and that, at some point, Gunnar was going to have to explain what had happened in the market. I made a face like I, too, would very much like to know what had happened in the market. He probably noticed.

The door to the chamber was unsealed, and we were let out.

And then it was done. We had done it, Gunnar and I. We have swum the depths of Guinnee, trudged the snows of Niflheim, drank from the Well of Mnemosyne, walked the wastes of Duat, and now we are done. Now we can rest.
We have seen the dead raised back to life, and whatever else any asshole has to say about us, that's impressive.

"Blisters on my feet, a wooden rosary
I felt them in my pocket as I ran
A bullet in the night
A Federales' light
San Francisco, do you understand?

Tell him that I made the journey
And tell him that my heart is true
I’d like his blessing of forgiveness before the angels send it through

And I will know that I am clean now
And I will dance and the band will play
In the old out to cantina
Cause we’ll runneth over the ancient clay..."
Brandon Flowers, Magdalena

Earmuffs

I appeared in the boondocks of Mexico to see my sons sailing backwards through the air, probably about to crack their skulls open on the ground.
Jack wasn't too far away, his arms flung out behind him in a post-throw stance. It wasn't hard to figure out what had sent Alexander and Erik airborne.
Rushing towards Jack, where my sons had been before Jack interposed himself, was a very upset lindwurm.

I caught my sons and held them, one on each hip, clutching them to me and telling them it would be alright while Jack manhandled the lindwurm. Raising mine and Gunnar's sons certainly hasn't softened him any; he's every bit as strong as I remember him being. He didn't have any trouble with the scaly fucker, and I got the chance to hug my sons while I waited for him to finish.

It didn't take long. In less than a minute, Jack knelt in front of the thing, making sure it was dead, then stood up and made a face when he saw me.
I put the boys down and marched up to Jack, more than a little pissed.
"What the fuck, Jack?! What happened here?"
He explained that he and the boys were going to dig a well and that the lindwurm came up through the ground and was about to attack my sons and Jack just threw them back to get them away from the serpent. But a cracked skull will kill a nine-year-old as surely as the weight of a 50-foot lamprey.
"Where did you come from?" Jack asked when he was done with his explanation. "You look like shit."
I did look like shit. Half of my clothing was falling off of me, my skin was black with the dust of Duat, I hadn't slept in like, 39 days, and my lips were hella-chapped.
"Yeah," I smiled a little. "I feel like shit."
I heard one of my sons giggle a little, and Jack and I turned back to the boys at pretty much the same time.
"Boys, earmuffs!" We shouted simultaneously.

Magdalena, Part One

"Please don't tell me I can't make it
It ain't gonna do me any good
And please don't offer me your modern methods
I'm fixing to carve this out of wood

From Nogales to Magdalena
There are 60 miles of sacred road
And the promises made to those who venture
San Francisco will lift your load

In the land of old Sonora
A shallow river valley cries
The summer left her without forgiveness
It's mirrored in her children's eyes
Prodigal sons and wayward daughters
Carry mandas that they might
Be delivered from the depths of darkness
And born again by candlelight..."
Brandon Flowers, Magdalena

Harlan had his dragon problem handled, which was good, because I got that familiar feeling that was the most familiar of all the familiar feelings.
Gunnar was in trouble.
I said ‘bye to Harlan and then was a little surprised when I appeared in the desert of Egypt with a Gunnar falling on top of me.
I caught him. Kinda

.
Well, I broke his fall without breaking him, and that was good because he was really focused on breaking the fall of the late Marie Glapion, and wouldn’t that have been a bitch to drag her body all this way and then break it on the fall off the back of a dragon.

We were heading for a place I wouldn’t know until later was called the Manu Passage. Amanda had picked it out and told us where to go. So we went.
We were moving towards a cave entrance, and that’s where things started going wrong, you know, almost as soon as they possibly could have.

Ixion showed up and started attacking us. Well, he started attacking Gunnar. And he wasn’t the real Ixion, he was one of those simulacra. They have two… um, auras or something. They don’t look like a normal person.
I tried hitting it, and I missed. I don’t usually miss, so this was noteworthy. I did what I could to keep Gunnar safe, I don’t really know how to describe it. It’s not like I lent him some of my strength because I didn’t get any weaker. I just wanted him to be stronger, and he was.

He went in to check out the cave, and to stop getting hit by Ixion. Then Ixion stopped moving. I put an index finger to his chest and pushed him over into the sand. When he still didn’t move I ran in after Gunnar.
I think Gunnar was surprised I didn’t just hack it to pieces. Maybe I was a little bit, too, but I’m sure I made the right call.

Ixion candy-coating or not, there was still another, different person inside that shell. Killing Ixion’s simulacrum, even if I could do it, would not just kill one person. It would kill two more. It would kill whoever was stuck inside it now, because I wasn’t going to be able to take care of that person and I couldn’t see them to safety and I couldn’t call in the cavalry and let them get blown up. And then it would kill whomever Ixion decided to put into it next, because if I were an evil asshole like the Burning Wheel Man, and some jerkface trying to save the world broke one of my toys, I would just make myself another.
And another. If I were Ixion, I would probably look at people as disposable power sources. I don’t want that much blood on my hands, especially if it isn’t really even Ixion’s.
This whole trip was about getting the blood off of my hands.

Plus, Gunnar told me he smelled gunpowder in the walls of this cave, and I started feeling more and more like just getting Gunnar out of there. Fire I can handle, explosions are okay, but I don’t know how long it would take me to remedy us being buried alive. I mean, we can’t hold our breath forever.
So I hurried in, past the dying fire in the center of the cave and started reading the hieroglyphs at the back of the cave. There were pillars to either side, and a statue of some sort. The hieroglyphs didn’t tell me a whole lot, just that this was the home of a Titan, which was peachy, and then I remembered that I was carrying the manual to this shit.
I started speed-reading Amanda’s scroll and figured out how to open up the portal. Gunnar ran in ahead of me, saying something about how he hoped I was behind him, and I stuck around just long enough to be able to see the statue start moving, and Ixion step into the cave and reach an arm out in my direction, and the fire flared to an angry, crackling life, and then things started to explode.

We weren’t dead. We weren’t really even hurt. We had walked into almost complete darkness, though. I am starting to like the dark less and less, so I started glowing. Once I did I felt Gunnar grab my wrist. He asked me what in here would make the sound of shifting sand.
My inspired guess what that something was moving in the sand.
I don’t know if that was a good guess, or what he wanted to hear, or just a stupid guess, but he started running, holding me by the wrist, and I was just doing my best to keep up.
I don’t know what he was running from, or what direction he was even taking us in. He heard something he didn’t like and he didn’t want to stop for it. 

 

After we'd been running like, a minute, I heard something speak to us, sort of in a “Halt, who goes there?” type of way.
I gave the inquirer my name, and when Gunnar asked if we should stop I said yeah. We stopped, and into the edge of the light I was giving off stepped a woman with a snake’s head and another guy, both who carried Sticks of Being Really Important. Was or something, ruling class gear, if you believe in that sort of thing. The ruling class, not sticks. I believe in sticks.

The chick looked at the both of us in an expression I can’t describe because I was too busy being creeped out by staring at a snakelady. 

“Why are you here?” She asked.
“Um, I’m here to see a god about a resurrection.”
“You are… not dead,” she observed most observantly.
“Uh, no.” I agreed.

Then she seemed to notice the corpse Gunnar had slung over his shoulders, and noticed that Gunnar wasn’t saying much, and I introduced him and we all agreed to speak Greek since Gunnar hadn’t mastered Ancient Egyptian yet and Snake-Lady-Called-Kebauet said she would take us to the Hall of Two Truths and the Scales to talk to Ma'at where something magical was going to happen but it ended up that Kebauet was only surprised that we didn’t get our hearts ripped out and eaten and our souls destroyed.
Which I guess is magical enough, when you think about it.

Ma'at is a spawn of the Titans, it helps to know, and she was kinda scary and didn’t seem all that happy at being called away from wherever she was and whatever she was doing. And it was a really good trick that she was able to be scary, I mean... We never actually saw her. She was just this presence that felt like it was a hair away from tearing our faces off.
But she didn’t try to kill us and she wasn't technically a titan, which is what I pointed out to Gunnar when we were trying to decide whether to deal with her at all. I mean, at the beginning our policy was "Fuck titans." Not necessarily "Fuck titans and all of their descendents." That would require an inordinate amount of fucking, since just about anything can trace lineage back to the titans if it tries hard enough.

So, yeah. Kebauet was all kinds of impressed that Ma'at didn't try to eat us right away. Not sure if there's anything special going on there, or if we are just that awesome, or just that inconsequential. It's probably the last one, we just weren't worth the time.
Ma'at basically asked us if we were innocent of the crimes against heaven. What are the crimes against heaven?

Well, if you're Egyptian and you're dead and you're a good person, you're supposed to be able to stand up in front of Ma'at and declare the following:

I have done no evil against any man.
I have never caused my kinsfolk to be put to death.
I have not caused false witnesses to speak in the Hall of Justice.
I have not done that which is hated by the gods.
I am not a worker of wickedness.
I have never oppressed a servant with too much work.
I have not caused men to hunger nor to weep.
I have not been devoid of good works, nor have I acted weakly or with meanness.I am not a murderer.
I have not conspired to have another put to death.
I have not plotted to make another grieve.
I have not taken away temple offerings.
I have not stinted the food offered to the gods.
I have not despoiled the dead.
I have never committed adultery.
I have not failed to keep myself pure as a priest.
I have not lessened the corn measure.
I have not shortened the hand measure.
I have not tampered with the balance.
I have not deprived children of milk.
I have not stolen cattle from the meadows.
I have not snared the birds consecrated to the gods.
I have not taken fish from holy lakes.
I have not prevented (Nile) water from running (in channels).
I have not turned aside the water.
I have not stolen water from a channel.
I have not put out the fire when it should burn.
I have never kept from the Nine Gods what was their due.
I have not prevented the temple cattle from grazing on my land.
I have not obstructed a god (his image) when he came forth (in a festival procession).

I um... I count three problems with that list.
One, yeah, I was a murderer. Even if what I did to Marie wasn't murder, I'd murdered Caleb and we'd killed people at the Order.
I have conspired to put Ixion and Kane to death. It just hasn't come to fruition yet.
I have plotted to make Kane and Ixion grieve, too.
So, yeah. I was not worthy.

With Ma'at gone, Kebauet offered to give us the run down on what was going to happen. I was about to have my sins purified. Translation: I wasn't worthy of automatic entrance into Sekhet Hetepet, and life was about to start sucking like a ten dollar hooker. Not pleasantly, and with no promise of anything resembling a happy ending.

So, there are twelve gates in Duat and each one is supposed to restore something that was taken from the traveler upon entrance into the desert. The entrance was the first gate, and that was the one that would take everything from us. It was called the Hall of Two Truths, which I don't think I cared about previously. Anubis used to live here, but then shit hit the fan and Kebauet took over. I guess part of the job of judging the dead has gotten easier, since there aren't all that many dead traipsing into the Desert these days.

How did Kebauet land such a posh job? She's Anubis' daughter, and he's apparently not happy with her since she'd let ghosts into the Halls and offered them refuge from the wastes outside.
See, the wastes are a massive proving ground. Just by surviving them you prove you are worthy of surviving them, and you get to keep surviving them and proving that you are worthy of surviving them. If you were awesome enough in life you could have your heart weighed by Ma'at. Weighed against... something. A duck, maybe.
This is where the hearts got measured, and if the heart measured up to Ma'at's standards, then they got to skip some of the noise and go straight to Sekhet Hetepet. If not, they were given to the wastes, where maybe they’d make the trip on foot to the palace of the gods, or maybe they’d go crazy, or maybe they’d get eaten, or maybe they’d give up and just stay at one of the gates where there was less crazy and less face-eating.

Anyone who stepped into the desert would be stripped of memories and possessions. Everything I had bothered to acquire would be ruined, but as we got farther through the wasteland things would get better for us. Or at least less sucky.

And when she got to explaining this part, Kebauet held up to Gunnar and I each one of those colorful little memory fish, telling us not to worry and that they’d be waiting for us when we got to the right gate. I had to just trust that everything would happen as it was supposed to, and that everything would be alright. It had to be, I had dragged Gunnar all over creation and I'd feel like shit to just turn around and give up now.
So Kebauet told us what we could expect from each gate.

Making it to the second gate would give us warmth. Until then we would be cold down to our bones.
Making it to the third gate would let us have water again. Until then we would be thirsty. The wastes would ruin all potable substances we had brought with us. At every gate to come we would also find warmth, as well as all of the amenities we had earned by surviving the trip to and through gates previous.
Making it to the fourth gate gave us food. We would find trees whose fruits were free of the black grit of the desert that ruined everything else.
Making it to the fifth gate would let us rest. Until we got there, the wailing of the shades in the wastes would keep us awake and uneasy.
Making it to the sixth gate would give us light. Until then we would travel in near-darkness.
Making it to the seventh gate would give us clothes. Until then we would be naked.
Making it to the eighth gate would let us bathe. Until then we would be filthy.
Making it to the ninth gate would let us remember one another. Until then we would simply be travelers to one another.
Making it to the tenth gate would let us love one another. Until then we know each others' face, but we would not know how to laugh, sing, dance, celebrate or love.
Making it to the eleventh gate would give us the upgraded versions of everything that came before. There would be meat instead of just fruit. The water would be clean. The clothes would be fine. The songs would be beautiful. From here we would be able to see the palace of Sekhet Hetepet.
Making it to Sekhet Hetepet would prove that we were worthy of the favor of the gods. I hoped. At least then Lord Osiris and Lady Isis might actually listen to our request that they help us reassemble the sundered bits of Marie. And I was getting myself in the habit now of referring to them as Lord and Lady, because good manners go a long way.

I called Marie’s ghost to us, which took a lot more out of me than it did the first time, and we got ready to not be ready. I consulted Sibyl and saw a raging hippopotamus, something shadowy that I was talking to, Gunnar tilting his head in a direction opposite the city and saying he heard voices.
“I don’t want a hippopotamus for Christmas,” I grumbled as I came out of the trance. Gunnar didn't get the joke.
Then we set into the wastes, and I didn't know where Gunnar or Marie went. I had some people traveling with me, though. A girl whose memory was worse than mine and a guy who was wearing sunglasses and what at least started out as a snakeskin-looking cloak. The desert kind of tore that up as we passed through though, and by the time I got to the gate with the clothing, I really needed it.
I didn't see Gunnar anymore, though. Or Marie. He had to be taking care of her, and I would find him later, right?
I mentioned that my husband was gone, and the guy with me said his wife was gone too, but that he was sure he'd find her.
He postulated that our spouses were probably just hanging out together up ahead, “but not like that,” he assured me.
“Good, cuz I’d kick his ass,” I mumbled.

I did find a hippopotamus. It was hurt and it was hungry. It was covered in sores and it looked so awful, from the inside and out. I did what I could to help it and it calmed down, but it’s still going to die. It’s been poisoned, and the poison has made it blind. The blindness, as far as I can figure, is a result of degenerative nerve damage caused by prolonged exposure to the poisons it had ingested. It was probably poisoned by the river made entirely of snakes.
It didn’t used to be a river of snakes. And, the sixth, seventh and eighth gates didn’t used to be bisected by a massive chunk of Tartarus. Duat used to be a different place, a nicer place, Kebauet told us.
You know, I don’t think it’s right to say that Duat used to be nicer. At least, not in the sense that implies it was ever kinder.

But as was promised, things got both easier and harder the further in we got. The howling of the ghosts and the winds increased, as did the rewards awaiting us at each gate.
At the fifth gate there was less screaming. We were able to relax a little, though none of us slept. I wasn't tired, neither were the guy or girl with me.
At the sixth gate I saw something sitting on top of the piece of Tartarus which was embedded in the world. It was lithe and inky and when it spoke its voice was all sibilant. I told the guy I needed to go talk to it, because I'd seen myself talk to it. He mentioned that his wife had probably talked to it too. It said that its “friend” was bringing the darkness, or something like that. It was referring to Mikaboshi. It asked us to hang out, telling us that it had made things safe here, that all the ghosts had gone away. It made me nervous, and I didn't stick around long.
At the seventh gate there was clothing, rough linen stuff, but it was a hell of a lot better than the barely-extant rags I'd been clutching about me since I'd stepped into the desert. I really didn't want to be running around naked in front of strangers, anyway. It was not even comforting that they were nearly naked now, too.
At the eighth gate we all bathed. I made a huge deal about demanding that the guy turn around while the girl and I got cleaned up. I had to ask her to help me wash the grit and sand from that bit on my back behind my shoulder blades.
At the ninth gate I looked at the guy traveling next to me and I finally knew his face. I knew what shade of blue his eyes were behind his sunglasses, I knew the curve of his shoulders under the linen clothes and I knew the shade of his hair and the face he made when he was deep in though. I recognized him, and I was glad he was with me.
At the tenth gate I remembered him. How much I loved him. I felt my breath catch when I looked at him, the guy who didn't seem to mind that I'd forgotten our wedding or what a big deal I made that he turn around while Marie scrubbed my back. That's not a story I'm ever going to tell the bird. He'll never fucking shut up about it.

Halfway to the eleventh gate I started feeling tired. We had been here in Duat for more than a month, now. My shields kept getting battered down by the desert winds. The sandstorms just cut right through it, and the last gate was farther than I could see and then, because not quite enough shit had yet hit the fan, I suddenly knew that my sons were in trouble.
I just stopped talking and I stopped walking and I stared at Gunnar and I knew my eyes were wide with all sorts of panic.
When I told him, he wanted to know why the hell I was waiting to go to our sons.
He asked me if I trusted him to finish this.
I hesitated, but not because I didn't trust him. I hesitated because sometimes I'm an idiot and sometimes I'm stubborn but above all, I trust Gunnar. I trusted him to have my back in Guinnee, I trusted him when I encouraged him to take Tesla's spindle, and yes, I trusted him to finish this.
I cannot think of a single moment when I doubted Gunnar. If I did, I couldn't have married him, and I certainly wouldn't have had any kids with him. I trusted him, and our babies were in trouble, and I had to go.
I just didn't wanna leave him to clean up my mess. If he took Marie to Osiris and Isis without me, how would that look? He didn't shoot Marie. He's just the guy who gave me a place to crash in Vegas. I wanted to be there at the end to see this thing through, but... But our babies were in trouble.
Our babies were in trouble, and I was suddenly grateful that Gunnar had put his head in the Well and had to come with me to do this. If I'd been alone now, I would have to leave Marie here and all would probably be lost.

I trusted him to finish this, which meant I trusted him to do it with or without me. I wasn't so sure that I trusted Jack to protect my sons as well as I could. And I don't even need Sybil to tell you that if I didn't go, and something did happen to the boys, Gunnar and I were going to have problems the likes of which would make Hephaestus and Aphrodite look like domestic bliss.
So I went to our babies and left Gunnar in the desert.

Goodbye Blue Sky

"Did you ever wonder why we had to run for shelter
When the promise of a brave new world
Unfurled beneath the clear blue sky?"
Pink Floyd, Goodbye Blue Sky
Not too far from us, a dragon did a nosedive out of the sky, bringing with it a plane. It roared something I didn't understand because I don't fucking speak dragon, then it ripped into the plane like a can of sardines. Dead bodies poured out. It was going to be that kind of a day.

The dragon mostly talked to Harlan, who apparently understands everything.
I wasn’t really paying attention to that, I was hanging around in case it needed to be hit. It ended up not needing to be hit, which was both relieving and disappointing. It told Harlan what the deal was.
The deal was that the dragons were going to be coming back. Nine of them were already awake, and hungry and they all had weird names and were scattered all over the globe. One in Canada, one in Japan, one in Chile, one in Brazil (I think), one in England, one in New York, one in the Philippines, and (this is the best one) one in space.
Yeah. Space.

They were supposedly princes, and they were hungry, and they were insulted because apparently nobody was there with juice and cookies when the dragons woke up from their naps.
Also, the humans were supposed to have stayed out of the air. Oops.

So, the rest of the band needed to figure out who was going to go talk to which dragon and when, so that Harlan’s new friend (I’m going to call him Banana Splits) could fly around the earth three times at Mach 86 billion and take everyone to talk to their dragons.

Anyway, that was kind of not my problem. As the treaty had been arranged with humans previously, the dragons were not supposed to eat the humans and thus were not a threat to the people I have decided to protect.
The terms of the treaty also state pretty clearly that we divine types are supposed to keep our nose out of the humans’ business. I’m okay with hanging out in the background, and rushing in if they need us. But I’m not diplomatic, and I’m not patient, and I don’t like dragons. My hands are tied because of this stupid treaty, and those laws of the divine (which I might have to decide are more like guidelines). If the dragons turned on the humans and started eating people en masse, like I think they might but hope they don’t, then it will be my problem. But not until then. So I was going to deal with the shit that was my problem, and I set about doing what I told Gunnar I was going to do. I kept having to go back to him for advice and backup and just so I didn’t pull my hair out, though. I remember thinking, "Fuck, I don’t know how I’m going to handle navigating an underworld all on my own.
After Banana Splits showed up and spelled out the urgent need for diplomacy was when I’d asked Gunnar for advice and done my own awkward, rambling version of a long goodbye. Then I talked to Azzeza to make sure she actually wanted to go to Duat. She does. She’s the kind of kid that won’t back down once she’s said she’s going to do something. I like that about her. And she’s only kind of scared about the fact that the underworld might be plunged into darkness. So I told her to start getting ready to go, that I just needed to learn Ancient Egyptian so that I could actually talk to the people in the underworld and maybe be able to keep her safe a little bit.
Then I went and talked to Amanda to tell her to get ready, and to talk her into just letting me run off with her relic and convince her to stay where it was safe so that I only had to worry about protecting the soul of one child from damnation and destruction. I wasn’t really even completely sure I could keep me safe.
She seemed receptive to the idea of letting me borrow the scroll, but said she needed something that would let her cast spells. That’s how she keeps a lot of the kids safe.
I told her I would figure something out. I’m not going to be the reason she couldn’t protect the rest of the kids.

Then I went and talked to Kas, who wanted to go with me. But she also wanted to help with the dragons and couldn't do that and help me at the same time, and Kas was Azzeza's half-sister. I know if it was Susan... I would want to go, too. So I understood her feeling conflicted and I wouldn’t have been surprised if she were a little mad at me for putting her between an underworld and a dragon place.
Then Kas had the best idea ever and I felt like an idiot for not having thought of it myself. I didn’t have to take Azzeza now. I could just go to get Marie dealt with, and then I could come back to Midgar, planning on making another trip to Duat later. And when I went back to Duat I would know what to expect, and I would probably be stronger and maybe by then we’d have the darkness dealt with so I wouldn’t have to worry about leaving a baby in a world gone dark.
Kas is a genius, and she is my favorite cat lady.

So I talked to Gunnar again, letting him know that I wasn’t taking Azzeza after all and that I just needed to find something that would let Amanda cast spells and she’d be willing to trade relics with me.
Gunnar then mentioned that he just happened to have a dagger that would do just that. Marduk's dagger, the dagger the dead guy called “First Son” had given us, was a conduit to magic.
It was looking more and more like maybe I was actually supposed to go to Duat, things were starting to come together.

So then I told Amanda that I had a plan, and she didn’t have to come and us leaving wouldn't leave her without a relic, and we sat down and she started teaching me Ancient Egyptian. I started reading the scroll, hearing her translate it for me, describing how Isis gathered the pieces of her beloved Osiris and rejoined them and made her lover whole.
And that’s when I began singing. It was a song that began with equal measures hysterical laughter and prolonged expletive.
A little ditty that went something like: “Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuckfuckfuckfuckfuck. Gods damn it.” When I stopped screaming I covered my face with my hands, then stood up straight and proper, looking around for Super Gunnar.
“Gunnar,” I called. “We need to talk.”
He was there with an unexpected amount of haste. “Good gods, you’ve scared the shit out of me. What is it?”
“Sorry, I’m really, really sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you. But Gunnar, Gunnar, Gunnar, Gunnar, Gunnar.” I told myself that saying his name helped me think and only made me sound a little crazy. Deep breath, Laurel. You are capable of having an intelligent conversation where you don’t ramble or swear at all. Well, much.
“Okay. So, I’m reading this scroll. And it’s the real-fucking-life account of how Osiris was brought back from the dead. All of the steps Isis took to put Humpty-Fucking-Dumpty back together. It’s a motherfucking how-to guide for bringing back dead people.” I was frustrated and terrified all at once. I knew that the answer was going to be in Duat. I knew I could figure out how to get Marie back. It just wasn't how I wanted it.
I wanted to do it myself, to finish cleaning up my own mess because I was the only one who'd pulled the trigger and Gunnar shouldn't have to keep putting himself in harm's way because I got trigger-happy one night.
I felt a little sick when I looked at him. I was trying so hard to just let him go, to do his own thing, and not have to follow me around. But that apparently wasn't going to happen. “And, um… of course, there’s a catch. All of Marie’s pieces have to go to Duat for it to be done this way.”
“What!?” He'd already grasped the inconvenience of the situation, and indicated as much with an eloquence which rivaled mine. “Gu- wu- fuck.”
I nodded solemnly. “Yeah. But this is it. This is the spell. This is how I do it. Except...” I had to point out the obvious, and the painful, and the true. “You’ve got her memories.”
He put his head in his hands for a second, then raised it back up and just said, “Fuck.” Then he just looked off at Banana Splits, and repeated himself. “Fuck.”
He looked back at me. He looked uncertain. “Do you think I could do it even if I tried? I’m not the sturdiest one around. And on top of that… how are you supposed to get her body and ghost there?” Yeah. He'd gotten it right. Fuck. I felt like I was going to burst into tears. I wanted Marie back, I wanted Erzulie happy, I wanted my sons in the clear, I wanted the intel on Kane. But not like this. Not if it meant getting Gunnar hurt, not if it meant hurting Gunnar.
I swallowed hard and thought even harder before I spoke. “If you don’t want to do it, or if you think the dragons are more pressing right now, then I won’t ask you to. I mean… fuck, you’ve already done so much to help me clean this whole mess up. I can find another way,” I stared hard at him, “if I have to.”
There had to be another way. It might be harder, and it would probably be more painful for me, but I looked at Gunnar and thought about how much had been taken from him because of me. In Guinnee we’d lost Sara. In Niflheim he’d lost… I don’t know what to call it. His bravado was gone; that place changed him. In Hades he’d lost parts of his memories. None of it would have happened if I had just kept my temper in check with Marie, and if I could keep Gunnar from getting any more messed up then any pain would be worth it.
“And no, you’re not the sturdiest,” I continued, because I’m not in the habit of fucking lying to my husband. It takes a bit more effort to keep him safe and well than it does to protect Nate, and Gunnar isn’t really any more reckless than Nate is. Not anymore. So the logical and obvious conclusion is that both spirits are willing but one's flesh is weaker.
“But neither is Amanda and somehow she thinks she’d be okay,” I pointed out. “If there’s no way around her going,” I added, mostly and hopefully referring to the hypothetical future in which I would be stronger and have something like a clue of what to expect when I get there, “I’ll protect her, just like I’d protect Kas and if you decide to come, I will protect you, too.” I made a serious face because it was a serious promise, and it was one I was sure I could keep. Then I fidgeted because I was nervous and a little scared. I was scared he would say he couldn’t go, and more scared that he would and that I’d be all wrong about being sure I could keep him safe. “And for getting Marie’s body there… I’ll fucking carry it. Hell, I’ll carry the whole godsdamned caravan if I have to. And for Marie’s ghost, I dunno. I figured I’d grab her by the hand or something. Find a ghost-leash or something. Or maybe I could summon her to me when I get to where I need to be.” I'd done that last bit before, which was why her soul was in Greece.
“Right, that might work. And really, now that I know that Amanda doesn’t have to come, I really don’t think we should let her. I think it’s well within our power to stop her from sneaking along with us, and I’d feel irresponsible not doing so. If it’s really as dangerous as we think, she wouldn’t stand a chance. I mean, if it comes down to it… we run an awful lot faster than she does.” I couldn't help but laugh at the mental image of demigods running away from a little thing like Amanda.
“True. You know, she may never forgive us… But I guess that’s good practice at being a mom, and probably means I’m doing it right.” I paused for a second. I wasn't sure either answer would make me happy, but I'd feel like a jerk for not making sure this choice had been his. “So, I’m giving you an out here. If you aren’t sure I can keep us all safe, and I mean absolutely sure, I’m not asking you to go. And if you feel like you’re needed somewhere else, not necessarily with the dragons but maybe investigating the darkness on this side, I’m not asking you to go. I’ll find another way if you are at all uncomfortable with this plan.” Just like he wasn't going to stand in the way when I felt like I had to go do something, I wouldn't stand in his way either. If he feels like there's something else that's more important, I can't hold it against him. “But I remember what it’s like to have Marie’s dreams and thoughts in my head from that week of nightmares courtesy of the Furies. I’m pretty sure I know why you came up barfing, and I figure the sooner I can get that bullshit out of your head, the better.”
Gunnar smiled and I felt my stomach unknot. I knew I'd been nervous and frustrated, but until I relaxed I didn't realize how tense I had been. Then Gunnar looked thoughtful for a minute. “You know, I’m an idiot. I’ll be going through those memories for the important stuff while we’re at it, so we don’t have to go through the trouble of interrogation or even just the waiting necessary for her to tell us what she knows once we put her back together. I mean, I remember it as perfectly as she will, and it’s been a while now since I’ve realized that I can pretty effectively think, talk, and chew bubble gum at the same time, so it shouldn’t be any problem.” I wasn't sure it would work that way, I mean... I couldn't go through his memories that way, but we could talk about that later. He had a moment where he just stood there, looking like he was going to say more any second, and I didn't want to interrupt... whatever it was. But then he just shook his head, apparently remembering that he was still talking to me. “Oh, but right. Look, I know you’re worried about being at fault for people getting hurt when they were depending upon your for protection, but if you were going to be able to protect Amanda, then I’m sure you’ll be able to protect me - at least from everything other than myself, and probably that too.”
I had to at least smirk at that. Hell, I've been protecting Gunnar from himself since he declared that encouraging a mythical serpent to eat him was a “tactical combat maneuver.” It's not, for the record. It's stupid.
“Besides,” he continued, “you talk about finding another way, but let's be honest, we both know there isn’t one.”
He was wrong on that. I was sure there was another one. Isis isn't the only person ever to have raised someone from the dead. This just seemed like the least painful way to get it done. Maybe I looked like I was going to argue, because he kept on, “And if there is, it’ll probably be months and months before we figure out what it is.” Okay, yeah. On that much he was absolutely right. And we didn't really have that kind of time. We never really had, I just made time because I got pregnant with our sons. “We’ll make it work,” He assured me. “We’re good together like that.” And like that, he had me smiling and relaxed again, because I could not argue with him. We were good together, and I was pretty sure we could handle damn near anything together.
It’s so fucking cheesy, but I know he makes me better and stronger. I hugged him and kissed him. “We are, aren’t we?”
Yeah. I had just let my husband talk me into putting his life, and maybe his soul since we were going to an underworld, on the line. And all he really had to do was smile at me. But he knew what he could handle, and seems to have a good grasp on what I can handle, and I trusted him to tell me if I was being stupid. I seem to remember that being part of the agreement before we got married, that I would let him talk me out of doing stupid shit and vice versa. So I wasn’t nervous anymore about going to Duat. I was relieved that he was coming with me, like this was the way it was supposed to be.
I didn't want to handle this solo, to do all of the thinking on my own. That should be his gig, the thinking. He can be the brains of this operation, and I will happily stand around and look distractingly good and occasionally chop things in half. This arrangement works for me.
“I guess this is one of those proddings from Fate about how we shouldn’t split up because we’re too awesome together,” I grinned. For a long time I’d been thinking about how different this all would have to have been if he weren’t with me. I mean, if he hadn’t lost his youth to Kairos we wouldn’t have gone to the Garden of the Hesperides and we wouldn’t have had the Golden Apples to give to Hades and Hades wouldn’t have let us near the Well, and Gunnar wouldn’t have gotten Marie’s memories and had to go with me to Duat and… And I’m not sure yet why he’s supposed to go but I’m sure in a decade or so it will come to me why it had to be him and it had to be now. It all happens for a reason, I just don't understand the reason right away.
“Plus,” I smiled gently, “this is a good way to make sure that we didn’t lose Sara for no good reason.”
“Who?”
And then my smile was gone. Fuck. Titans. “Sara. Daughter of Athena,” I said softly, hoping for some sign of recognition. For Gunnar's sake, I didn't want him to have forgotten this, too. “You watched her die, and you freaked when Hades sent her as one of the two souls we traded for Marie, and you freaked even more when the giganto-snake raided Bikini Bottoms and we lost her. You drank. A lot. More than a lot. I wanted to remove your liver so I could grant it asylum. Okay, that’s an exaggeration, but still.” And the titans seem to have said, weeeeell, fuck what you want. He'd forgotten.
His expression sobered more than a little. All the playfulness was gone and he scrunched up his face trying very hard to remember. I don't think I've ever seen that expression on him before, him actually having to try to remember anything, and it looks fucking weird. “Sara… Sara… I… I remember being upset… and the drinking…” He made another face and shook his head. “We lost her though? That’s pretty uncool.”
Gunnar Esparza, also a master of the understatement.
“Yeah,” I nodded slowly. I was searching my own memory, having to put everything together from context and references. Things were… fuzzy. “I don’t remember exactly what happened… some dredging of souls, and we’d thought she would have been okay in the Baron’s care, that she’d be better off than if she stayed with Hades but there was a fight and… I don’t think it went well, I remember being fucking terrified,” but I couldn't remember anymore what I had been scared about. I can't remember anything about the fight except for fear, and sadness, and that heavy feeling in my chest that we had failed. “And before that I remember you telling me on Agwe’s boat about how a shinobi cut her in half and then back at the house you felt like a failure, which was stupid, but… yeah.”
He seemed to remember that conversation pretty well, so hopefully he didn't think I was telling him it was stupid to feel bad about Sara. It was the feeling responsible part that was stupid. It’s not Gunnar’s fault that Kane’s a giant phallus. It’s not Gunnar’s fault that Sara was bad at not getting cut in half by shinobi. And Gunnar didn’t stab her and it’s not like he was bound by blood, honor or oath to be her guardian or anything. So he shouldn’t feel responsible and he didn’t fail her. Of course, I didn’t say that, and I couldn't think of anything else to say and he'd said it pretty well already. “Really fucking uncool,” I repeated after him.
Having had my explanation, he seemed to agree with my assessment of the situation. “Well… yeah. I mean, just because I don’t remember doesn’t mean that my actions can’t vindicate the loss. So yeah, among other things, it will mean she wasn’t lost for nothing.” I’d have preferred if she hadn’t been lost at all, honestly. Not because I knew her – cuz I didn’t – but because I didn’t like the way her death had effected Gunnar. But maybe this could help make it right, as right as any death could be.
“Alright. So I guess if you’re coming that means you should come kick my ass at learning Ancient Egyptian.”
Gunnar grinned “Gladly.”

I actually kicked Gunnar's ass at learning the language. Well, okay, it wasn’t an actual ass-kicking. I learned it a whole hour faster. I’ll take it, because I still learned it a whole hour faster.
But anyway, it became kinda evident that I was picking it up more quickly and somewhere while everyone else was deciding which dragons to placate first, Gunnar with his perfect memory thought to mention the fact that we needed to take Marie’s body with us.
We were going to Egypt.
We were currently in New Parnassus, Germany.
Her body was in his apartment in Chicago. So we had a small problem, which left me cursing the tyranny of distance and thinking of Ted Leo.
Then, like Gunnar does, Gunnar came up with the plan. The plan was that Gunnar would ride Banana Splits with the rest of the group and get dropped off in Chicago so that he could grab Marie out of… You know, I don’t know where he’s been keeping her. I don’t really care, either. I haven’t seen his apartment since the first time I ever saw it, when I was busy doing surgery on Dorthen. I’d be lucky to tell you where the bathroom was. I have just kinda been trusting that her body is safe.
At the same time Gunnar was hitching a ride to Chicago, Nate was going to get dropped off in New York, Kas was getting dropped off in Saudi Arabia, Brendan was going to England and Harlan was going to space.
Yeah. I get to wander the desert for forty years, and Harlan gets to ride a dragon into space. Whatever, my legends are probably going to be about perseverance and persistence, restoring my honor and traversing the underworlds, and Harlan gets the one about seducing a nutjob. Anyway.
Before everybody saddled up on Banana Splits, I consulted Sibyl to see what the future would hold for them. I saw a merry-go-round, all my friends riding a different dragon, and the dragons moved up and down on poles that weren't poles but were strings and then I looked up and saw that Ixion was the one pulling the strings. Great. If they actually ran into Ixion and needed me there to give him an axe to the face, I was pretty sure I would know it and could come running. I knew I could do that now; I had done it for Gunnar when we were in Hades’ realm.
And speaking of, I almost took off when I thought Gunnar was in trouble. Turns out he was just falling off of a dragon capable of going faster than the speed of sound. Um, it sounds worse than it actually is because he was fine.
Well, he’d been a lot worse. It’s not like the dragon exploded on him at the same time he was falling, or that the ground was made of spikes and rusty nails. Anyway, this dragon planned on making three trips around the world in the span of a day, giving each member of the band 8 hours between dropoff and pickup. He posited that all of these trips should easily have allowed a meeting with each of the dragon princes.

And then another woman showed up, dressed in a mess of tulle and cogs. She called it “steampunk,” but I don’t think any of the pieces on her getup were even moveable, let alone actually steam powered. I guess, after dealing with Ixion and Tesla, I expected to be a bit more impressed. Um, but she was nice enough and she said she was here to help, that her dad sent her because I was worried about the others and that he said I’d been a good ride. Yeah. A good ride.
Then it clicked, before she said it, that her dad must be the Baron. I like the Baron, and she was here to help, so I could forgive that nonsense she called clothing. Her name was Kate and she volunteered to go to Chile.
I don’t know really know how any of that went, except Kas is pretty sure she’s got a new best friend in the dragon from Saudi Arabia. Kas has a lot of best friends, though, and I'm not sure that most of them know about it. Oh, and Brendan ran into Ixion, who was trying to convince the dragon to pitch for Team Titan. I think Brendan declaimed his intellect or something though, and was able to out-talk Ixion. So, gold star for him. Metaphorical of course. If I had any gold stars, they probably burned in my house.
Nate ran into Kane, which was fun. Turns out Nate helped vouch for Kane, who is Nate's uncle, and one of the dragons is on his side. Kane’s side, and consequently Mikaboshi’s side, too. Not Nate's. So, fuck dragons. And fuck Kane.
That was a bit of a clusterfuck. I missed out on that, mostly. Probably for the best. Gunnar may have forgotten, but I don't really have much love for the scaly fuckers. I did get called while the others were up in the air and trying to solve the food crisis, and asked to come up with some answers to that shit. So I asked what had happened to the normal dragon food sources, rocs and phoenixes and other huge birds that don’t exist anymore except on the tables of nerds. The answer was that the humans had been told by Kane’s dragon friend to hunt them to extinction while the dragons slept.
I don’t know why.
The Band wanted to know how to find proof of it, and I only had an inconvenient, cryptic answer for them: They could find the proof in the mind of the perpetrator. Or something like that.

The only other event of note happened while Amanda was teaching me, and it didn’t really have anything to do with the dragons. We pulled an all-nighter in New Parnassus, and as I’m tracing my fingertips over the hieroglyphs I smudged one. I can’t explain that, how I managed to smudge the text on a magical relic. I just have that kind of talent for messing things up. But as soon as I smudged it, something weirder happened. I felt a pull in my head, like when I sit down and consult Sibyl, except I hadn’t asked for this and it wasn’t from my point of view. I was seeing something through Gunnar’s eyes, through his memories.
Early memories. Things didn't look or smell as sharp as the memory from Jotunheim. I was watching him watch Athena hold the girl named Sara. Sara was bloody and she was still. She was dead, and I felt his sadness.
I saw Athena gather up the girl and her relics, and then I saw Athena grow great white feathery wings, like those of a great snowy owl, and she took flight.
And then I wasn’t seeing through Gunnar’s memories anymore, but I was still watching Athena bear her daughter away. She set herself down on the ground some distance away. She dropped Sara’s body on the ground and her face changed. She wasn’t Athena anymore. She was Malsum, the wolf-trickster-god who out-trickstered Loki and buried him in the ground in Mag Mell.
And once she was a he, he was standing in front of Kane Taoka and he was handing Kane Taoka an urn with the symbol of a humanoid figure, both hands stretched upward, either supporting or fending off a great darkness in the sky. I didn’t know what the urn was until I consulted those mystery stones, I didn’t realize just how fucked we were until I did.
I wanted to know what the urn was, and then… Kane had killed Sara, Malsum had taken her body and relics from Gunnar’s care, and then Malsum had given Pandora’s Box to Kane Taoka.
I was shaking when I came out of the trance, and it took a minute to convince Amanda I was okay. I went back to reading and where I had smudged the ink the hieroglyph had become something different – a symbol of a humanoid figure, both hands stretched upward, either supporting or fending off a great darkness in the sky.

The Darkness is coming, and I don’t know what we are supposed to do about it. I don’t know what good Pandora’s Box is supposed to do Kane. I mean, the story is that it was a container filled with all the evils of the world, and that the last thing left when Pandora got done with it was hope. She kept the hope bottled up and that’s why the world is still worth a damn. So… I don’t even know what the hell to do with that information. If the story is right, then Kane is going to be holding hope hostage. Or setting it free, or something. If the story is wrong… I don’t know.

Anyway. There was more running about, trying to deal with the dragons. That Kate chick went with Kas to Canada and they talked to an aurora borealis that ate a forest. Kate said that Ixion was already trying to screw with the president of Chile, and not to trust that guy. And she got weird when Nate was talking about Harlan’s armor that he ganked from Pan, the one that has turned out to actually be a piece of Tartarus with a dead god named Nergal in it.
Nergal is kind of a dick.

Nate went to Japan, and Harlan went to space. I think that’s how it happened. I may be getting the order messed up. I don’t know, I wasn’t there and I didn’t get all of the calls. And someone must have gone to Brazil, I just don’t remember who.
I think there were progress reports about who had spoken with which dragon and how the meetings had gone but none of those sitreps ended with, “And that’s why he needs an axe to the face,” so my attention was pretty firmly planted elsewhere.
I just know that it was on the last round before Harlan told Banana Splits to call the conference in the Himalayas when I boarded Dragon Air 1 to finish learning my language and get dropped off with Gunnar in Egypt, where we were going to make our grand entrance into Duat. Gunnar had already gotten picked up with the body, so he was able to help get Amanda on the dragon without her getting hurt. It’s not unlike boarding a plane, except that the plane swoops down and can break your spine if you don’t tuck and roll just right when it’s picking you up.
Harlan had gotten dropped off in the Philippines, and there had been some hullabaloo about Ixion maybe having corrupted the President of the U.S.
I am looking forward to tearing Ixion’s face off, for the record. Anyway, yeah, I'm sitting on the back of a dragon, chilling the most with Gunnar and Amanda and not actually feeling any desire to put an axe in this creature’s face when I get a feeling I know pretty well.
Someone's in trouble. Nothing special.
Harlan's in trouble. Okay, almost as surprising as Gunnar being in trouble – which is not very.
Harlan was about to take some magma to the face. …That one was new. I took off right away. I just looked at Gunnar and said, “I gotta go,” and I think, in a peculiar reversal of roles, I swear I heard him say “Godsdamnit,” as I disappeared.
I showed up in front of Harlan, threw my arms around him, threw up one of those shield thingies and yay, no fried Harlan.
I'm seriously proud of myself. Not only did I help Harlan stay pretty - again - I didn't even start swearing when I showed up. I didn't act butthurt because I couldn't understand a damn thing he was saying, and I didn't fly into a murderous rage because a dragon had just flung half a caldera at one of my friends.
I don’t care if he’s a son of Loki, I don’t care if he just bewitched Carmen to shut her up, I don’t care. He's saved my ass, kinda, and he's certainly saved Gunnar's.
And if I’m not going to kill him, no-fucking-body else is, either.

I kept my mouth shut, and stood there, like a good little bodyguard. Well, I kept quiet because as far as I could tell, Harlan had this.
And I didn’t speak scaly.
And I wouldn’t know what to say if I did. The only thing I said was, "Harlan... why the fuck are there bones everywhere?" It was because (surprise, only not) dragons eat people when dragons get hungry. I was really looking forward to getting out of Midgar, and away from the dragons, and more than a little afraid what I would find when I came back.

A Faulty Camera

"In a place where we only say goodbye

It stung like a violent wind

That our memories depend

On a faulty camera in our minds..."

Death Cab for Cutie, What Sarah Said

I don't think it really would have made a difference to Gunnar if he'd known what was going to happen. He's that kind of guy, I think. From what I remember.

But there's a lot I don't remember because of the Well.

It's funny what just a few seconds in the Well of Mnemosyne will do to your head. It was the hardest on Gunnar, it looks like. I don't remember ever seeing him shake like that, not when his mom got kidnapped or when the giants had his dad so whatever is in his head must be pretty awful.

Um, so... Only four of us went into the Vault. Gunnar, Brendan, Harlan and I went through. Gunnar gave Hades the last four of the five golden apples we'd gotten so that we could go in.

Nate was still with ghost-hero and boat-woman. Kas just decided not to go into the Vault. She didn't like the idea that she'd have to do whatever Hades said when he called in a favor, and Hades made us swear some oath before he'd let us in the Vault.

I swore his oath knowing full well that I probably won't like what he tells me to do, and when I tell him just where he can shove his fucking orders it's probably going to hurt.

It's probably going to hurt, and it's probably also not going to stop me.

Harlan will probably just talk his way out of it, and I don't know yet what Gunnar's plan is.

If Gunnar has a plan. Probably, I mean, he usually has one these days.

Brendan probably has one too, since he also agreed to the oath Hades asked us to swear.

Shit, I hope they've got plans. Only one of us really needs to go running around without a plan.

So, yeah, Gunnar, Brendan, Harlan and I sauntered our bad selves into the Vault and went bobbing for memory apples. All of maybe three seconds later, I came back up with holes in my head, Gunnar came up looking shaky, Harlan decided not to do that again, and Brendan looked mildly confused.

Then Gunnar and I put our heads in a second time and I got even more holes in my head, replaced by memories that aren't mine and one that was Gunnar's which gives me a migraine because holy fuck he has so much going on in his head.

Brendan tried again too, but I don't think he came up with anything. He certainly didn't swish his hair back declaring that his intellect had saved the day.

He does that sometimes.

If Brendan or Harlan forgot anything, it doesn't seem to have been that important. I mean, they know their names and our names and they act like they remember what we were doing here.

Gunnar though... I think he's a little messed up. I didn't really know that while we were still in Hades. He hid it pretty well and it wasn't messing with him physically, just his head. I don't have any mental instability senses. And I don't have Gunnar senses so I didn't pick up on how messed up he was. Is. Will be for a while.

Gunnar waited to mention it until after we’d made it out, when we decided to compare notes and make sure nothing really, really, super important was missing.

Hey, guess what. We've both got super-important things missing. But hey, true to how we usually roll, I've got some of his missing stuff and he's got some of mine. He doesn’t seem to think I should want it back, though.

The only thing I really want back is my memory of our wedding. I feel like I should remember how this ring got on my finger. The one my dad gave us, I mean. I remember how the other one got there.

I put this ring on after the wedding. I gave Gunnar the ring I'd made for him, with the cheesy "Until Ragnarok, at Least" inscription on the inside of it, and he gave me the ring I wear now, with some cute quip about how most girls aren't so lucky to get two wedding rings from a guy.

And it's true. Hell, most girls aren't lucky enough to get one. I am lucky.

I didn't say it then. I probably should have. There's lots of things I haven't said but probably should. Um... I should work on that.

Anyway, I don't remember... Anything.

I don't remember planning it which leaves me with a lot of very large gaps during which I hope nothing too terribly important happened, and I don't remember anything that actually happened that day.

I want to be pissed about that, I feel like I should be pissed about that, but the way Gunnar described it, it sounded like a massive fucking headache, anyway.

Um, a massive headache that was totally worth it!

Shit I hope Gunnar never reads this, that sounded kinda bad.

Gunnar, if you're reading this, I'm sure I would say it was worth it if I could remember it.

Also, if you're reading this, stop it. I sound like a fucking nutcase in this thing.

I lost other stuff too. I don't remember my mom dying.

I don't remember how we got the ghost who's waiting for me in Greece.

I don't remember how I got my Purple Heart.

I don't remember half of what happened in Niflheim.

I don't remember a lot of what happened in Guinnee (though I do remember getting a small amount of satisfaction from telling Victor's ghost that he was a dick, repeatedly).

It's because of the well. The Well of Memory.

The Well of Memory, v. 2.0, is in the Vault of Hades. We didn't get to the Vault until after we stared into the abyss and met Perseus. Not in the abyss, he was in the Tower. And we saw where the Furies live. And talked to the Furies. And talked to one of Ixion's simulacra. And saved the woman stuck inside from suffocation and cut her out of the metal skeleton encasing her and freed her from the fate of being Hades' new ferryman and investigated the theft of Cerberus and apparently forgot several hours of our lives and in case I haven't said it lately since my memory's a little fuzzy: Fuck titans.

Fuck titans and fuck the Darkness and fuck gods who keep secrets and fuck this whole fucking mess.

Anyway, back to the Well.

I went in twice and came out with someone else's thoughts in my head, and they weren't even the thoughts I wanted. Except for Gunnar's memories they were all silly stuff that happens all the time. To humans, to mortals, I mean.

People die. People fall in debt, people fall in and out of love. These are all inherent to the human condition, but each one felt like it was the end of the world.

I guess, for these people, it was.

I remember having a failed marriage and deciding to drown my sorrows in cupcakes. I don't really like cupcakes, and I certainly don't have a failed marriage. But I did in this memory. I was someone who baked to kill the pain of watching my ex with his new wife.

I, Laurel Esparza, do not bake. It is part of the natural order of things. Something usually combusts when I go into the kitchen for anything besides a cup of tea. I set a microwave on fire once. Nevermore was impressed.

I remember that I lost my life savings to "some wily cutpurse," as I remembered it, and ended up taking to the bank a coinpurse filled with rocks. I kinda sympathize with that, except the wily cutpurse was Ixion and he was enough of a dick that I didn't even get a bag full of rocks. I got my astrolabe rolled into the fucking Bay. Dick.

I remember being young, having lost my mother and being afraid of my drunken father who was going to lose his job and then we'd be homeless.

Except I have lost all of my money. I did have an absentee father, I am homeless. I got over it.

Apparently that's what I do. Not so much the mere mortals.

I guess that kinda puts things in perspective, showing me exactly what's at stake if we fail to figure out what's happening with the Darkness. These people need some serious help if all it takes to make them fall apart is some wily cutpurse and a plate of cupcakes. The memories are petty and not terribly significant.

The people they used to belong to are, though. And that's why I need to puzzle out this Darkness bullshit. I need to know what Kane is up to. If we don't figure out how to stop it all of these petty mortal memories, and the precious mortals to whom they belong, will all just cease to be.

So now I feel even more like going to Duat is the right thing for me to do. Marie has to know something useful, and if I'm lucky (or unlucky) enough to meet any gods while I'm there, maybe they can help me make sense of what I've seen in Hades.

Maybe they can tell me how to stop it, where to look, what to do next.

Maybe.

The last memory I gained from the Well wasn't petty, and it wasn't from a mortal.

In the last memory that wasn't mine, I was seeing through Gunnar's eyes. I didn't realize it right away, then I actually bothered to recognize the people who were around in the memory. All of the Band, and me - and it's weird seeing myself through someone else's eyes.

I was smelling through Gunnar's nose, hearing with his ears and I had all of the thoughts in my head that belonged to him.

His mind is... dizzying. It's too full, it's too strong, it's... It's incredible, is what it is.

If I ever needed proof that Gunnar is way smarter than I am, I have it now. Just trying to focus on his memory makes me feel like I've got an afterburn on my retinas, like when you look at the sun.

His memory started in what I thought was just gibberish. Something he was reviewing, symbols and sounds that were rolling around in his head and it took me a long time just to sort them out so I could focus on them long enough to realize that it was Japanese. We were all walking towards the giants and he was drilling himself on Hiragana and Katakana. Both of them, simultaneously. At the same time he was taking in our surroundings, running through different "oh shit" scenarios in his head, and then there was something about numbers that I just couldn't understand. I hadn't yet realized what a genius Gunnar is turning into, but the strings of numbers and formulae reinforced it.

Math is so not my thing.

Trying to make sense of any of it was like trying to grab at one fish in an overstocked fish tank, there were too many of them and they were all slippery and I couldn't get a good grasp on anything. Just trying to take it all in made me feel like my brain was about to tell me to go fuck myself and take a nice leisurely walk out of my head through my ears.

It got a little better when I just focused the memory on the giants. He could smell them before I could even see them, and I am so ridiculously glad that I don't smell the way he does, because they did not smell good.

At all.

It's like... Okay, they're frost giants, so of course they smell cold.

Cold has a smell. It's the same smell as when you stick your head in an ice box.

I mean, if you do that.

Okay, I do that.

Well, I did, back when I had a house that had a freezer that I could open up and smell. I used to like the smell of ice, when it was more of a novelty, back before Niflheim and the Jotun Mountains.

But the giants, they didn't just smell like ice, they smelled like trees too. Aspen.

And body odor.

Oh my gods.

Massive, gargantuan amounts of body odor. It's like someone rubbed an old Christmas tree on a mound of rotten onions and covered it all in ice cubes made from gym-sock tea and spoiled curry.

I'm not sure why Gunnar doesn't throw up more often, I don't know how he was able to stomach the smell. He could smell everyone else, too. Aftershave, shampoo, skin. He probably could have told you which smell belonged to which person. I can't, the smells are all unfamiliar to me.

And then there was the way everything looked. Everything was so clear and so sharp. Like it was made out of perfect, pure crystal. The colors were brighter, the sounds were louder. He doesn't just hear footsteps in the crunching snow, but he hears each divet of each shoe sinking individually. He hears heartbeats and breaths and the whispering of hair against hair just in the movement created by a footstep. His memory isn't the same as my memories. Mine feel jumpy in comparison. Like, my head doesn't flow from second to second with clear transitions. My memories jump, like the transitions in dreams.

The editing sucks.

But Gunnar, he's amazing. He remembers everything. The tents outside the cave. The exact pitch of the Jotuns' voice. The shade of their skin, the texture of their hair. Every word they said, and the way they sounded when they said it. Every word we said.

It was a jumble, but I got a good sense of what he was feeling, too. He was angry, much moreso than I'd picked up on. Annoyed too, at that woman named Sedna. Angry that his father had been tricked, even if Utgard-Loki said that Heimdall shot first. Well, not shot.

Mostly he was relieved when it was all over, relieved that as far as we could tell, it wasn't a double-cross. Though, if it was a double-cross and neither Gunnar nor Heimdall could pick up on it, we were probably way too screwed for words.

I am not capable of seeing the world like that. My brain just will not hold that many details all at once.

It's weird having seen the proof of just how much stronger he is, how much more he can take in. How perfectly he remembers.

I can't hold onto it all. The sharpness of his memory has already started to diminish. It's like... my mind dulls it and it can't keep its edge. I wish I could remember it all the way it was the first time, just to know how the world looks when he's looking at it.

The things he notices, the thoughts he thinks. I love having the chance to see things from his perspective, migraines and all. I can't keep it all together, though. I keep losing bits of it.

When I first got his memory in my head I wanted to pull away from the Well. I wanted to come up whimpering and whining like I did as a kid when I got soap in my eyes - which actually does nothing for headaches.

It's just too much to take in all at once. Sensory overload.

Though, there is something to be said for the conspicuous lack of Nevermore.

Anyway, um… I think Gunnar got it worse.

He threw up right after he pulled his head out of the well. Violently.

There's not a lot you can do for someone who's on all fours puking up a lung.

I rubbed his back while he barfed.

"Oh, gods," He groaned. He looked like shit. There was... there is something wrong with his head and I don't know how to fix it.

Not yet. I'll think of something. I'll lose another limb, if I have to.

"I found it. I have it. I don't want it, but I have it." He sounded about like he looked. I can't imagine ever getting used to him sounding like that.

He's fucking Super-Gunnar. He's not supposed to get sick, he's not supposed to look so... shaken.

So sad and awful and hurt. He's really not supposed to get hurt cleaning up my messes.

He's just doing all sorts of things he isn't supposed to.

Gonna have to talk to him about that.

He was trembling a little when he asked me to stay back as the others left the Vault. He said we needed to talk when we got out of Hades. And right after he said that, he quirked his head like he was listening for something.

Then everyone else in the Vault heard what he heard; a screeching and a tearing and a I-don't-know-how-to-describe-it kind of sound. It sounds about like what you would expect an end of the world to sound like. Some of us (named Nevermore) were staring into the abyss again, trying to see what was happening, because I guess that sounds like a good idea to a bird.

There was something flying around out there, I couldn't see it but after Jormungandr went swimming by through Acheron I figured that was the sign that the time of dragons had begun.

Someone asked if this was the start of Ragnarok.

Hades said no, this was not the beginning of Gunnar's apocalypse. Like it's not going to affect Hades. Like the god was able to just completely ignore the fact that Jormungandir, the World-Fucking-Serpent, just went surfing through his river.

And Jormungandr was supposed to have been sleeping beneath the ocean, which might mean he was comatose beneath the Drowned Road which means it was in the Guinnee area. So a Norse monster sleeping under the Loa underworld goes surfing through the Greek river of the dead.

But yeah, Hades probably has it figured out. The Aesir's apocalypse can't possibly affect anyone else. Nothing is really connected and the Dodekatheon will probably just sail right through Ragnarok untouched.

And I'm the blue ribbon pig at the Podunk County Fair.

Anyways, Hades went running for his castle and some helmet showed up on his head. It kinda looked like the one Camila wore sometimes. Maybe they know the same smith.

Uh, and as Hades was running he apparently decided that being in his realm meant we were his to order around.

No, that's not quite right. I think he probably decided that the second we showed up. I just can't remember being right since I went staring off into the abyss. But it probably happened.

Anyway, so we go to deal with what he's yelling about and we find ants and shadow and end up climb-falling down this massive chain to that island he wouldn't tell us about and Nate flew a pterodactyl. Or something.

We found blood when we got to the bottom, lots of blood and dead shadow ants. The blood smelled like... nothing I've ever smelled before. Earthy. Old.

We followed the trail of blood to a stone dome that Gunnar just sort of stepped through, and then I got that feeling that Gunnar was about to get hurt by something big and stoney. I showed up next to him just in time to hear him hit the floor. I guess I overreacted.

But when I lit up like a light bulb so I could see in this darkness – I am starting to become less and less fond of the dark – we found another guy there. He was big, and he wasn’t wearing much and he was hurt really badly.

I did that thing where I'm all singleminded and focused on not letting someone die. I did everything I could do, and some things I didn't know I could do until that moment. Like the whole “lighting up” thing. That was new, for all the good it did.

The end result was a tired medical cliché: “I did everything I could, but...”

I don’t like watching people die. I like even less not being able to watch people die. I wasn’t able to stay with this guy. We had to turn and run.

But at least he waited to die until after he’d told us his story. First, he helped Gunnar and I get out of his house after a brief game of charades.

I had raised an axe tentatively, the injured guy raised his hands together to form a circle, telling me there was no way I could dig under it.

Then we realized Harlan could talk to him, and the guy told Harlan a story.

It's a long story, and I don't understand all of it. I don't remember all of it. It had a lot to do with dragons, which are not high on the list of things which interest me.

Basically, I think, things are about to get bad and we're supposed to protect humanity. Kind of. We aren't supposed to speak for them, at least not when it comes to negotiating with the dragons.

And war is coming (except for the part where war is here. But apparently this is a different one, or a different part of the same one. I don’t know, it’s kind of confusing). And dragons used to be bad, but then they made some deal with the humans and now the dragons and the humans are supposed to be friends, at least when it comes to standing against the Titans.

Except the dragons are cowards, and they withdrew from Midgar partially so that they didn't have to stand up to the titans. Or something like that.

Then he told us to run, so he could die. He said he knew he was going to, and that a group of scions would come find him and that he was supposed to tell us his story and give us something. Well, two somethings. One is a dagger that was supposed to have belonged to Marduk, and the other is... a thing. We don't know what it is, we don't know what it does so it's not a really great lead.

Well, it's supposed to be used to end the fighting and preserve the world so it can be born again. Which is... vague and not really all that helpful. Not yet.

Anyway, then the darkness started spreading and the ants kept coming, and on our way out Hades gave me a note from my dad and we had to haul ass out of there.

It was when we'd gotten out, and when the dragon went away that Gunnar and I got a chance to talk. I'd mentioned when Hades was done and we had Marie's memories that I was going to go to Duat, and now shit was hitting the fan and if Gunnar was going to run off talking to dragons I didn't just want to leave him alone, and I didn't want to just leave Nate and Harlan and Kas and Brendan, so I did what I do when I'm confused and a little scared. I turned to Gunnar.

"Okay, you’re smart, what the fuck do I do?" It really was supposed to be a compliment, I'm just bad at them.

"Uh-er-I…" He stopped and rubbed his temples with his fingers. “You go meet with the dragon in Saudi Arabi, then go to Duat, I guess.”

I didn't really like that answer. "What if going to Saudi Arabia makes me too late to take Azzeza to Duat? What if it’s closed then, and I never get the chance to take her there? I mean… are the dragons really our problem? You heard Harlan’s giant-guy and dragon translation. We aren’t allowed to speak for the humans."

“Yeah, but frankly humans don’t have anyone to speak for them either. I mean, there is no unified human government or other representative body, and even if we pretended the United Nations did fit that description, it still has its own problems. I mean, this whole crap about negotiating between two different species as though they are each, as a species, a single unified body is simply ridiculous. But then I guess this isn’t the time for that kind of nonsense. Look, if you think that the more urgent thing for you to do is to go to Duat, I certainly won’t fault you for it. All we really seem to need is enough people to get the word out that there’s going to be a meeting and all the Dragon princes need to show up before the whole world just ends up flooded with murderous territorial dragons. Not to mention someone or someones to get together some conglomeration of representatives - most of whom will probably vehemently hate each other - into a room to meet with beings they were probably unaware even existed prior to the very encounter in which they will meet nine of them." When he finally finished spouting that rather long, and swiftly-conveyed torrent of information he took in a very long breath. "But yeah, if you think you should go, honey, then go ahead to Duat. This is something you’ve been promising to do for a while - and on two accounts. I know how important your promises are to you, and I’d never ask you to risk breaking one of them."

I frowned. If anyone could convince me not to go just by asking, it would be Gunnar and the way he'd said the first thing made it sound like that was the more important. Like I should know that it was more important.

It just didn’t feel more important. I had made a promise to go to Duat, and I don’t want to be the type of woman who makes a promise and only plans to follow it until something else comes up. You know, like a wedding vow or something.

“Yeah… Fuck, I don’t know,” I scratched my head. “I mean, if the darkness is taking underworlds over, maybe it isn’t even safe to take her there, and maybe the darkness won’t touch Duat. We don’t know where it’s going, and we don’t know what happens once the darkness does take over, and it’s not like we can ask now… And I don’t know how good I’m going to be at helping negotiations or dealing with politics or any of that bullshit. I certainly am not a fan of the idea of negotiating with anything scaled, since they’ve all been kinda pissy so far.” I was doing a fantastic job of talking myself out of dealing with any dragons. Plus, I really believe that if I am not supposed to go to Duat, then I won’t be able to. Fate will put me where it wants me, no matter what direction I am trying to go.

Gunnar was trying to be reassuring, I think. “"Yeah, well the titan of light is supposed to be the major opponent of the Pesedjet right? So maybe Soku-no-kumi will avoid that one for a while for fear of encroaching on other titanic territory… But, I mean, I can’t really say."

"That’s the problem with this whole fucking thing," I groaned in frustration. "Nobody’s giving us enough information and now that we really need it, I can’t even go bitch at them for keeping us in the dark… Ugh. I just worry what might happen to you guys if I go.” I paused and gave him a very serious look and said in a very serious voice, “If you think you’ll need me, I’ll stay."

He gave me a sideways grin, the kind that makes me think of explosions and shrapnel. "We’ve managed to make it through a lot so far. You have something you need to do. I understand, and so do the others. I even think Kassandra has been thinking about trying to go with you."

I wasn't so sure about the others understanding, but I was glad to hear that Gunnar did. The thought of Kas coming worried me a little, though. Well, worried me and relieved me. The backup would be nice, and Kas could probably survive okay, but more than being backup she would probably be a reason for me to be brave. I’m always braver when I’m protecting someone. Brave or stupid, take your pick.

But it would divert some of my attention away from Azzeza.

"Right. I’m not sure… If she comes too, that’s three people I have to look out for and while the extra eyes might be nice I don’t know how good I’ll be at watching over another body." I bounced on the balls of my feet, feeling almost like there was a scream of frustration building up in me. "But I guess I’m gonna try, because I don’t really know how not to… And I guess that if you guys really do need me, I’ll find a way to get to you." And I would. If he needed me, if any of them needed me, I'd be there.

I sighed, more than a little tired. "I’ll just figure out how to be everywhere, and that should solve all our problems, right?"

"Right," He smiled at me, the kind of smile that makes his eyes look brighter, if you see him smile like that while he’s not wearing sunglasses. Then he looked thoughtful for a moment, and the smile slipped a little.

"There’s something else we need to talk about before anything else happens though. Mnemosyne really screwed with our heads. At least, with mine. I can tell that there are a lot of things I’ve forgotten, and I refuse to let that go by without rectification. I wa-" he paused. He shuddered and started over.

"I’m pretty sure that you are the strongest person I have ever known, and I think you needed to know that. One of the memories you left behind in the well ended up in my head, and… yeah. I don’t think I would have survived that if it happened to me."

"Hnh," I frowned, chewing on my lower lip. I’m not particularly fond of the idea of Gunnar not surviving something, and I really wasn’t fond of the idea of him carrying around a memory that belonged in my head of something he didn’t think he’d have survived.

"So that’s where that went,” I tried to lighten the mood, which is also something I am not good at. “I’m uh… I’m sorry."

I don't know if that was the right thing to say but I obviously needed to say something. Whatever was in his head kinda freaked him out, and it made me sad for him that it was my fault. I felt guilty, even though I had no idea what he was even talking about.

"What uh… what are you talking about? I mean, I’ve got a few things missing." I felt like I should have been angrier. Not at him, of course. Just… at everything that had happened to us. Instead I was just tired. It was just hard to be angry when I was this confused and conflicted.

"Uh, er, right. Do you remember, when you came back from Afghanistan?"

I had to think really hard, but I kinda remembered it. Or, I remembered stuff that referenced it. I remember the Purple Heart, and the sessions with Dr. Thrace who told me I was uncooperative, stubborn, evasive, and kind of a bitch. I remembered the wounds which turned into scars which made me self-conscious and weird. That was about it. I didn’t remember how I got them, or talking about how I got them, or really anything more specific than: I went to Afghanistan and I came back damaged.

I shrugged at him. "Um… I remember being in a hospital for a while before I came back to the States, and not really being all that happy about it." Being stuck in bed sucked. Having messed up ribs sucked. "And I remember meeting with some touchy feely quack lady who told me I wasn’t trying hard enough and I remember telling her to go fuck herself, and I remember that’s why I keep writing in that journal I have but now it seems a little silly." It does seem silly. And a little unnecessary. But I guess it might be helpful if I go staring into any more abysses, or fishing in any more memory wells.

Gunnar was quiet for a second. "Yeah, I remember why. I remember how you got the injuries you were in the hospital for - I remember why you had Post Traumatic Stress Disorder - I… yeah. It was pretty nasty, and just the fact that you lived through it both mentally and physically is a lot more impressive than pretty much anything else I’ve experienced."

I blinked at him. Super Gunnar, my hero, probably the closest thing to a superhero I’ll ever know, was telling me that I was impressive and strong. That he knew what I’d been through because it was in his head, and that he didn’t think he could take it.

“Oh. Um… I’m sorry,” I repeated, a little softer. I winced a little, and I wished I knew how to make it better for him. That’s a wish I make kind of often. “It’s not really fair that I get that sorta weight lifted off of me, and then you get to be the one who carries it. That really sucks.” Laurel Esparza, the master of understatement.

“Are you… okay?” It was a dumb question. He had a memory in his head of an event which had fucked me up for the larger part of a decade on top of carrying around Marie’s memories. Of course he was not fucking okay.

He scratched his head. “Yeah. It’s not as bad as Marie’s memories.” He was lying to me, which made me feel like shit. I remember just the dreams of Marie’s existence. Well, the nightmares. I remember waking up and running to the bathroom, vomiting from the pain and the disgust. It was hard to imagine what was worse than that.

“Anyways,” Gunnar was merciful and changed the subject before I started getting queasy. “I want to make sure there’s nothing major that I don’t remember, and vice-versa. Especially about us. I mean, like… why did we have those golden apples again? I mean, we went and stole them from a dragon… because… because…”

My eyes got wide and as soon as I started talking I was almost shouting. I know better. I know he can hear me just fine. “Because you lost thirty years of your life when we got tricked by Pan into helping him stab Kairos! Holy shit, you don’t remember that? Do you remember the Garden? Cuz I can give you the cliff’s notes, if you want.”

He shook his head. “I remember the Garden,” which we later realized was halfway right. He remembered us talking about going to the Garden. He didn’t really remember us actually talking to the dragon. “I even remember Pan being a dick… and Kairos… I just don’t… don’t remember being old. I remember the boys… seeing that other one… with the blue and purple hair… and future Gair… I guess it happened during that. … We don’t have any kids I’ve forgotten have we?”

I answered him all out of sequence. I think I was still just a little ticked about the whole "making out with someone who wasn't me" thing. I nodded. “Good, cuz I would hate for you to have forgotten how fucking awesome I was playing fetch with Ladon, and how I totally kept my temper in check and didn’t even threaten to cut any of the Hesperides in half after that one…” I realized I was being a little petty, and jealous, and we didn’t have time for me to be either. “Um, sorry, I digress.”

I started over. “Yeah. You were in a real funk about it, which I get. I got older too, but not the way you did.” I got quieter, more serious. “You aged like… thirty years in the blink of an eye. It slowed you down, and it made you a little… I dunno. Different.” I shrugged and I fidgeted. I had been doing so well, I had been making sense and mostly staying on topic and then I started thinking about how I felt watching him get older and of course I started rambling because apparently I still remember how to do <em>that</em>.

“Not that you weren’t you, you just weren’t the same you… Is this making sense? I mean, I can show you, if you want. It was even freakier than holding our kids while they aged ten years a minute after they were born.” Kids, right. He had asked about kids. Stay on topic, Laurel. “And the only kids we have… that I know about, that are ours, rather than the ones we’ve taken it upon ourselves to protect, are Alex and Erik, and they’re with Jack. As far as I remember.”

I think he was a little relieved. Um, not that we didn’t have more kids, but that we didn’t have more kids that he had managed to forget about.

He nodded. “Yeah. That’s what I remember too. Okay, let’s just go through everything important we remember, in order, since we met. That way between the two of us we should be able to fill all the holes in for each other. Also, I need to tell Harlan about the time he saved a Senator’s daughter from some crazed Spanish kidnappers - but that’s for after we’ve been able to straighten things out.”

I made a weird face at the idea of Harlan doing anything too heroic, but let it go. He probably has it in him, when he’s not making psychologically damaged young adults fall in love with him. “Okay,” I took a breath. “So we almost got married in Vegas and then you and Jack threw Canopus off a building, after you screamed for it to eat you. Which was really dumb.”

“Yeah, hind-sights’ 20/20,” he started, but then paused. And he made a face, and then told me about how he didn’t remember the fight with Canopus.

Not a great sign that he doesn't remember the first thing I start talking about.

So I explained the Canopus thing, and the stupid Jackson Donald name and the cult and the trash-frog, which was kind of a waste of breath because he remembered all of that. Then I reminded him about the show we went to see, Pangyrjklfdjsal-something, and the sacrifice onstage, and the lots of other stuff that he said he remembered until I got to the part with Kane.

The night Victor popped into Gunnar’s hotel room, where he remembered letting me crash, and Victor was expecting we'd surrender all of our relics and weapons and just let Kane become a god with the Black Feather Shroud. That part Gunnar had forgotten. The whole, “zombie viking uprising” thing was kind of memorable to me, even though I was really busy being arrested by Nate at the time.

The next thing he didn’t remember after that was when we got all the kids away from the Order, which we found because Horus and the Baron missed their kids.

So I fixed that with a minimal amount of rambling.

“Dude, that’s where we found my sister. And Carmen hit on Nate, and Camila was there, I guess that was before she went all murder-happy with the god-types.” That got a funny look from him, which elicited the explanation that Camila “killed” Mannanan Mac Lir. He was just as unsettled the second time.

“And you shot a priest holding a grenade,” I said very critically, going back to telling him about the Order. “Or maybe you shot the grenade. You walked away picking shrapnel out of your face, and probably would have died if I hadn’t done that Die-Hard thing on you before you shot the grenade. Which was also dumb.” I stuck my tongue out at him.

He didn't argue that it was dumb. He just grunted a little, and waited for me to keep going. “Hmph. Okay.”

“But,” I said in a placating fashion, “you stopped doing stuff that was kinda dumb after we went to Helheim, and I’m a little fuzzy on how some of it happened, but I remember you stuffing some c4 into the chest cavity of a dragon, and Harlan pulled me back, then you were smacking at me with your trenchcoat like I was on fire, then you were kinda mopey and you freaked and buried some explosives in the snows of Helheim. Niflheim. Too-fucking-cold-heim. Oh, and in case you forgot, Harlan walked around the second half of that trip carrying a giant’s testicle. I haven’t teased him about that lately…” I looked back over my shoulder to try to see Harlan, but turned back to Gunnar pretty quickly.

He looked kinda confused. “I… tried to put out fires on you with my trenchcoat? Weird.”

Yeah. Weird. Weird was the same fucking thing I thought when it happened. “Yeah. But I wasn’t on fire. And then you were mad at Harlan but you never told me why, so I can’t help you there,” I shrugged.

“Huh, okay,” spake Gunnar the verbose.

“Um... and then next was...” and I rambled for a bit, actually kind of enjoying the chance to tell him how awesome he had been, until I got to the next thing he didn't remember, which was under the water outside Jersey.

I helped him as much as I could, but bits of that were missing from my mind, too. “I remember we were in the water,” I squinted while I spoke. Squinting helps me remember. “And Brendan waved Harlan and I through, then I was on the floor of our sub and I think you hugged Kas? I don’t remember what for.”

He didn't look thrilled. "Yeah… I remember… the submarine… and one of the ghosts possessed one of the boys before they were even born, and I was able to sort of twist my own legend around to exorcise him. It was a little odd. But yeah, I don’t remember what happened after that before getting on the sub. I’ll have to ask one of the others."

Yeah, the whole possession thing had managed to slip my mind. Funny, I would expect to remember being fucking terrified while one of my babies was possessed in the womb, but I didn't.

And then, as I imagine it must look to someone who can't see ghosts, I looked like I was about to beat Gunnar within an inch of his life. I wasn’t failing terribly at abusing my husband. Really I was swatting at Nevermore, who was trying to squawk into Gunnar's ear about letting me die and not taking care of me and liking the Cubs.

“Uh…” I glared at the air by Gunnar. “Apparently I died. But I got better, obviously.”

Gunnar blinked. “Wow. I… would have been completely useless in that situation. I imagine Kassandra helped get you… better.” He could have said, “not dead anymore,” and it wouldn’t have bothered me. Though, I guess maybe it bothered him. “Explains the hugging you witnessed.”

I shrugged, kinda bewildered that I could forget about dying, and apparently getting my babies killed in the process. “Yeah, that makes sense. Okay, I’ll have to ask someone what exactly happened there. But at least there weren’t any snakes. That I remember. And really, I’m surprised you didn’t say anything in Hades when fucking Jormungandr showed up.”

“Huh? Why would I? I mean, it’s a big deal and all but…”

“Uh…” I just stared at him for a second. If I hadn't seen him put his head in the Well, if I didn't know what that place could do you your mind, I'd have thought he was just fucking with me or something. I knew better, though. “Okay…”

So I had to remind him that he fucking hates snakes. I told him about how so many of our encounters involved things with scales, like Canopus and company, and couldn't help but think how weird it was that something like that could just slip his mind.

“…Wow. I’m… that’s an odd trend to forget.” Great minds and such.

“Oh and there was the basilisk in the desert when we went to rescue Horace from those angel things. Forgot that one. That’s where you got those boots. And that cloak you almost never wore at first because you thought it would make people look at you funny.” Because a guy wearing sunglasses at two in the morning never gets any funny looks, I guess.

“Wait no,” I corrected myself, “That was a Lindwurm. Vegas.”

At this point he was just nodding, trying to take in as much information as he could, which I knew was a lot. He didn't have to focus all of his attention on me, but I couldn’t bring myself to mind.

“You practically jumped right on top of it,” I kept on with obvious disapproval in my voice, “and it tried to take a chunk out of you. It turned part of you to stone and…” I closed my eyes briefly. It was my turn to shudder a little. “I’ve never heard anyone scream like that. That time, it was my turn to be dumb, cuz then I ran right up to it so I could heal you, and I didn’t even close my eyes because I didn’t think of it.

And after getting past the basilisk, that’s where we found Horace Farrow, where Pan was keeping him hostage and using him to keep those angel things dormant or docile or something. We had to leave,” I looked at the ground and paused for a second. Almost a year later and it still pisses me off. “The only reason Horace got out was because I prayed to my dad about the army Pan was building, and a little after that Horace showed up at our doorstep. Well, it was still just my doorstep then, that was before we…”

I fingered the wedding band and engagement ring Gunnar had given me, making a face that was probably a little sad and a little sorry. “I don’t remember getting married.”

"What? Oh jeeze, okay.” He took a breath and just started talking. “So you had to spend days getting ready in the whole Greek tradition, and then because Aphrodite’s a bitch she refused to give you her blessing - not that you needed it, if you ask me - and then at the wedding my dad gave your dad a herd of golden yaks that were herded up I-35 by a pack of dwarves in broad daylight. One of the furies wrote “Murderer” on your forehead, some jealous boyfriend of Nate’s wife - then girlfriend - brought the press ‘round to harass everyone and I only narrowly avoided assaulting some mortals. Oh, and since Hera demanded to perform the ceremony she had us do a ritual where we let our blood out together and swore never to be unfaithful. Seemed a little unnecessary to me, but I’m pretty sure she used a power over us so that we’ll incur some number of years of bad luck if we break it - or something like that."

I blinked, and waited for part of that to sink in, sound normal, or otherwise make sense. Then I gave up on that and just started asking questions. “Wait, why did Aphrodite refuse to give me her blessing??” For a second I was scared that, being a goddess of love, maybe Aphrodite had determined I didn't really love Gunnar, or some equally implausible bullshit.

“Well Aphrodite’s a giant hypocrite and refused you her blessing because you weren’t a virgin.”

I made one of those “are you fucking kidding me” faces, and wondered if I'd looked as pissed the first time this all happened.

Whatever. Next question.

“Hera performed the ceremony??” It seems like meeting the Queen of the Gods (of my pantheon) should be something I would remember, especially if she had deigned to do me the honor of performing my wedding ceremony – and I was probably supposed to see it as an honor, rather than an inconvenience or her butting in. But that wasn't really what I cared about.

“Did my dad make it?” And then before Gunnar could answer either question, I remembered the part where he said something about mortals and assault. “Why were you going to assault mortals?”

He answered my questions in the order I'd asked them, because he's cool like that. “Yeah, Hera basically just walked in and had some of her people start re-decorating and told us she was doing the ceremony. And yeah, your father was there. Actually the guest list was kind of star-studded. Zeus, Hera, Artemis, Frigg, Odin, Heimdall, Apollo, and Dionysus - as The Situation.” He let me goggle for a moment over all the gods I could no longer remember meeting. And over Dionysus being The Situation.

“Oh, and I almost assaulted the news crews that Nate’s not-friend dragged along. I swear, those people don’t understand the meaning of ‘private’ and ‘go the fuck away.’”

I had to giggle a little at the last, because even if I couldn't remember it, I could imagine that much perfectly. “Yeah, you’ve uh… you’ve got a way with words. That’s awesome that your dad was there, too, and Odin. Did we get any cool gifts? I think I remember a blender, but…” I shrugged. It was a nice blender.

Gunnar nodded. “Yeah, Artemis gave us an astrolabe that’s pretty awesome, and enormous… Frigg gave you a prophetic vision of our future together,” and he described to me the plains of fire and the ice giants and the four cribs and Nate losing a hand and Gunnar himself standing in the mouth of what I guess was Jormungandr. Is. Will be. Whatever.

“… and… I think that was more-or-less it. The blender was from Ciara.”

I miss Ciara. She knows how to make something bleed.

I wanted to ask him a lot more about the wedding, I wanted him to tell me everything like who wore what and who said what and I wanted to hear everything from his point of view but even I realized we were running short on time and we had much more pressing shit to do. Pressing shit that was going to take me who-knew-how-far away for who-knew-how long, and if the pressing shit he needed to go do happened to go really, really wrong and I couldn't get there when they needed me...

I took a deep breath.

“So I planned a wedding I don’t remember and it doesn’t matter because my plans pretty much didn’t matter since you said Hera redecorated and I got married with the fucking word “murderer” on my forehead. I bet your mom loved that,” I rolled my eyes, wincing. I do remember being pissed at the Furies, but I get pissed at a lot of people. “Y’know… Maybe it’s for the best that I forgot that. It sounds really aggravating and like it probably made me a nervous wreck. And if that’s the case, I’m sorry for any bullshit I put you through that I don’t remember.” And anyway, the ceremony itself wasn’t really the part that was important. It didn't matter how the wedding happened, really. It matters that it happened.

But there was something important that I needed to say, something I'd wanted to make sure he understood for a while, now.

“Um… I feel like I’m a little bit better off, though.” The words I wanted to say were, I am going to be okay, but I’m glad you were so cool as to be with me when I was not okay. I almost got there, I think.

“Some of the stuff I don’t remember apparently made me a bit of a head case, enough so that I was always really worried you would take off running when you realized how damaged I was.” It was a really stupid worry, stupid on like… eight different counts.

“But you didn’t, and that was really awesome of you. So you talk about me being strong, and all this time I’ve been marveling at you being…” I had to pause to find the right word. There were a couple that would have worked. “Insane” was one of them, but I went for something just a little bit gentler. “I dunno, maybe just crazy, enough to stick with me.” There was a point there, and I was trying really hard to make sure I didn't just wander around it. I just wanted him to know how much it meant to me, how much he meant to me, and just how grateful I was for him having made me so much better off than I used to be and giving me a reason to keep getting better, honing my skills and whatever. I wanted him to know in case all of my plans went to shit and I didn’t make it out of Duat. Except I’m bad at this.

“So thanks,” I finally managed to get the words out. “In case I didn’t ever say it before, or I don’t get to say it later, thanks. I don’t think I’d be where I am now if it weren’t for you. You give me a million reasons to be better at everything, to be stronger and good at protecting people – and somehow you still manage to find all the trouble I can’t fix. Like old age. I mean, the apples were just a temporary fix for that and I’m still working on the more long-term fix. But I’ll figure it out, because it’s for you. Just like I learned how to fucking teleport because I thought you were in trouble.”

Shit. It wasn't quite coming out right.

I frowned but kept talking. I guess I needed to keep talking because if I stopped talking I would start thinking – and it is pretty obvious that I do not do both tasks simultaneously. I really didn't wanna do that right now, I didn't wanna think about just how long I might be gone and just how soon that was going to have to happen.

"There was a point in there somewhere… Oh. Um… We don’t have a whole lot of time right now. So while I want to keep trying to fill in all the holes in your memory, and mine - like I would love to remember whether I was actually there with my mom when she died - there’s other shit we have to be doing. And while I would love to just look you in the eyes and say, “Fuck dragons and Titans, let’s go get a room,” I realize I have no money and a metric fuck tonne of responsibilities to be taking care of. Like what Odin said to go do, and maybe figuring out how to stop what we saw happening in Hades, especially now that my mom is down there in the darkness and I don’t know if she’ll be okay, or any of the other souls, and I don’t have all the time in the world to spend figuring it out while everything else goes dark. And you’ve got dragons to go talk to, because for some reason I don’t really understand, you seem to want to go do that.

So the point is, when I get back - because I am fucking coming back, - I want a vacation.” I said a silent prayer to the gods that I didn’t just lie to my husband. “Hell, I’ll settle just for <em>a day</em> off. I don’t care how we manage it, but my request is you, me, and a room containing nothing but a big bed and a full size bar stocked with nothing but whiskey. Now I gotta go learn Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics."

Gunnar just smiled at me and said, “It’s not like it’s been a one-sided thing, if it weren’t for you I would still be a hot-headed dunce who was better at getting himself nearly killed than he was at really helping anyone out. I mean, without you a lot of what I’ve been through probably would have changed me for the worse, and in a fairly serious degree. So, if the point you lost was an ‘I love you,’ then let me just say ‘I love you too’ - despite the incredibly cheesy phrasing.”

That wasn't what I was trying to say, actually.

I was trying to say goodbye.

But yeah, “I love you” worked, too.