Dead Gods: Fourteen
There’s a lot going on when Dean finally stumbles onto the edge of the wheat field.
There’s Ben, propped against the huge chunk of black rock that Sam had decided was some kind of mystical boundary marker, an arrow protruding from his chest. There’s Hermes, right next to Ben and far too close, coming to his feet. There’s the perfect circle of decimation about thirty feet across all around them, and there’s the burning wheat and the billowing smoke, and the ground rumbling like an oncoming freight train. And at the furthest extent of the decimation, there’s the three huge mounds rising from the earth, distending then contracting, in and out, up and down, bulging like bubbles in a boiling pot and growing with each contraction.
None of it looks good.
Dean pauses, anxiously adjusts his grip on the angel blade, tries to get a read on the situation before he goes running in. He’s not risking Ben on reckless heroics, not when he needs a second, just half a second, to figure out what to do next.
Then a claw pokes through the mound closest to Ben.
A claw, swiftly followed by a wing that unfurls outward, bits of soil and charred wheat stalks raining from the fragile skin between its finger bones. The stench of fetid blood and rotting meat unfurls with it, rolling out in all directions in a wave of damp heat. It washes over Dean in a surge of sense-memory: Alistair’s blade cutting into his flesh, the screams and howls and laughter of the damned, the great winged things swooping in the sky.
For one sliver of a second, Dean thinks he’s in Hell again.
But the sky is all wrong; it’s not the pinkish, throbbing sky of the Pit, but the crisp blue-black sky of the Kansas night, stars popping up one by one, a gibbous moon on the horizon.
Not Hell, then, but Hell is definitely coming up for a visit.
Another claw follows the wing, then an arm and a head with snarled hair and snakes slithering between the snarls. And they keep coming, these things; three of them, emerging out of the ground one wing at a time. Woman-shaped but huge, twice as large as a man; naked, skin the color of roofing tar, sagging, leathery, scaly. More wicked-black snakes slithering around their necks like jewelry, around their waists, between the fingers of their claws. Blood oozing from their eyes, teeth deadly sharp in their mouths, wings extending outwards and upwards, blocking out the stars.
Dean remembers these things; Alistair had admired their barbarism and blood thirst, though frowned on their lack of precision and control. He had called them the Kindly Ones, but that’s just a cute euphemism for what everyone else calls them.
He understands now why Artemis disappeared and took Sam with her.
From behind him comes the rustle of leaves and the snap of twigs as Lisa bursts into the clearing, snapping him out of his near flashback. She stops beside him and gasps, eyes wide. Dean knows what she’s going to do before she does it because she’s Lisa and she’s Ben’s mom, and he’d never expect anything less.
“Ben!” Lisa screams and runs right for him.
Dean calls after her, tries to catch her, but she evades his grasp, fear for Ben putting an extra burst of speed in her step. She sprints towards Ben and slides to her knees at his side, pulls him against her as if she has any power to protect him from things that literally belong in Hell.
Dean’s got no choice now, not that he’d make another. He follows, drops to his knees right along-side her. Ben’s conscious, though he’s shivering violently and his eyes, his human, non-gold gleaming eyes, are glassy from shock. Blood soaks his clothing, blood and something else that flashes gold in the light of the fire, smears his mouth and chin. The arrow is shoved into Ben at an upward angle, which means that Ben probably did the shoving, and shit, just shit.
The Hell monsters are preoccupied with crawling out of the ground, and Hermes is nowhere to be seen. Maybe he’s done a runner, which would suit Dean just fine at this point, and the breeze is blowing the fire and smoke out to the west, pulling it away from them. Dean’s got a minute to assess, to figure out how bad things are before they move Ben, but probably not much more than that.
He jabs the angel blade into the ground point first, tugs Ben’s hand away from the wound. There’s not a huge gush of blood, which probably means the blood is gushing internally. Not good.
“Apollo?” Dean asks, though the silver arrow protruding from Ben’s stomach has already told him the answer.
“Dead.” A thin tendril of blood trickles down Ben’s chin. “I killed him.”
“You did this to yourself?” Lisa’s voice is twisted with the same piercing fear and agony as every cell of Dean’s body. She smoothes Ben’s hair away from his face. “God, Ben. Why?”
“Had to, mom. No other way.” Ben licks the blood off of his lips. “But I’m okay, though. I promise.”
“The hell you are.” Dean grabs Lisa’s hand and puts it over the wound, forces himself to ignore Ben’s cry of pain at her touch. “Apply pressure, but hold it still. Too much moving can make it worse.”
Lisa’s eyes are wide, showing too much of the whites, and she’s breathing in panicked little pants, but she nods in understanding, still with him. Dean presses his fingers to the pulse of Ben’s neck. His skin is cool and clammy, and his pulse is too fast for Dean’s liking.
Dean shifts on the balls of his feet, gets into a better position to lift Ben. “I’m going to move you now, and it’s probably going to hurt like a bitch, okay? Lisa, let go as soon as I’ve got him and grab the angel blade. We’re going to make a run for it.”
Lisa nods, but Ben pushes weakly at Dean. “We can’t go. I have to make my case.”
“The fuck you do. We’re going. Now.”
Against Ben’s protests that they have to stay, that this is the only way to kill Hermes now that he’s so powerful, Dean slides his arms under Ben’s knees and back. He’s tensing to lift him when Lisa makes a strangled sound of terror. Her eyes are fixed over Dean’s head, and she looks like she’s about three seconds away from passing out.
Cautiously, Dean looks back over his shoulder and up into the three hideous faces of the Furies.
So, here are the huge, leathery wings, blocking out the stars.
Ben’s distantly aware of his mom, holding him in her arms and shaking in terror, and of Dean, easing his arms out from underneath Ben and picking up his weird shiny sword, but Ben really only has eyes for the things looming over them, their eyes demon-black and unblinking.
“Tell us, little mortal,” the Furies say as one, the cacophony of their voices grating and harsh. “Why have you summoned us?”
Ben should be scared. He should be a puddle of whimpering goo by now, just like with every other supernatural thing he’s seen ever, because these are the Furies, creature of relentless vengeance; a demon, a succubus, and a vampire are nothing compared to them. But instead, there’s this limitless feeling of power, like when he’s just hit the ball way into the outfield and he’s taking every base at full throttle, knowing that he’s going to make a homerun, that the ball isn’t going to get across the field in time, that he’s fucking got this and there’s no power in the ‘verse that can stop him.
“Hermes killed my brothers and sisters with Titan magic,” Ben says, Apollo’s ricocheting memories guiding his words. “I accuse him of familicide.”
The Furies rustle their wings in agitation, and beside him, Dean mutters, “Shut up, Ben.”
Ben ignores him; he’s got this. “He murdered his own nieces and nephews. And he did the same to Poseidon and his offspring.”
The Fury in the middle crouches, bringing her huge teeth and claws that much closer to Ben. “Hermes, you say?”
“Yes.”
“Ben,” his mom says sharply then, “Please.”
“A weighty charge,” says the Fury on the left. She snaps her wing out and back, out of the circle, and sweeps a very confused looking Hermes back in. He looks back over his shoulder like he’s not quite sure how he got here. “Be sure, little mortal, that this is the one you accuse of such heinous crimes.”
“Yes.” Ben points at him for good measure. “That’s him.”
The look Hermes gives him could melt metal, but when he turns to the Furies, his eyes are wide and innocent. “What charges, my most vengeful mistresses? I’ve been occupied with lost travelers at Paddington Station this evening, from where you have just now pulled me, and I’m afraid I have no idea what is going on.”
The Fury on the right leans in, takes a long, deep sniff of Hermes.
Hermes steps back from her, an expression of offended disgust on his face. “Madam, please.”
“I know this one,” she says. “It’s the godling thief.”
The Fury on the left bends down to peer more closely at Hermes. He stumbles back from her a little. “Who?”
“He filched the man who killed his mother,” the first replies. “Remember? All those years ago, when we still roamed the up above?”
The smarmiest, most ingratiating smile appears on Hermes’s face. “Yes, you are correct. I am Hermes. I do confess that I removed Orestes from the path of your justice, but that was at the command of my older brother, and besides, I believe the matter was settled to everyone’s satisfaction.”
“Yes, Hermes Dolios, we recall the outcome of that trial and your thieving ways.” The one in the middle comes to her feet, stretches her wings up and back before folding them again. Something in the action suggests irritation and impatience, like she’s about as impressed with Hermes’s smile as Ben is. “The little mortal has made an accusation of familicide, and he’s not wrong. I can smell their blood on your hands. What do you say to that, Hermes Dolios?”
“Yes, answer, Hermes Dolios,” the left Fury says, a gleam of murderous delight in her eyes. “Tell us of your nephews and nieces, swallowed whole.”
“And your father’s brother.” The right one shakes her head. “Shameful.”
“And his uncle’s family,” the middle Fury says. “Greedy little godling.”
“Greedy,” the other two echo in agreement.
Hermes tugs down the hem of his vest nervously. “Well, ladies, I would say that you should perhaps question the boy about the blood on his hands. He killed his father right before my eyes, and used Apollo’s own arrow to do it.” He gestures towards Ben. “Look, there’s Apollo’s ichor still literally on his hands. Isn’t patricide a more damnable crime than a few mortal nephews and nieces?”
The beasts turn their black, bleeding eyes towards Ben. “Is that true, boy?”
Mom tightens her arm on his shoulder. “Dean,” she says with a trembling voice.
Dean starts to get to his feet, but Ben grabs his arm, doesn’t let him move. He can’t let Dean get caught in the crossfire.
“It was self defense.” Ben’s stomach is sinking like a lead weight; he’s got a bad feeling about this. “I had to do it.”
“Dammit, Ben, shut up.” Dean hisses in warning.
“Self-defense?” the middle Fury says. She crouches again, digs her claws into the earth like she just can’t wait to dig them into something else. “You do not deny it, then?”
Ben almost lies, but figures if there’s anyone he shouldn’t lie to, it’s the Furies. And besides, everyone keeps telling him what a bad liar he is. “No. I would have died if I hadn’t.”
“No fan of Apollo, me,” the one on the left chimes in, “but blood of a father spilled is blood of a father spilled.”
The one in the middle nods. “I would agree sister. Paternal blood spilled must be avenged.”
Ben frowns. “No, wait-”
“No.” Dean lunges to his feet, throws himself in front of Ben, arms wide. “No. He’s mine. I’m his father. Not Apollo.”
“Oh?” the Fury in the middle says. She leans down, gives him a good sniff, and Dean’s face twists in disgust. “You do smell of father, but not enough of father. It is unclear.”
“I am his father. I..I claim him.” Dean’s voice is all thick and raspy, and there’s this tremble in it he’s never heard before. “The kid’s mine. Has my taste in cars and music and... and... burgers, and dammit, he’s mine.”
The Fury leans to the side, past Dean. “Is that true, little mortal? Do you agree with his claim?”
Ben nods fervently. His eyes are burning and his own voice is thick when he speaks. “Yeah. Dean’s my dad.”
She turns her black, bleeding eyes on his mom. “And you, mother? Do you support this claim?”
“God, yes.” Her voice comes out as a croak. “Dean is his father.”
“A claiming is a claiming,” says the Fury on the left. “Even one that is thirteen years late.”
“Agreed, sister,” says the one on the right. “What say you, Tisiphone?”
The middle Fury -Tisiphone - pushes Dean aside with one huge clawed hand and leans into Ben. Dean yells something with a lot of swear words in it, and his mom makes an inarticulate cry of terror, but Ben holds himself steady and braces himself, that feeling of power gone now that the literal embodiment of vengeance is hovering over him. A puff of her breath rolls over him, and it’s awful, hot and damp, smelling just like rotting meat and sewage, just like the succubus in the woods when Artemis killed her. She inhales, long and deep, her hideous face so close that Ben can see the beads of blood welling around her eyes, can see the scales climbing her cheeks and the blood red eyes of the snakes writhing in her hair.
Black eyes bore into him like she knows Apollo was his father as much as Dean and is waiting for Ben to break and start blubbering out a confession. Ben meets her eyes evenly, because he’s made his choice, Dean is his dad, and if Ben ever kills him, then she is more than welcome to come for him then.
The stare off seems to last forever. Then she snaps her teeth once, right above his face, and withdraws. She comes to her full height and shakes out her wings.
“This man’s claim holds true. The boy is his child and is not guilty of familicide.”
Dean is back at Ben’s side in an instant. “You okay?” he asks, one hand resting on the top of his head.
“Yeah. I’m fine.” Ben’s vaguely aware that his parents - his parents - are fussing over him, and that Dean’s giving his mom instructions about making a run for it again, but Hermes is trying to sweet talk himself away from the Furies and Ben wants, no, needs, to see what happens next.
“Lovely, the matter’s settled, then,” Hermes says brightly. He claps his hands together, rubs them brusquely. “If the boy isn’t Apollo’s, then the children weren’t his brothers and sisters, and there is no complaint to be had. I will just be on my way.”
“What?” Ben says, and his parents are hushing him, but he slaps their hands away. “No, he murdered his family. You are supposed to punish him for it!”
“Your worries are unfounded, little mortal.” The Fury on the left grabs Hermes’s shoulder, digs her claws in to hold him in place; Hermes grimaces in pain as gold ichor dribbles down his shirt front. The Fury gives him another sniff, long and deep. “Your complaint may no longer be valid, but he still reeks of family blood.”
Hermes scoffs. “Only nieces and nephews, and barely that.”
“And Poseidon?” says Tisiphone. “How do you answer for your uncle’s murder?”
“Yes, how do you answer, brother?” says someone else, someone new.
A woman has suddenly joined the circle, completely out of place in her gray suit and high heels. Ben catches a glimpse of the real her, though, the helmet and the spear and the breast plate with a screaming gorgon, so maybe not that out of place, then.
The Furies rustle their wings in agitation.
“Areia,” says the Fury on the right.
“Tritogentia,” says the Fury on the left.
“Daughter of Zeus,” says Tisiphone, removing her finger from Hermes’ side and sucking off the gold ichor.
“And Basilea, now,” the woman says with no little pride. “I inherited my father’s kingdom and titles.”
“Athena, sister!” Hermes says with exuberant insincerity, even he twists in the grip of the Fury holding him, grimacing in pain as he tries to escape. “Tell these fine ladies that there is no injured party to level a complaint.”
The look Athena shoots Hermes says that if he were on fire, she wouldn’t pee on him to put him out.
“But here is someone to level the complaint, Hermes. Me.” She paces further into the circle, her heels sinking into the charred earth. “He slaughtered our uncle, our father’s brother. He devoured our nieces and nephews, our brother’s children, as if they were sacrifices on his altar. Family blood is family blood, honorable ladies, even when it is only the merest drop of ichor.”
“And the boy?” Tisiphone tilts her head, eyes Athena curiously. “He says the mortal man is his father, yet there is godly ichor bleeding from his wound and blackening on his clothing. What do you say to that?”
Athena looks at Ben for the first time, and his blood runs cold. It reminds him of the way all the things he had met had looked at him, hungry and malicious.
“The mortal has laid claim?” Her eyes flicker to Dean, briefly flashing gold. Her mouth twists with distaste. Ben sees Dean stiffen out of the corner of his eye; the shiny sword is in his hand again, and Ben really hopes he doesn’t start trying to stab people with it. “Well, who are we to deny the claiming?”
She turns back to the Furies. “Hermes on the other hand, is guilty of his crimes. This time, ladies, I see no reason for a trial. The blood is on his hands.”
Tisiphone nods solemnly. “We accept your grievance, Athena.”
“Hermes Dolios spilled family blood,” says the Fury on the right.
“Hermes Dolios must die,” says the Fury on the left.
“Wait, no!” Hermes is begging now, eyes huge and soulful, even though they gleam and shine with his golden numen. “Athena, I am your brother.”
Athena nods. “Yes, you are, and I love you. But you’ve committed Kronos’s sin, and that cannot stand.”
“What! No, I’m a god at full power, you can’t-“ Hermes’ indignant rant is cut short as Tisiphone stabs her entire hand into his chest.
Gold light erupts from Hermes’ chest, brighter than the fire, brighter than the sun. Ben’s eyes water and he has to look away from the glory of it.
“Hell fuels our justice, these days, godling thief.” The Furies are speaking as one again, their tripled voice like nails down a chalkboard. “We no longer answer to Father Zeus nor Queen Athena nor any other earth bound divinity, and Hell does not recognize your power. Your hands drip with the blood of your family. It is our right to avenge.”
“Shut your eyes!” Ben cries, realizing what’s about to happen. Apollo had been on the road to restored power, and his death had only blinded Ben temporarily, but Hermes had nearly made it back to his full power, and his death would do a whole lot worse.
Ben feels someone’s hands over his eyes, Dean’s probably, and he feels his mother’s forehead, pressed against his temple, and then there’s a horrific ripping sound, flesh tearing, bones popping from sockets, a cry of unimaginable pain as the Furies rip the god Hermes limb from limb.
There’s a flare of light, as bright as a supernova; he can see it through Dean’s hand and his own eyelids, can only imagine how Hermes’s death throes light up the world.
Then there’s darkness again and the roar of the fire and the sound of sloppy chewing and crunching bone.
Dean’s hand lifts away, and Ben opens his eyes slowly, finds Athena standing over them, her face as empty and hard as a stone statue.
“If you would like your claim on Ben to stand, Dean Winchester,” she says with a voice that is so cold and dry that Ben isn’t sure whether he is shivering from hypovolemic shock or just the sound of her voice, “I recommend taking the boy to a hospital before he bleeds out.”
Dean licks his lips, his expression almost as cold and hard as hers, and lifts Ben without any warning.
Ben cries out, the pain of being moved rattling outward from his chest. Dean mutters his apologies even as he comes to his feet, then they’re moving quickly, not quite at a run, but almost.
“Mom?” Ben mumbles into Dean’s chest, suddenly panicking. He just got her back. He can’t lose her again.
“She’s right here,” Dean says. “She’s okay, kiddo.”
“I’m fine, baby. I’m here.”
Ben nods against Dean’s arm, relieved, and realizes he can’t feel his fingers or toes. The shock is really starting to dig in, now. He huddles closer to Dean’s warmth and clutches a handful of Dean’s flannel shirt in his numb hand, the movement causing relentless pain. He’s so cold again, so cold and scared, and he knows he may not live through this.
At the tree line, Dean has to turn to the side to get them past a low hanging tree limb, and for a brief moment, Ben can see the fire raging across the wheat field, swept westward by the wind, and Athena, a black silhouette against the fire as she watches them go, and the great, leathery wings of the Kindly Ones, rising into the night as they feed, blocking out the stars.
I did that, he thinks.
Then things go black for awhile.
The man in the red vest sits down first.
There are five blue chairs in the hallway, and Ben is sitting in the one closest to the nurses’s station so the grownups can keep an eye on him. He’s trying be a good boy and color in his Lion King coloring book like Mommy asked, so when the man sits down at the other end of the row, Ben doesn’t pay him much attention.
But then the doctor sits down.
“Hi, there, Ben,” he says, bright and cheerful. He stretches one arm across the back of Ben’s chair, and Ben tenses. “I’m Dr. Acestor.”
Ben looks up from Simba and frowns at the doctor. “How’d you know my name?”
The doctor smiles. His teeth are really white and the corners of his eyes crinkle when he smiles. “Oh, I know a lot of stuff about you.”
Ben’s hunches his shoulders uncertainly. On the one hand, he knows he’s not supposed to talk to strangers. On the other, this stranger is a doctor and they’re at a hospital. Ben doesn’t know what to do, especially since this doctor seems to know him.
Ben glances towards his mom, standing on the far side of the nurses’s station, talking to Grandma’s doctor with Aunt Sarah. Aunt Sarah is crying, and Mommy is rubbing her back like she does to Ben when he is sad or scared. His tummy twists unpleasantly, and he looks away. He probably shouldn’t bother them right now.
He returns to carefully coloring in Simba’s body, hoping the doctor will just go away on his own, but he doesn’t.
“Whatcha coloring?” he asks.
Ben hesitates, because ignoring the doctor isn’t making him go away, and he’s not sure what to do next. Mommy says he’s not supposed to be rude, either, and not answering grownups when they ask a question is rude.
“A lion,” he finally says, but he keeps his eyes on his coloring book, hoping the doctor will take a hint.
“Cool,” the doctor says, not taking the hint at all. “That’s Simba, right?”
Ben nods. The man in the red vest laughs a little. The doctor doesn’t say anything, just watches him color. It’s sort of weird, and it makes Ben’s tummy twist even more. He wonders if he should go to his mom even though she’s not done talking to the doctor. He looks in her direction again. Aunt Sarah is crying loud and gross like a little kid now, and Mommy is still rubbing her back, even though tears are running down her face, too. Ben’s tummy feels really bad now, and he jerks his eyes back to Simba, keeps coloring him in careful, even strokes.
“So I hear your grandma is really sick,” the doctor says.
Ben freezes, the yellow crayon stopping in mid stroke.
“Hey, it’s okay, kiddo,” the doctor says gently and smoothes a hand over Ben’s head like Mommy would. “You can talk to me.”
A wave of warmth flows over Ben, and he’s not quite sure why he was so afraid to talk to the doctor a minute ago. He’s a doctor. They’re good guys. They help people.
“Mommy says Grandma might go live with Grandpa in heaven, soon.” His bottom lip starts to tremble. “Everyone says that Heaven is a good place, but if that’s true, why is everyone so sad that she’s going there?”
“I’m sorry to hear that, kiddo.” The doctor sounds sad. “People are always sad when people they love go to Heaven, even though it is a good place. But let me ask you something. Have you tried kissing her better?”
Ben shakes his head and starts coloring again, but he can’t seem to keep the yellow crayon inside the lines. His vision is kinda blurry. “I asked Mommy if she tried it, but she said that kissing it better only works on little kids. Grownups need hospital medicine to get better.”
“So you didn’t try?”
Ben shakes his head again. He doesn’t give a lot of kisses to Grandma, just the one when he and Mommy leave after Sunday dinners. He doesn’t like her very much. Her house smells funny, and he’s not allowed to touch anything, and she doesn’t have any toys he can play with. She’s kind of mean and she always gets mad when he gets bored at dinner and crawls under the table to play. When Ben complained about it, Mommy said it’s ‘cause she’s strict, which is a grownup word that means she has lots of stupid rules that she thinks little kids should follow.
Ben feels really bad about not liking her, but he can’t help it.
“Do you want to try it?” the doctor asks.
Ben stops coloring and looks up at the doctor, surprised. None of the other grownups had thought it was a good idea at all. “Kissing her better?”
The doctor nods.
“Do you think it would work?” Ben asks, the twisty feeling in his tummy easing a little.
“I think so. As long as you really, really want your grandma to get better.” The doctor leans in a little, drops his voice like he’s sharing a secret with Ben. “Do you really, really want your grandma to get better?”
Ben nods. Maybe he doesn’t give her a lot of kisses and maybe she’s strict, but it would be mean to want her to stay sick. And he knows Grandma is in a lot of pain, even though Mommy said the medicine the doctors were giving her were keeping her from feeling bad. The medicine’s not working though, and when he tried to tell his mom that, she just got all sad and told him to go play with his cars.
“Okay.” The doctor gets up and offers his hand. “Let’s go try while your mom and aunt are talking to the doctor.”
Ben stares up at the doctor, alarmed. “Mommy said I wasn’t s’pose to go in Grandma’s room.”
“I know you don’t want to get in trouble, kiddo, but how can you kiss your grandma better if you don’t go in her room?”
The doctor has a point, but Ben isn’t so sure about this. If he gets caught, Mom will take away his toys. But if Grandma gets better, maybe everyone will be so happy they will forget he broke the rules, and he won’t lose his toys. It seems like a big risk to take, but if he can do anything to help his grandma get better so she doesn’t have to go to Heaven yet, he should probably do it.
Ben checks on his mom again to see if she’s watching. The doctor is gone, and Mommy and Aunt Sarah are hugging each other and crying and not paying any attention to Ben at all. It’s scary, seeing them cry like that, and Ben decides that if he can make Mommy and Aunt Sarah happy again, he should try kissing grandma better, even if he does lose his toys forever.
Ben slides off the chair and takes the doctor’s hand.
They walk down the hall to Grandma’s room. The man in the red vest comes with them, too, but he stops in the doorway when they enter and hovers there, like he’s waiting on something.
The room is dark inside, except for a little lamp next to the bed, and there are a lot of machines, whirring and beeping and flashing their little lights. The doctor walks Ben to Grandma’s bed. Grandma looks so scary. She’s trembling all over, and has a whole bunch of tubes coming out of her, and doesn’t have any hair on her head. Her lips are moving like she’s talking to someone, but no sound is coming out, and her skin looks weird, stretched tight in some places and droopy in others, like it doesn’t quite fit her bones anymore.
Ben grips the doctor’s hand as hard as he can. That twisty feeling in his tummy is back again, even worse than before. He wants to run away, to find Mommy and hide his face in her neck and make her take him home.
The doctor crouches down next to him. “Don’t be afraid, Ben,” he whispers. He puts his big hand on Ben’s back and starts rubbing in circles. “This is just what sickness does to people, but you can make her better. Don’t you want your grandma to get better?”
Grandma looks so small in the bed, and she hurts. She hurts so bad.
Ben nods.
“Can you be brave just a little longer?
Ben swallows thickly and nods again.
The doctor smiles, all big and toothy. “That’s my boy.” He sweeps Ben up and sits him next to Grandma, and Ben clutches the sleeve of the doctor’s coat in terror. She looks so much worse up close. Ben can see all the blue veins under her skin, and her eyes are watery and unfocused. She smells bad, too, sort of sour and dusty.
“It’s okay, Ben, You’re doing great.” The doctor’s voice is soothing, and Ben relaxes as he rests a hand on Ben’s shoulder and keeps it there. “Now, this is important. Before you kiss her, you have to tell her what to do, okay? Tell her she has to get better so she knows what to do with your kiss.”
“Okay.” Ben takes a deep breath like he always does when Mommy has to pull off a Band Aid, and leans down to whisper in her ear, “Grandma, you gotta get better, okay?”
And then he kisses her on the cheek like he always does when it’s time to leave after Sunday dinner, but this time there’s a quick flash of light, bright and yellow like sunshine, and Ben jerks back, startled.
“Oh, good job, Ben,” the doctor says, all smiles. He pats Ben on the back. “I think that’s one of the best kissing betters I’ve ever seen.”
Ben’s confused though. Nothing has changed. He can tell. “But she’s still sick, and she hurts.”
“Well, you’re only four, kiddo. You have to be a lot older for kissing better to work right away, but give her a few days, and she’ll be right as rain.”
Ben narrows his eyes at the doctor. “Are you sure?”
“I am.” The doctor makes a big X across his chest with one finger. “Cross my heart and hope to die.”
Ben considers that for a minute. That’s a pretty big promise to make. “Okay,” he says with a nod. “I believe you.”
“Benjamin Isaac Braden!”
Ben jumps at the sound of his mom’s voice, not loud, but sharp. Mommy is in the doorway, hands on her hips. Aunt Sarah is behind her, sniffling into a tissue, Ben’s Lion King coloring book and his crayons clutched in one hand. The doctor is nowhere to be found.
“What are you doing in here?” Mom comes over to the bed and scoops him up. “I thought I told you to stay in the chair.”
Ben hunches his shoulders. He’s about to lose his toys. He can tell because she used his full name. “I was just kissing her better.”
Aunt Sarah lets out a loud sob, and Mommy’s eyes get all wet.
“Oh, baby. I’m sure she feels better already.” His mom cuddles him close and sniffles a little, kisses him on the top of his head. Aunt Sarah makes a whimpering sobbing noise and rubs Ben’s back. No one seems to be mad anymore, and Ben is a little confused. Does this mean he gets to keep his toys?
After a minute, Mom pulls back a little to look at him and smoothes down his hair. “Ready to go home? Aunt Sarah is going to stay tonight, but we’ll come back tomorrow, okay?”
Ben nods and puts his arms around her neck. Going home sounds like a really good idea. Now that he’s not worried about getting in trouble, he’s suddenly really, really tired. He’s feels as tired as he does when he and Mommy go to Miss Annie’s house, and he gets to swim in her big pool all day. Mommy and Aunt Sarah start talking about when they will come back tomorrow, and Ben rests his cheek on Mommy’s shoulder, his eyes starting to droop. Mommy’s voice is a nice rumble under his ear, and he’s just about to fall asleep when he hears someone say, “You cheated.”
Ben opens his eyes. The doctor and the man in the red vest are standing in the doorway of Grandma’s room, looking at Ben. The doctor smiles and waves by wiggling his fingers, but the man in the red vest is pouting like a little kid, hands shoved into his pockets.
“Did not,” says the doctor. “I helped him a little to keep him from hurting himself, but the healing was all Ben.”
“Fine.” The man in the red vest pouts more and slaps a twenty dollar bill into the doctor’s palm. “You’ve made a hero. Good on you.”
“Oh, don’t be like that, baby brother.” The doctor snaps the bill taut a couple of times and winks at Ben. “It’s just twenty dollars. Besides, I thought you’d be impressed with my trickery.”
Mom says bye to Aunt Sarah and walks out of the room. The doctor and the man in the red vest part to let her pass, but Mommy doesn’t seem to notice. They fall into step behind them as Mommy heads for the elevators down the hall, and Ben lifts his head to watch them over her shoulder.
“This is not trickery,” the man in the red vest says, motioning towards Ben. “This is blatant stupidity, Apollo. You didn’t just muck about with an angel vessel, you mucked around with an archangel vessel.”
Ben has no idea what they’re talking about, and he’s not sure if he’s being called stupid or not. He decides he doesn’t like the man in the red vest, and scowls at him to let him know.
“Yeah, well,” the doctor says with a shrug and puts the money into his pocket. “The way I see it, if you're gonna build a time machine into a car, why not do it with some style?”
The man in the red vest rolls his eyes. “You’re quoting mortal movies, now? You’ve been spending too much time with the Muses again.”
The doctor sighs. “At least they don’t pout like a sullen little baby when they lose bets.”
Mommy stops at the elevator and pushes the down button. The doctor and the man in the red vest stop just behind them like they’re waiting, too.
“Well, I hope all the divinity you put into the kid was worth it when one of the angels shows up to smite your numen into dust.” The man in the red vest is looking at Ben with his mouth turned down in a mean way, and Ben tightens his arms around Mommy’s neck.
Just then, the elevator dings and opens. Mommy steps in, but the doctor and the man in the red vest don’t. The doctor gives Ben a little wave; Ben smiles and waves back.
“He’s four years old, and he just cured a terminal case of stage four pancreatic cancer by giving his grandmother a kiss on the cheek. Trust me, Hermes,” Ben hears the doctor say just before the doors close, “It was worth it.”
Next: Dead Gods: Fifteen
Previous: Dead Gods: Thirteen
Back to the Master Post