I settled into the couch across from Lucius, the warm porcelain cup cradled in my hands as steam curled up toward my face. The tea smelled like chamomile and something faintly floral, probably one of Alfred's blends that had found its way into my office through Lucius's briefcase. I took a sip, letting the warmth settle into my chest, and gestured for him to continue.
"So," I said. "Tell me how the company's been running without me babysitting it. And this so called God that paid us a visit."
Lucius settled into the chair across from me, crossing one leg over the other with the easy ease of a man who'd spent decades in boardrooms. "Functioning like clockwork, mostly Mr. Dawn. The contracts with the city and federal government are proceeding right on schedule. Donations are steady, if not growing. And R&D finally cracked that durability issue with the modular housing units. Should cut construction time on disaster relief housing by almost forty percent."
"That's good news as always Lucious," I said, and I meant it. Even with the world threatening to end, it was nice to hear that some small part of it was still moving in the right direction. "I take it this is where a 'but' comes in."
Lucius gestured with one finger before taking a slow sip of his tea, clearly savoring the moment of suspense he was building. "You'd be right to sense that. About two and a half weeks ago, a woman walked into the lobby saying she was a god. And she was... very distracting."
I raised an eyebrow, intrigued. "Distracting how?"
He took a moment, visibly searching for the right words, his brow furrowing slightly. "She was eye-catching. That's the only way I can describe it. No one could take their eyes off her. Staff, clients, security, it didn't matter who they were." He set his cup down and rose, walking over to my desk. His fingers moved across the keyboard with the practiced efficiency.
I swear this man understood every system in this building better than I did. A moment later, the monitor flickered to life, pulling up a security feed.
I leaned forward, studying the high definition footage. A woman stood in the center of my lobby, radiant olive skin catching the light from the overhead fixtures, long auburn hair cascading past her shoulders in soft waves. Her eyes glowed amber, an unnatural warmth to them that no contact lens could replicate. She wore a reddish-pink dress, tight and form-fitting, hugging every curve of her body and putting her cleavage on generous, unapologetic display.
"She's quite the looker," I admitted.
"Describe what you see," Lucius said, his tone carrying a strange weight.
I frowned, confused by the request but obliging anyway. "Olive skin. Auburn hair. Amber eyes. Reddish dress. Why?"
"Because I don't see that," Lucius said quietly. "Even watching the same footage, everyone in this building saw someone different. Some of the younger staff swore up and down she was a famous actress. One of my security men thought she was a singer he'd had a crush on in college. I...." He paused, and something almost embarrassed crossed his face. "I saw my wife. From our college days."
That sent a chill down my spine, and made me have a bit more respect for the older man. "And she told you she was a god?"
Lucius nodded. "She did. Quite plainly, actually. With no hesitation what so ever."
"Did she say from what pantheon? Or what she wanted?"
"She said she was a very close friend of your grandfather," Lucius said. "I assumed she meant on your mother's side. Which would make her part of the Greek pantheon." He tapped his chin thoughtfully. "And given the effect she had on my staff, the way people saw whatever their heart desired most... I've already eliminated Hera, Nike, Athena, and Psyche from the list. My money is on Aphrodite."
I sighed, dragging a hand down my face. Of course it was Aphrodite. Why was she here? Did Ares tell her what happened when we met, or is this something else entirely?
Lucius's gaze shifted, drifting past my shoulder toward the private balcony behind me. "Speak of the god herself."
I turned and my eyes widened. And there she was.
The same woman from the footage stood just beyond the glass door, though something about her had changed. Her hair had darkened to a rich brown, styled with soft curls that framed her face, and her olive skin now carried a deeper, sun-kissed glow, as though she'd stepped fresh from some Mediterranean beach that existed outside of time. She wore a professional dress now, form-fitting but tasteful, the kind of outfit a high-powered executive might wear to close a billion-dollar deal.
"What the bloody hell is she doing," I muttered under my breath.
The woman raised a gloved hand and knocked politely against the glass, as if she hadn't just materialized on the balcony of a skyscraper thirty stories up. I stood, crossed the room, and opened the door.
She stepped inside with the fluid confidence of someone who had never once in her existence doubted her welcome anywhere. "Thank you," she said, her voice carrying a posh English accent that immediately did something strange to the back of my mind, a subtle pull, like a hook sinking gently beneath skin. "You are a hard young man to find, Caius Dawn."
"I've been busy," I said, trying to keep my tone level.
She chuckled, the sound was smooth and deliberately sophisticated, laced with an undercurrent of sensuality that radiated from everything about her, her posture, the way her gaze lingered, the slow roll of her hips as she moved further into the room. It was all clearly intentional. Not that I minded watching a beauty like her move.
"I would like to speak with you about some family matters," she said, glancing toward Lucius. "Alone, if you don't mind."
Lucius, ever the gentleman, rose immediately. But there was something different in his eyes now, a strange spark of renewed energy that hadn't been there moments before.
"Go give your missus a spontaneous surprise," Aphrodite said sweetly. "She will love it."
Lucius blinked, and then smiled, wide and unguarded in a way I'd rarely seen from him. "I will do just that," he said, and walked out of my office like a man twenty years younger.
Aphrodite watched him go with a satisfied smile. "Those two will be making love quite passionately tonight."
I stared at her. "Did you really need to say that?"
She turned back to me, unbothered. "Now. Back to you." She extended a hand, palm down, fingers elegantly curled, the universal gesture of a woman expecting a kiss upon her knuckles. "Let me introduce myself properly. I am The Goddess of Love, beauty, passion, and procreation. Aphrodite. Hello, Caius Dawn, it is a honor to finally meet you in person."
I looked at her hand, then back up at her face, and leaned back against the edge of my marble desk, crossing my arms. "So, what do you, or the gods, want?"
Her smile faltered for just a moment, replaced by something like mock offense. "Right to business, then. I do rather fancy pleasantries. But I suppose you're not offering your guest, a lady no less, a drink or snacks either. Maybe you take after your grandfather more than I thought."
"I'm kind of in the middle of something important," I said. "So forgive me if I skip the small talk."
"You mean the Viltrumite invasion," she said, settling gracefully into the chair Lucius had vacated and pouring herself a cup of tea as though she owned the room. "Or the search for that nasty little underground ring of human or technically metahuman traffickers, in this context."
I narrowed my eyes. "If you already know about that, then I'm guessing the gods want me and the other heroes to save someone. Or kill someone."
"A bit of both, actually," she said, sipping delicately. "On the trafficking matter, one of the god's spawns found themselves captured and sold off. Quite nasty business. So Zeus wants you heroes, mainly you, to rescue the boy. And while you're at it, kill everyone associated with that ring. Just make sure that nasty headmaster survives. He's to be delivered to us. Alive."
I closed my eyes briefly, already feeling the headache building. "Of course Zeus has another bastard child. And of course that child happens to be caught up in a trafficking ring. Poor kid." I opened my eyes again. "I'd ask why he doesn't handle it himself, but something tells me the pantheon doesn't get involved unless it's specifically a 'godly' matter."
Aphrodite sipped her tea, unhurried. "You're half right."
"Meaning?"
"Zeus and Hera still have an agreement," she said. "She and certain other gods are forbidden from harming him directly. So instead, she goes after his children. I'm certain you know your history, considering it's also your family's history. Between your great-grandparents."
I raised an eyebrow, the implication settling over me slowly, ugly and inevitable. "Are you telling me Hera is the reason this kid ended up in a trafficking ring?"
"Of course not, Caius," she said, sounding almost offended. "Hera is a great many things, but she would rather kill her enemies outright than make them suffer slowly. We Olympians aren't monsters."
I let out a short, incredulous laugh. "Really? The Greek pantheon, which is essentially one long allegory for a failing, abusive monarchy, a ruling family that was supposed to lead and protect its people and instead abused them at every turn? The hubris of your family is beyond appalling."
Her expression shifted, cooling slightly, but I kept going.
"Considering my great-grandfather, the king of the gods, bound Prometheus to a rock for eternity after he stole fire to give to humanity. Sent an eagle to eat his liver every single day, only for it to grow back overnight so the torment could start all over again. And then he punished all of humanity for it, created Pandora and gave her that jar full of every evil imaginable, just to spite mortals who'd done nothing but receive a gift."
"Caius...."
"Or my great-grandmother," I continued, not stopping. "Who prolonged the agonizing labor of Zeus's lover Alcmene out of spite, and turned her servant Galanthis into a weasel simply for tricking the birth goddess into letting the child be born. Who drove Alcides, or Hercules, mad with rage until he slaughtered his own family, and then forced him through twelve labors to atone for a crime she herself had orchestrated. And made sure those labors were far harder than they were ever meant to be."
"That is quite enough....."
"Where do I even start with great-uncle Poseidon?" I said, my voice rising now, years of buried resentment finally finding an outlet. "The assault on Medusa in Athena's own temple, and then the flooding of entire kingdoms out of pure spite when things didn't go his way."
"Caius."
"Or great-aunt Athena," I pressed on. "What she did to Medusa afterward, punishing the victim instead of the attacker. What she did to Arachne over a simple weaving contest. Or you, Aphrodite. What you did to Psyche. To Myrrha. To the Daughters of Cinyras. Need I say more?"
The room shook.
It happened so suddenly that I nearly lost my footing, an invisible pressure crashing down from every direction at once, the air growing thick and heavy, hard to breathe, hard to move through. Aphrodite's expression had gone cold, her smile still technically present but utterly devoid of warmth, a mask stretched too tight over something furious underneath.
I planted my feet, forcing myself to stay upright despite the divine weight pressing down on me, gritting my teeth against it. It hurt, but it didn't break me. My Viltrumite physiology and divine blood ran through my veins held the line.
After a long moment, she exhaled, and the pressure vanished as quickly as it had come, leaving the room feeling strangely empty in its absence.
"Fine, Caius," she said, her voice flat. "We gods have made mistakes. I won't insult either of us by pretending otherwise. But I did not come here to relitigate ancient history."
"Then what else do you want?" I asked, straightening up, willing my racing heart to slow. "I'm already planning to save the kid and take down the ring leaders regardless. If you want the headmaster delivered to you personally, I'm going to need a better reason than 'because we God's said so.'"
Her smile returned, sharper this time. "The gods want to handle him personally because he is attempting to bring an unstoppable force into this world. One that even the entire pantheon, standing together, could not stop."
I already knew who she meant before she said it. Brother Blood. High priest of the Church of Blood, a man obsessed with expanding his twisted religion across the globe, brainwashing the desperate and the broken, purging nonbelievers to establish total spiritual supremacy. A man who could drink the blood of heroes and villains alike and steal fragments of their power for himself. But that was only the surface of it. The Church of Blood worshipped Trigon as their supreme deity, and as its high priest, Brother Blood's ultimate purpose was to drag his master into the mortal realm. Except he didn't want to serve Trigon. He wanted to devour him. Steal his power outright.
I remembered running into members of his church back when the Titans were first forming. They'd been obsessed, all of them, with capturing one person in particular. Raven, since she was the child of Trigon and his key to getting into our world.
"This man is Brother Blood," Aphrodite confirmed. "And he intends to summon Trigon into your world."
"I figured as much," I said. "But without my friend Raven, good luck with that. Last I spoke to her, years ago before she disappeared, she told me she'd have to be emotionally open, willing, to let her father cross over. Of her own volition."
Aphrodite's expression shifted, something almost pitying crossing her features. "Well, unfortunately, they have your friend. And it's only a matter of time before they break her mind enough to make her willing."
My blood went cold. "What? When? How? She's been missing for almost six years."
"She hid herself well," Aphrodite said. "On some Native American reservation, tucked away from prying eyes, human and otherwise. But she left recently, for reasons unknown to me, and was picked up two days ago." She paused, watching me carefully. "If I were you, I would move quickly."
So that's her game, I thought bitterly. Get the mortals to stop the apocalypse so the gods don't have to lift a finger. Let the heroes do all the dying while Olympus watches from a safe distance. God, I hate the gods. Which is ironic, considering I'm technically part god myself.
"Okay," I said, forcing my voice steady. "I'll let the League and my friends know. What else? Are the gods planning to help with the Viltrumite invasion at all?"
Aphrodite paused, considering her words carefully. "You'll have to speak with Zeus directly about that. Once you've delivered Brother Blood."
I didn't like that answer one bit. I knew how fickle the gods could be about helping mortals, even when the fate of the entire world hung in the balance. Though, considering the Grand Regent himself was technically the child of a New God, maybe I could leverage that for at least a little divine assistance. But knowing how these things typically played out, even with the world on the line, the gods rarely intervened directly. Probably because even if Earth burned to ash, they could simply relocate somewhere else. A new planet. A new dimension. It would probably cost them nothing.
"I'll consider it," I said. "If that's all, I need to set up a meeting with the school that psychopath runs."
"There are two more things," she said.
I sighed, rubbing a hand down my face. "Of course there are. What?"
She smiled, and something in her expression shifted into something almost gentle. "You are so much more powerful than you realize, Caius. Since you are of our blood, know that the gods have been watching you since you were young. Even the Endless have taken notice."
My eyes widened. The Endless. The second most powerful cosmic forces in the entire multiverse, second only to the Presence and the Overvoid themselves. They'd had their eyes on me?
"Which of them?" I asked carefully. depending on who has there eye on me I should be worried.
"Two, in particular," she said. "Destiny. And that cutie, Death, I believe she fancies you. And I don't believe I've ever seen her show that kind of interest in anyone before." Her gaze swept over me appraisingly. "From what I can see, you have far more potential than you've tapped into so far."
I didn't know how to respond to that. My mind was still trying to wrap itself around the concept.
"Listen, Caius," Aphrodite continued, her tone shifting, growing more serious. "War is coming to Earth. And soon, you will have to choose a side."
"Why do I get the feeling you don't mean the Viltrumites," I said slowly. "Is there another civil war brewing in Olympus?"
Her smile turned rueful. "Unrest is stirring. Some gods want action, real action, while others wish to correct old mistakes and undo punishments that have lasted centuries, millennia even. Just know that you will be recruited eventually. Consider this a piece of friendly advice."
I narrowed my eyes at her. "And the last thing?"
"Yes," she said, setting her teacup down with deliberate care. "I heard from Psyche that you spoke with Ares recently. Correct?"
"Yes. Why?"
"Please, tell me how he looked. And do you know where he is now?" Her voice had taken on an edge of urgency now. "He's been difficult to find. Not even Zeus can locate him currently. And him appearing to you in his full divine form, that was the first time any of us have noticed him doing so in longer than I care to admit."
I frowned, genuinely confused. Was Ares avoiding his family? Avoiding Aphrodite specifically? Maybe both. But why? This makes no sense, but it could explain why when I met him he had a deep and natural Irish accent. Because he spent who knows how long living in Ireland, maybe.
"He met me," I said slowly. "Tried to give me advice, honestly, but it pissed me off, so we didn't talk much before he left. He gave me this coin, told me to burn it if I ever wanted to talk again. Said we'd talk like adults next time." I paused. "He was more disciplined than I expected. More reserved. He only hit me once."
Her eyes fixed on the golden coin as I pulled it from my desk and held it up between two fingers. "I will need that coin, thank you."
"No," I said flatly, closing my fist around it.
Her expression flickered with frustration. "Why? Why can't you or the other gods just talk to him directly?"
"It's not your business," she said, her tone suddenly cold. "It's god business."
"You mean adulterous lover business," I said. "Last I checked, you and my grandfather have had one long on-and-off affair for centuries. What, did you two finally have a lovers' quarrel? Or did he found someone better?"
Her smile vanished entirely, replaced by a cold, hard stare, her voice dropping into something low and dangerously serious. "Listen here, boy. I am the goddess of love. I am the most beautiful woman in this world and every other. There is no one better he could possibly find. Now give me the coin, or you will learn exactly what it means to be cursed by a god."
I felt a flicker of nervousness at that. Gods and their curses were nothing to scoff at, I knew that much. But I also knew Zatanna, Doctor Fate, and a handful of other divine and magical heroes personally. Combined with my Viltrumite and demigod physiology, she couldn't do much to actually hurt me, or twist my mind too far.
I smirked despite the tension in the room. "What are you going to do, curse me to smell bad? Make me fall madly in love with a parent figure? Joke's on you, goddess. My hybrid pheromones already make my love life an absolute nightmare, since I don't even know who it'll happen with next. So really, what else could you possibly do to me?"
Aphrodite's smile returned, small and knowing, and for one brief, uncomfortable second I felt like I shouldn't have run my mouth quite so freely. She rose gracefully, moving toward the door to my private balcony without another word about the coin. At the threshold, she paused, glancing back over her shoulder.
"Little Caius. Your love life could get so much worse." Her tone softened, almost gentle now. "My word of advice: seal the deal with the Kryptonian girl you imprinted with. Unlike you, she still has her maidenhood intact. But she is already frustrated enough as it is. She lost her entire world. She's forced to live on an underdeveloped planet compared to everything she once knew. And she watches you get flirted with by every other girl who crosses your path while she keeps her distance out of some misguided sense of pride and duty. Those kinds of things can drive a girl mad with rage, Caius."
And then she opened the door, stepped through it, and vanished, as though she'd never been there at all.
I stood there for a long moment after she disappeared, letting everything she'd said settle over me.
So the gods were watching everything happening on Earth. And still, they weren't doing anything remotely helpful. Typical. Brother Blood had Raven. I sighed, remembering something she'd told me once, that her mother had been half Native American, half Indian entirely. It explained her fair skin and raven-black hair, the way she could pass for either heritage depending on the light. I felt stupid for not connecting those dots sooner. But the sooner the Titans knew, the better.
I should let Donna and Diana know about a possible civil war brewing in Olympus too. And another thought nagged at me, uninvited. Why had Aphrodite brought up Kara specifically? It had been Kara's idea to keep some distance between us in the first place. I'd never once told her not to sleep with other people. But something about the way Aphrodite had said it left an uneasy feeling settling low in my stomach, a feeling that things were about to get a lot more complicated.
Fortress of Solitude
Kara sat in a hovering chair at the round crystalline table, her posture stiff, arms crossed loosely over her chest. Across from her, Superman and Superboy sat with matching expressions. At the foot of the table, Krypto lay sprawled across a low bed, ears perked.
"Kelex informed me that the constant yellow sun therapy has mitigated the effects of the Viltrumite hybrid pheromones," Superman said, his voice gentle but direct. "The ones causing you and Superior to imprint on one another. But how do you actually feel, Kara? I know this is a sensitive subject."
Kara shrugged, trying to play it off with practiced casualness. "Listen, Kal, it's kind of a woman thing. Ovulation, biology, all that. Eve and Kelex have walked me through everything I need to know. And yeah, it sucks sometimes. But I'll keep doing the therapy, and I'll keep contact with Caius to a minimum, just to be safe." She managed a small smile. "Thanks for not blowing this out of proportion, or making a big deal out of it."
"Of course," Superman said, nodding.
Superboy leaned forward slightly, his brow furrowed in genuine curiosity rather than judgment. "Kara, couldn't you just, you know, sleep with him once, with protection, and get it out of your system? Or with someone else entirely? I'm not trying to sound insensitive here, but from the way Kelex described it, once you actually mate with him, the symptoms lessen significantly. Right?"
"Unfortunately, no, Conner," Superman said before Kara could answer, his tone firm. "The symptoms only lessen once impregnation is complete." He paused, choosing his next words carefully. "The physical, sensual stimulation aspect of it can lessen with the..." He hesitated again, clearly uncomfortable navigating this particular conversation with his younger cousin sitting right there. "Look. Kara doesn't need to feel pressured into sleeping with anyone before she's ready. That's not how this works."
Kara felt her face heat with embarrassment, the two of them essentially dissecting her sex life over a conference table like it was a tactical briefing. "Okay, can we please drop this?" she said, a little more sharply than she intended. "Let's talk about something else. Kal, I want to come with you and the others to Warworld."
Both Superman and Superboy looked up, visibly caught off guard.
"Absolutely not," Superman said immediately. "There's a real possibility the Viltrumites or their allies will show up there."
"Exactly why I should go," Kara pressed. "You need heavy hitters out there. Earth has plenty already, Caius, Conner, and Icon is staying behind too. And since I'm bonded to Caius, none of the other Viltrumite pheromones will be able to affect me."
Superman studied his cousin for a long moment, clearly torn. "I don't want to put you in more harm's way, Kara."
"Look," she said, softer now, "I'll be more focused and useful on this mission than I would be here at the trafficking ring situation. I need this. I've had so much pent-up stress since I came out of the Phantom Zone two years ago. Plus this pheromone situation. I think cutting loose for a bit would actually be good for me."
Superboy spoke up again, glancing between the two of them. "Why not let her go? Caius and I have Earth covered, along with the other heroes. And honestly, Kara could use some time off-planet. Maybe she'll find some advanced tech out there to bring back, something that makes her feel a little more at home."
Kara smiled at superboy happy he said that.
Superman sat in silence for a long moment, weighing it, before finally exhaling. "Fine. I'll make the call. Can you be ready to leave in ten minutes?"
Supergirl was gone in a blur of motion and back again before he'd even finished the sentence, already dressed and ready. "I'm already ready."
Gotham Harbor
A green portal tore open in the air near a condemned stretch of Gotham Harbor, the place still scarred from some recent explosion. Rusted shipping containers lay toppled and half-sunken in the black water, and cracked concrete jutted up at odd angles like broken teeth.
A hooded figure stepped through the portal and into the ruined lot, his boots crunching against broken glass and scorched debris. He stood still for a long moment, surveying the destruction around him, his hands slowly curling into tight, trembling fists at his sides. The darkness of his hood swallowed most of his face, leaving only the faint glint of eyes visible beneath the shadow.
"It was you, Guardian," he said, his voice low, seething with restrained fury. "You ruined everything I worked hard to build." He took a step forward, boots dragging slightly through the ash. "But I know who you truly are. The Viltrumite. Invincible." His voice cracked with barely contained hatred. "I know that across the multiverse, you have killed, and harmed, and destroyed millions in the drunkenness of your own power. I want you dead. I will kill you. Dead."
He reached into his coat and withdrew something small, an object that looked, at first glance, like nothing more than a black pen, sleek and unmarked. He turned it over in his hand once, studying it with a strange kind of reverence.
"I searched all across the multiverse," he murmured. "And I found my key to doing it. I won't make the same mistake the other one made."
He raised the pen and pressed its tip against his own chest, directly over his heart.
"Will this appease you?" he asked no one. "To give me your power?"
A thin beam of crimson light burst from the device, punching a clean hole through his sternum. He staggered, then collapsed to the cracked concrete below, his body crumpling awkwardly, blood pooling dark and slow beneath him.
For a moment, there was only silence.
Then an eerie black light began to bloom above the corpse, spreading like ink dropped into still water. Within that light, a figure took shape, a woman with blue-toned skin, bald, one side of her face marred with an old, deep scar. She held a heavy leather-bound book cradled against her hip, and her expression carried a slow, satisfied smile as she looked down at the body below her.
"Yes," she said, her voice carrying an ancient, resonant weight. "This is a sufficient price." She tilted her head, studying the corpse with something like approval. "Angstrom Levy, of Earth. You are the physical embodiment of Death itself." Her smile widened slightly. "Now. Rise."
A black ring shot through the air and settled onto the dead man's finger, and a wave of black and gray light erupted outward from the corpse, washing over the ruined harbor like a tide. The body twitched, then rose, joints cracking and resetting themselves as a black lantern uniform materialized across his form, sleek and merciless, an emblem glowing faintly at his chest.
Angstrom Levy stood slowly, flexing his newly resurrected fingers, studying the ring now fused to his hand with something like fascination.
"What do I call you?" he asked, his voice steadier now, colder.
"You may call me Scar," she said. "Guardian of the Black Lantern Corps."
Angstrom's mouth curled into a slow, hungry smile. He raised one hand and tore open another green portal, the same sickly light spilling out across the harbor once more, his black cape billowing softly in the wind that followed.
"Well then, Scar," he said. "Let's go build an army."
"The Blackest Night will soon be upon this universe," Scar said, her voice echoing with quiet certainty as she began to levitate toward the open portal, the black book still clutched at her side. "And everyone will know the name Zekron."
She drifted through the portal first, unhurried, and Angstrom followed close behind her, his cape trailing after him like a shadow given form. " And soon Invincible will pay."
The portal closed behind them, sealing the ruined harbor back into darkness and silence.