I FIGHT • I BATTLE

@mxrnamai                /               don’t blow this

The rain on the roof of the car was soothing. Hermes could have nodded off there, feet propped on the dashboard in the warm dark, lingering amidst the smoke that hung heavily in the interior. But he pulled a drag on his cigarette, leaning forward to peek around the massive frame of his brother filling the driver’s seat.

“That’s the place,” he said, pointing out the window with the ember glowing between his two fingers. “Warehouse docks. Real predictable. But where else can you find that perfect ambiance for an underground boxing ring?” He sniffed, rubbing once at the tip of his nose. “Smells like Po’s place. Fish makes me gag, I’m dying here.”

He ashed on the floor of the car, heedless to the way it made the pricey floor mat sizzle with the burn.  "So you know I love your way of doing things,“ he continued, knocking once against Ares’ arm to be sure he had his attention. "Fists first, barge in, I love it. Pristine. But I think, and correct me if I’m wrong, we might need a more subtle approach to get the maximum yield here. Since, you know. They have guns. And they’re looking for people causing trouble. So I think we should ease in, scope it out, watch some of the fight. Place a bet or two,” he added under his breath. “And then we decide what to do from there. Read the room. And by that I mean, let me read the room.”

Ares was staring with a dogged attention at the comings and goings of the warehouse docks. If and what he retained of that good quarter of an hour was questionable at most, and it was a certainty that he had little aptitude to interpret or compose any sort of tactic around what information he’d gathered.

Not that he was aware of his shortcomings. Or thought of them as such. Sure, Ares wasn’t anywhere near at clever as wheedling and wheeling Hermes. But he was underboss to his father’s operation. And that had to count for something. Status. Respect. Lead on a smash and grab job his father saw important enough to leave in his hands.

“Is that why you wanted in on the job?” Ares asked dispassionately, craning his neck to see around a high stack of crates making up the warehouse entrance’s cover. “Dad told me to take you along. Told me you wanted in. Guess you thought you were gonna pull one over on me, ahn? Tell my dad you’re the brains of the operation? You think he’s gonna—what? Reward you? Give you a raise? Doesn’t work like that. Not without my endorsement, and you know it.” He let out a disbelieving laugh through his nose. “Wouldn’t be surprised if you came here to gamble, either.”

@mxrnamai           /         myth verse

Aerith woke to the sound of men’s voices in the distance, bouncing through the trees like the calls of hunting hounds. The echoes made it hard to tell—the forest had a way of twisting and warping sound like roots—but it sounded like they were nearing her clearing. She sat up amidst her flower bed, upturning a flurry of petals that scattered as she scrambled to her feet to cordon off her patch of lilies.

She was grumbling about hunters and their stupid, heavy feet (perfect for stomping flowers) when the pair of them emerged from the treeline, spattered in garish red and grey-brown dirt, bearing the stench of sweat and soil. But one glowed a golden sheen, bearing a bow with the grace of a harp, and the other seethed a bloody red with a spear clutched in his hand.

Ugh, she said to herself. Olympians.

“No hunting in this grove,” she called over, not bothering to stand from within the lounge of her flower petals. “Lady Artemis says so. She’ll have words for you, brother or no.”

Hunting with Apollo was a joke, for how inviolable his skill with a bow and arrow was. While Ares was not without facility in handling the weapon, he did not possess what could be considered a comparable competence. Which irritated the competitive god to no end. At least his prowess with a spear was unmatched. He’d crow about that for at least an age, surely.

But the hart they’d felled was almost an equal effort between them, at least by his estimation. Apollo was currently covered in the same hematological mess he was, their hands still slick with blood as they trudged through the wood for the sake of exploration, leaving the hart to the worms and the weather. 

A high, lyric voice interrupted their pointless taunting, like a thread of silver catching the light. Ares’ ears were rakishly attuned to the sound of distinctly beautiful voices, and his eyes swept the field to find the source of it. Anthusae were uncommon to witness, and Ares was doubly intrigued at the sight of she who warned them as though they were boy needing minding and not omnipotent gods.

Group Verse: Theomachy

Name: Ares, God of War

Faction: Areion

God or Hero: Woken God

Abilities/Skills:   overwhelming strength and physicality, 

Brief Bio:  The gods exist in the modern age, thoughtform potentates ensual of the mores of the times. It is a time of revolution and war, where campaigns and crusades are fought on battlefields and intellectual spheres alike. It is a time of upheaval, of change necessitated by violence and vehemence. 

Ares flourishes in the fallout. Enmity is his sustenance and delectation. His power grows so great that he easily becomes the most puissant of the Dodekathelion, waging war on Olympus to wrest the throne of his father’s hands. Zeus deposed, Ares rules on high, a reign of war and chaos that threatens the whole world.

He makes deals with mortals for alliances, most notably the King of Macedonia, who offers him the employ of his own íroas, the great heros under his command: Aiden ( Achilles / @catclawer ) Banshee ( Ajax / @4fourth ), Cullen ( Ulysses / @duxbellatorum ), and Hawke ( Hercules / @bluebirdy ). Ares takes them all, and also spirits away his queen ( @eromai ) who he suspects to be the reincarnated form of his greatest lover, Aphrodite. 

Hera: Ares.

Ares:

“Then use your eyes and not your intellect, my darling. Gods know you need to save what you have.”