AresJoxerCupidStrife - Raven

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11 Part 12 Part 13 Part 14

TITLE: Dark Side of the Rainbow Bridge 1/?
SERIES: Depends on ya'll. If it ain't worth it, I got other things ta do.
AUTHOR: Raven4 ( arcadian13_2000@y... )
ARCHIVE: If ya wanna, just let me know so I can blush.
FANDOM: X:WP, H:TLC
PAIRING: Ares/Joxer, Strife/Cupid
RATING: G (Hey, man, I'm just getting' started) OC, POV
WARNINGS: A) Newbie author
B) Character Death (DeadStrife tm)(thanks a lot script writers)
C) Possible Mary Sue, but I don't know. I'm still fuzzy on the whole Mary Sue versus typical character thing.
D) Somewhat limited Strife in this. I'm just setting the stage, don't'cha know.

DISCLAIMER: Strife isn't mine. If he were he'd still be alive and would occasionally wear revealing, tight leather, safety pinned outfits. The Greek Pantheon belongs to the Greek people, but since they don't seem to love 'em right anymore, anybody gets to call on 'em. The Asgaardians belong to the German and Swedish peoples, but (see remarks vis. the Greeks). Herc and Xena folks belong to Ren Pics and Flat Earth Prods. Go ahead, sue me. I'd have more time to write in prison.

NOTES: Okay y'all. Now ya done it. I haven't written fan fic in years, but this is too damn good to pass up. I had been toying with a tale about DeadStrife tm interacting with the surviving denizens of Asgaard for some time, and lo, the great Scorpio served an opening up with an irresistible side of whoopass.

Feedback will determine the continuation of this saga. Flames will be cheerfully ignored or used to keep Asgaard burning.

And here it is. If anybody likes it I'll add chapters to finish the tale. If not, it'll just die on the vine.


Strife watched through a mirror as Ares held his Consort cradled in his arms. His poor sibling was shaking with sobs. Joxer's grief was strong enough to tear him apart if he'd been mortal. A ghost of a grin passed over Strife's face. Trust death to show you who really loved you. While a little saddened that Ares wasn't here for him, Strife figured that the living needed his uncle more than he did. Besides, Joxer would forget all about this in a few days. Maybe Ares would visit then. There was a scratch at the door and the pale god looked up.

"H'lo, Uncle Hades." The young god said, wiping away a tear of his own. He hated it when his tender hearted sibling hurt. "How's Biz?"

Hades smiled, his dour face faintly painted with compassion.

"As well as ever." The grim king of hell regarded his nephew for a moment. "I have prepared a place for you."

"Right." The dead godling smirked without humor. "Can't spend the rest of my death hangin' out in your study."

Hades reached out his hand, and the two of them flashed to a different realm of Hell. Strife looked around. It was just like his rooms in the halls of war.

"What gives?" He asked.

"'Sephe thought you might be more comfortable in surroundings familiar to you." The king of hell mumbled, blushing. "She can be very*persuasive."

Strife just shook his head and plopped down in a copy of his favorite chair. He just didn't have the energy to bother with a joke about being "dead sexy"; it just didn't seem worth the effort. Hades eyes softened as he regarded the silent godling. He waved his hand and the mirror from his study arrived before Strife's chair. Then the King of Hell bowed his head sadly and was gone.

Unlike the real thing, this pseudo hall of war was silent. Strife saw no reason to disturb that state, so he spent his first night in hell curled up and unmoving in a chair that wasn't his, watching his brother cry.

Time passes strangely in the realms between the various Godsheims. The black bird was returning from a fruitless hunting expedition. She had been gone some time, she could feel, but how much was anyone's guess. She was impatient to resume her hidden vigil over the young god of mischief.

She watched. It had been her self-imposed penance to watch everything about them. She bore witness to every pain and every pleasure of the lives her family had created and destroyed.

She had watched all three brothers from a distance for a very long time, since their conception, in fact. She had watched in impotent fury as the young goddess was violated. She had watched from her haven, powerless, while the girl was raped and beaten again and again. She'd seen how the unborn children were damaged as surely as their mother, and she'd wept at their suffering as she'd wept for their mother, so many ages ago.

Eris had been a very young goddess when she'd been taken in Asgaard. Her torments had been brutal, and, unable to free the tortured goddess, the raven had fled, taking shelter in Alfheim and bearing witness. When the young goddess' brother had come searching for her, the raven's power led him carefully into Asgaard by a hidden route.

When the allfather's pets would have warned of the rescue, raven took their sacred necks in her delicate white hands and calmly twisted them until they snapped. The Greek god took the same route out, his battered, gravid sister in his arms. And the raven danced behind them, covering their scent and tracks until they were out of the realms of the Asgaardians.

She had watched the approach of the rampaging Greeks while she brushed her golden hair, and when they approached the bifrost, she reached out with her mind and Loki's dagger and slew faithful Heimdall where he stood. Ragnarok had come, and she could not find it in her to be sorry.

Why she was allowed to live, she never knew. She was pinned to the great meadtable by two of Nemesis arrows, and the third was headed for her breast, but the golden goddess had stopped, and left her there. It was then that she had first taken on the aspect of one of the allfather's slaughtered birds. She would be Munin from now on. Her entire purpose to watch and remember.

Cawing, she flew out over the void, heading for the Grekkenheim, and thinking about Jopanis as a child, and how she had watched him because no one else seemed to.

Jetticles was as happy as he could be. Both of his aspects seemed to enjoy the lives they pursued, and they were discreetly monitored by two of Eris' pantheon. Joxxious had been well cared for, first by the wispy blond excuse for a goddess of love, and then by the Greek war god. The redemption godling couldn't have been made safer.

It was Jopanis; the one called Strife that she had watched most carefully. He alone, of his brothers, was able to function as a god. He alone had been left to flourish or fail in the more subtle, but just as cruel world of the Grekkenheim, this Olympus. Though more refined than the court of her youth, the raven could tell that these deities were every bit as capable of cruelty as her brothers and sisters had been.

When he was young and feeling lonely she would often come to the child god in her disguise as one of the allfather's birds. And she had been his friend, until Eris had sensed her presence and flown into a rage. Then Munin had fled, and in time, Strife came to believe that his birdie friend had been a dream. But she still watched him.

She had hoped that after that, Eris would become a real mother for this one, and heal her own pain by coming to love the child of her agony. But Loki had done his work well and the poor tormented goddess was every bit as damaged as her offspring. She couldn't be relied upon for long.

So, Munin watched little Jopanis herself from the shadows. After all, she had been unable to help his mother. She hid in the realms between heaven and earth; watching Jopanis grow into Ares first Lieutenant and helping him whenever she could from the one hidden pocket in Alfheim that had escaped the destruction that consumed Asgaard.

She watched and she guarded, fulfilling her blood vow with silent vigil. Then her hearth flames had told her the worst of Eris' tormentors, Loki, damn him, had supposedly been seen alive in the ruin of Asgaard. It was whispered in the wind that he'd survived; though the raven couldn't see how given the almost total destruction of their godsheim at the hands of the enraged Greeks.

She beat her glossy black wings in frustration. Trust the Greeks to get all concerned once the damage was already done. They would rain down vengeance on the wind, but god forbid they safeguard their young in the first place.

Unfortunately even a rumor of Loki couldn't be ignored. After all, her entire family had died for his sins, and she had a few things to say to him. So she'd left off watching Jopanis. He would be safe enough with Ares while she winged away to what was left of Asgaard, searching for some scent of her rabid relative. She found nothing but ruins that still smoldered in the sky after all the eons. If Loki Godkiller had been there, he was long gone. Now she was almost home.

"Strife." She whispered to herself, savoring the sound of her long disused voice. She couldn't have been gone more than a few months, though one could never tell with the void. But she missed her home and her vigil.

Munin slipped through the fabric of the void and tumbled awkwardly into the air of Olympus. She would catch a quick glimpse of young Strife before heading to Alfheim for a nice rest. She checked his favorite places first.

His winged lover's temple was deserted. There were only the remains of what in the warhiem would be a fight, but in this temple of love was probably just an intense orgy. Moving on, she flew over the grove of the Bachae. Strife liked to drink and play tricks on those drunk, but there was nobody there either.

The Halls of War were grim and silent and there was a strange smell there. The scent teased her mind with cold fingers. There was something horrible and vaguely familiar about it. Uneasy, Munin peeked down to earth, searching for the divine trickster among the mortals he so loved to tease. Nothing. No trace of him anywhere.

Frowning under her feathers, she glided silently towards the Greek's Meadhouse. There were angry voices raised inside. She fluttered to a perch in the joint of two arches and a column. It was a divine argument, and sounded more serious than the usual bickering. The Greek allfather, Zeus, appeared to be asserting his dominance over several of his unruly children who were resisting vehemently.

"No I will not." The raven heard him say. "I am king, and I keep my own counsel."

"Please, father." Ares usual growl was not as intense as usual. He sounded wrung out, and his voice was gruff.

"Silence!" The father god thundered. "Strife died as a result of your plotting with that Callisto abomination. He stays in Hades realm."

An ugly sound broke from the ravens throat, shock and anguish piercing her breast as Nemesis arrows had pinned her hands on the night of fire. The little godling she had promised to shield was dead. She gagged, once more tasting the strange scent from the War Hall. It was the death of a god; a familiar scent in her nightmares since Ragnarok. Below her, the assembled gods all spoke at once. Mercifully masking the sounds she couldn't silence. The jumble of noise finally resolved itself into one voice as Munin gripped her beak in her claw.

"That's not fair, Dad." It was the voice of the wispy love goddess. The raven could only listen, eyes wide, mouth open in a silent scream. "Ares was keeping that bitch on the line for all of us. Dahok would have been the end of us. Ares and Athena's plan defeated him, now he just wants you to allow the return his lieutenant. Plus, Cupid's beside himself. Do you really want a broken love god? Asclepius had to sedate him. I don't think*"

"I said no, Dite." The king god snapped. "I was against the return of the hind's blood dagger from the first, but I gave you children your way and Strife died of it. You are all going to have to learn to live with the consequences of your actions. And it might as well be now when none of the major gods have been lost to the lesson."

The raven heard the whooshing sound made by a departing god.

"What about the consequences of your actions, father? Who lives with them?" The soft voice cut through the listening bird with the force of a blast to the breast. It was Eris, the wronged one, and her heart still bled. With a croak and a flutter the raven fled the hall. She could not aid the living, but the dead had once been hers to collect. Perhaps that would still count for something.

Munin couldn't seem to stop her own thoughts as she searched for him. They whirled in her mind like the vortex to Hel. What if she'd been there when this Callisto had attacked him? Could she have affected the outcome of this situation? Could she have saved the mad god of mischief?

It galled her that Strife's potential as a deity had been negated by the rabid machinations of one hate-filled devotee of Jetticles. It pained her how much of the Godkiller she could see in the twisted personality of Strife's split-headed brother. You could never predict with Jetticles whether he would heal or harm. He certainly came by it honestly.

If only she had been there, it would have been Callisto's blood on the ground. Mad warrior goddess, perhaps, but in her time Munin had forgotten more about warfare than the little blonde bitch would ever learn. She would have defended the young god by whatever means necessary, had she only been there.

She should never have left her post. She had sworn to watch over Eris' children. But she had also sworn the destruction of any Asgaardian torturer who had escaped punishment by the Greeks.

She slipped into Asphodel as silently as a prayer. Charon waved from his ferry, but they knew each other well enough these days that he raised no alarm. She soared out over the kingdom of the dead, searching for the shade of one dead god.

The raven couldn't be quite sure how long she'd looked for him, but at long last, she found him. He was curled into a chair in a copy of the hall of war.

The raven fluttered to a perch on the window nearest the distracted god and thought hard. It would do no good to flutter in a flurry. She knew he wouldn't respond to anything direct. She had watched him long enough to know that his pride and his curiosity were the paths to motivating him. Strife could be counted on to hop to when there was something tricky to do. All she had to do was find a prank worthy of a god and he would do the rest.

TITLE: Shine On You Crazy Godling 2/?
SERIES: Dark Side of the Rainbow
AUTHOR: Raven4 ( arcadian13_2000@y... )
ARCHIVE: If ya wanna, just let me know so I can blush.
FANDOM: X:WP, H:TLC
PAIRING: Ares/Joxer, Strife/Cupid
RATING: G (Hey, man, I'm just getting' started) OC
WARNINGS:
1. Never stick a pencil in your eye. It hurts. Ask Odin, he'll tell ya.
2. Possibly a Mary Sue, but I'm not sure. I'm still fuzzy on the whole Mary Sue versus typical character thing.
3. HUMOR AHEAD!!! Parts of this series will end up being very funny. Parts of it will be very, very angsty. I'm working on the details of the backstory including Eris suffering at the hands of some of the Norse gods. I'll label each installment so Y'all can be fairly warned.
4. Liberties have been taken with the Norse gods and Ragnarok. But I don't feel bad about it 'cause Strife is a new god anyway, and there really is no cohesive whole resource on the Asgaardians because every source we have contradicts its fellows.

DISCLAIMER: Strife isn't mine. If he were do you think I'd still be using a lighter to set off stinkbombs?. The Greek Pantheon belongs to the Greek people, but given the condition of the temples, I'd say their gods are ready for a change.. The Asgaardians belong to the German and Swedish peoples, but since they never had much in the way of temples to begin with, I'm adopting them too. Pthbbbbt!!!. Herc and Xena folks belong to Ren Pics and Flat Earth Prods. Go ahead, sue me. I'd have more time to write in prison. NOTES: (Deep breath) This is a sequel to Dark side of the Rainbow Bridge, which itself was a follow up on Scorpio's Pathos of Joxer. If you haven't read 'em, don't come cryin' ta me if ya don't get this one. For those of y'all that don't know, the Bifrost was a "Rainbow Bridge", and was supposedly the only entrance to the land of the Norse Gods. Flames will be cheerfully ignored or used to keep Asgaard burning.

SUMMARY: Strife is getting bored and an unknown ally steps up to the plate.


The normally manic god sat in his favorite chair and brooded. Well, actually it wasn't his favorite chair, it was a replica of his favorite chair, and that was the problem.

He'd only been here a few weeks, a month or two at the most, and already he was so bored he wanted to tear his hair out.

Being a god, he'd never really given much thought to death, at least not his own. Other peoples sure, but usually only in the context of how much trouble could be caused. He was a god, and death was not supposed to be his problem. Then one blonde bitch on the rampage of overcompensation had unexpectedly made it all very personal.

As if it weren't bad enough being dead, he had to deal with a home that looked just like his, but was subtly very not his, and made so as to constantly remind him that it was just barely off. He was quite sure that Hades hadn't arranged it on purpose, but he was annoyed because it was just the sort of underhanded irritating thing he'd have loved*if it hadn't been happening to him.

Scowling, the black clad godling rose and began to pace. He'd always enjoyed pacing, it annoyed people. Other than the halls of war, this room had been his favorite pacing place, but it just wasn't the same any more. The room had been recreated six paces too short.

"Fucking Hades." He swore and threw himself back into his chair.

"Irritated, my lord?" A large black bird croaked over his shoulder. He scowled at her for good measure. The irritating avian had shown up here on his first day, pestering him nonstop. She was disrespectful in the extreme, but she wasn't boring, so he let her stay. As if there was a damn thing he could do to make her leave stuck down here without his fucking powers. Dammit!!!!

"What the hell are you doing here, anyway?!" The dead god shouted. "I certainly didn't have one of you at home."

"Just trying to make your eternity a bit less onerous, my lord Strife!" The bird fluttered off to another perch, offended. "I mean it's not like I'm the one stuck here."

"Shut up, Munin." Strife threw a candlestick at the perch. It missed.

"Puh-leze, Lord Strife. If that's the worst mischief you can make its no wonder you're stuck here." Strife glared at her, debating, but then slid back into his chair, shaking his head helplessly. It wasn't worth the effort.

"Just go spy on someone else and leave me alone, Munin. I'm not in the mood." The raven cocked her head to one side for a moment, then ruffled her feathers and headed for the door, cawing to herself as she flew.

"I've got to find something to shake him out of this funk if it's the last thing I do." Scowling, Munin flew off in search of trouble.

Strife looked up briefly as the bird left the room. He contemplated calling her back. Isolated as he was, she was at least another voice to talk to.

"Fuck it." He said at last, and returned to his brooding.

Munin flew low over the vales and streams of the Grekkenheim, Olympus. It was too tamely cultivated for her tastes, but then, next to Asgaard anything would be.

"What Strife needs is a chance to make mischief even in exile." She mused. "Something to prove to himself that he's still got what it takes. Then he can turn that dangerous mind to getting out of that hole."

Extending her hearing, Munin soared over several temples, fishing for any useful tidbit. She was just passing the ghastly pink and white marble edifice dedicated to Aphrodite when she heard it. Circling down, she perched on an arras and trained her ears on the conversation within.

Moments later she was winging back toward Hades laughing softly.

"Oh it's too good, it's just too good."

She blew into Strife's chamber, twittering to herself helplessly.

"Oh baby, are you gonna love this." She croaked.

"I thought I told you to get lost." Strife muttered from his chair. "If I still had my powers there'd be raven stew for dinner."

"Poor powerless Strife." Munin sing-songed. "Tell me, mischief god, are you up to causing trouble without them?"

"What are you nattering about, birdy?" He snapped, intrigued in spite of himself.

"I have some information for you, which, if turned to your purposes could lead to some truly dreadful Strife."

The deposed god pursed his lips for a moment, then sat back in his chair.

"Spill it."

"I've just come from your erstwhile home, Aphrodite's pink palace in fact, miserable excuse for a love goddess that she is, and I heard something with definite possibilities."

"What?" Strife pressed, impatient.

"It would appear that she-who-grants-all-love had a match planned between two pretty boys she knows, but one of them is so straight you could level houses with him, so she herded Cupid into helping her, and they've come up with something dangerous."

"And that is?" He asked, leaning forward slightly.

"A new arrow for Cupid's bow. One guaranteed to change the sexual orientation of anyone even pricked with it."

Strife's eyes widened as his mind, lulled into sluggishness by weeks of inactivity, began to twist and whir once again. Biting the corner of his full lower lip, he leaned back again, throwing one leg over the arm of the chair as he thought.

"That would indeed be a useful tool in the right, or rather, wrong hands, but how can I use it when it's up there, and I'm down here." He looked at the bird pointedly.

"Honestly, my lord Strife," Munin said in an injured tone. "You don't think I'd dangle such a tasty treat in front of you without offering some means of securing it, do you? I can get you the arrow."

He patted the arm of the chair next to him and she glided over to perch on it, her glossy black beak inches from his wild haired head.

"What's your plan?" He asked.

"I just get the arrow, you decide how and on whom it should be used." The bird was regarding him intensely. "I will work your will in the worlds, lord Strife." She whispered.

"Uh huh." He narrowed his eyes at her. "And what's in it for you, Birdy?"

The raven fluffed up her pin feathers, looking wounded.

"How can you possibly doubt MY sincerity?" She huffed. Strife stared at her, lips quirked until she dissolved into giggles.

"Okay, okay. I did something in my own lands; something no one knows about. If the remnants of my people ever find out, I could be in pretty deep kimchee, so I need a new nest. It works out for both of us." Munin was very glad of the times she had spent with Loki in the before, learning the art of what he called the "con". "I get to become your right hand. I serve and protect you, you protect me when you can, and I get to go wherever you do, always."

Strife thought for a second, frowning. It was an uncomfortably vague agreement at best, but since she was the only game in town and he wasn't likely to ever get out of this cage anyway, he didn't figure that it could hurt. At least, not him.

"It's a deal." He said at last.

"Kick ass." Munin said, and he could almost hear her grinning. "So what do we do first?"

"Well," He paused, beginning to grin. "Revenge has always been a favorite of mine, right after chaos. I think we may be able to kill two*er*nevermind."

Munin cocked her head at him.

"Very funny, O pasty one."

"Yeah well,* What season is it up there anyway?" He asked, thinking hard.

"Two weeks until the autumn equinox, my lord."

"Oh that's priceless." Strife launched himself from his chair, knocking the raven into a confused tumble of feathers and cawing that resolved itself into a glide and some ruffling. Not noticing his new servant's offense, he began to pace rapidly.

"Get me that arrow birdy and let's have some fun."

TITLE:  Ooooo, I Need A Dirty Woman 3/?
SERIES: Dark Side of the Rainbow Bridge
AUTHOR:  Raven4  ( arcadian13_2000@y... )
ARCHIVE:  Feel free, but I wanna know where
FANDOM:  X:WP, H:TLC
PAIRING:  Strife/Cupid, Herc/Iolus
RATING:  R (some parents are squicked out by gay folks and others by nudity) OC, POV
WARNINGS:
1. Hope ya don't think of Iolus as a masculine fellow*
2. DeadStrife tm (thanks a lot script writers)
3. Possible Mary Sue, but I'm not sure.  She isn't me, she's my Goddess.

DISCLAIMER:  Actual Gods and Monsters are public domain.  So there!  Herc and Xena characters belong to Ren Pics and Flat Earth Prods.  Translation; We can dream, but hands off, dammit!

NOTES:  For those of you that don't know, Heracles, translated literally is Greek for "nursed by Hera"
Flames will be cheerfully ignored or used to keep Asgaard burning.
If you're looking for a Lexicon of the phrases the mystery goddess uses to describe things, go to http://www.ugcs.caltech.edu/~cherryne/mythology.html
They're all equivalent term from her POV.
SUMMARY:  Hercules and Iolus are in for some company and a few surprises while Strife discovers a riddle of his own.


Munin flew high above the Greek Midgaard, her sharp eyes seeking a certain foe of Strife's.  She could feel the dead god eagerly observing her through the mirror Hades had left him and was glad.  He had been spending far too much time watching Ares throne room and glaring at Cupid's temple of late.  The inside of his lover's domain was shielded, and Cupid never came out, but brooding over his lack of visitors wasn't going to get him out of Hades.  Why Strife's beloved gods had not visited him, she could not say.  It was something she planned to investigate when she had time.

The world inhabited by the Grekken-Aesir's mortals was rich in life, wild, as their Olympus was not.  She smiled to herself, grateful for the black beak that hid her expression.  She already knew where the quarry was, but she would "hunt" a little longer, both amusing Strife and keeping her pose intact, lest he suspect her true nature.  Eventually she would tell him the truth, but not yet.

Her borrowed black claws clutched a single arrow of gold, meant as a gift for some very special people.

Iolus, the golden haired hunter lounged on Hercules' sweaty chest.  It was good to have a demi-god for a lover, especially one as beefycakey as his HerkyWerky. He sighed complacently and snuggled down tighter against the bronzed body.

"You know something?"  The son of Zeus asked his hunter. 

"What, baby?"  Iolus simpered back.

"We should stop in at Phillippi and have a nice long bath."  Hercules licked Iolus' ear lazily.  "And a pedicure."

Iolus squealed as he rolled to look his lover in the eye.

"You mean it?!?"

"Absolutely!"  Herc grinned up at the suddenly energized blonde.  "We're due for some time off."

"Oh, baby, baby, baby!  You are speakin' my language."  Iolus hopped up from the post coital snuggle pile and started throwing clothes in the air.  "You're shirt, my vest*um*pants*definitely yours, not enough purple*"

Hercules rolled his eyes, grinning as he watched Iolus bounce about the
campsite, then rolled to his feet to dress and help pack.  After all, a wet hunter is a fun hunter.

Munin grinned from her perch in an ash tree next to the bawdy couple's camp.  While she could have enacted her business here, the overheard conversation stayed her claw.  She listened and then struggled not to fall out of the tree in merriment as the two heroes headed for the city.

She would have to blow her cover in order to infiltrate the city, but it would be worth it.  Oh, would it ever.  And she could always come up with another cover.  Besides, she was tired of pretending to be a bird.  The real Munin was long dead, she'd killed it herself the night of Ragnarok to kep it from alerting Odin of the intruding Greek wargod.  While Odin's pet's skin had served her well over the years, she was tired of it.

She was chortling to herself when she landed on the roof of the inn the
travelers had chosen to patronize.  She watched Hercules grab Iolus' ass as they passed into the tavern.  It was more than time.  Hiding herself carefully behind a stable, Munin took off her cloak of raven's feathers and ceased to be Munin.  The homeless goddess looked down at her body.  She was still shapely, still the loveliest of Asgaard, but somehow the satisfaction of that had faded since anyone who cared had died. Flitting around as a bird for ages had dulled neither her skin nor her eye, yet it brought her no pleasure.  She sighed.  What she really needed was to get good and laid.

Strife's chin was on the floor as his mind stumbled on the concept.  His bird was a bird!  Erk! His bird was a chick!  Erk! The raven was a woman.

The goddess smiled slightly as she drew on the magical abilities of her golden necklace.  Truly, it was worth the price she'd paid for it.  She shifted into the shape of a comely young man, red bearded and of average height.  Lovely and comfortable or not, her natural body wouldn't get her the access she wanted. Her eye color alone she retained as she called from her bauble the clothing of a travelling tinker and stepped from the bush.

She'd felt Strife's surprised regard through the mirror.  He'd ask questions when she returned, but it would be worth it.

A snap shrank the Munin-skin cloak until it was a ball no bigger than her thumb and she hid it in her pocket as she trudged toward the inn.  She tested out her manly voice as she entered the taproom.

"What ho, Vinlord?"  She called out, pleased when a deep accented baritone emerged from her throat.  She hadn't lost her touch.  Hercules and Iolus were already seated at a table near the fire.  The innkeep looked up at her and smiled.

"Good eve and welcome sir.  What's your pleasure?"  The goddess was pleasantly surprised.  The taproom was clean and well lighted and smelled of roasting venison.  She realized that she was, in fact, hungry for the first time in a hundred years.  No more eating like a bird, she wanted meat!

"Some of that buck, friend.  Quick, quick.  Jord smelled it two leagues ago and though it was the Einherjahr feasting in Valhalla!"  She pulled up at the bar as the barkeep chuckled. 

"You don't sound like you're from around here."  The voice from behind her was rich, not a surprising trait for the son of a god.  She almost grinned.  Her quarry was taking the bait.

"No, friend, I am not."  She whirled around to face the son of Zeus and made a show of swallowing quickly as her cornflower eyes traveled up to meet his.  Hercules would have seemed large even among mortal northmen, but her response was faked.  She assumed that his size would intimidate normal people on a regular basis, but for a goddess who had stared down Thor on a drunken bender, the demi god wasn't really all that.  Certainly not so lovely as dear, dead Frey, though few were, Strife's Cupid perhaps. 

"A stranger here."  She stammered for effect, then visibly rallied her spirits, noting that the hunter was shorter than her borrowed body by several inches.  She reached out and pumped Hercules' hand heartily.  "A traveler called Jord Njordsson."

"Yard Neoretsin?"  Iolus attempted it.  She laughed and clapped the hunter on the shoulder.  He staggered a little.

"Close enough, little friend."  She grinned.  "Close enough.  You should share Aquavit with me, that we'll be strangers no more.  Lifewater make you taller, ja?"

Hercules grinned at the scowling Iolus.

"I'm not totally sure what you said, friend, but we'd be glad to have you join us."

"'Honor is mine, friends."  The jolly young man hopped off of the stool.  "You have names also, Ja?"

"I am Hercules, this is my shield-brother Iolus."  The blonde nodded.

"It is pleasure with you to meet."  The big, red bearded man sprawled into a chair at the table.  "Pleasure and honor as well for even in cold north we hear of the might of Heracles."

Strife spit his wine all over the surface of the mirror and then stared, one pale hand over his mouth. 

"What?!?"  Iolus sputtered.  "Oh, uh, Hercules.  Its pronounced Hercules."

"Ja, Heracles.  I know this."  Iolus eyes bugged up to the size of dinner plates.  The flame bearded man grinned uncertainly at his two red-faced table-mates.  "I have said something wrong?  Please to forgive.  Your language still strange to me is.  Backwards, like farting."

Strife stared at the mirror with his mouth hanging open.  His birdy had some talents, no question.  He just hadn't realized that in addition to a stellar pair of tits, under those feathers there was a pair of cast iron testicles.

"Don't worry about it."  Hercules smiled at the stranger.  "It must be
difficult trying to speak a foreign tongue."

"Harder than sucking down mountain."  She pantomimed a skier. 

"Suck*Uh, Skiing?  Yeah.  Ok."  Iolus stammered.  "Innkeeper, how's that meat coming along?"

Strife watched amazed as his little black bird made jolly conversation through the whole meal.  It was a masterpiece of a con job liberally peppered with what could have been honest mistakes in foreign vocabulary but ended up being highly insulting remarks that went right over Hercules amiable but largely empty head.

She was just finishing a "no shit there I was" story about a cow, a meadhouse and a vestal virgin, and had managed to suggest that the companions' mothers were the best known whores in three kingdoms without Hercules even noticing it.  Oh, he and his bird were going to have words.  He'd start with credit where it was due, and then they would discuss the black fluffy jacket.

Hercules stretched, a satisfied grin on his face.  Iolus just stared at him, glassy eyed.

"Well friends, Jord must to the wet place."  The tall man got to his feet. "I'm smelling like your whores in heat, no?"

"What?!?"  Iolus dropped his third mug of the evening.

"Whores.  You know, you ride on them."  Iolus looked at the big man like he'd offered him a bite of half-dead weasel on a bun.  The tinker just grinned back at him, seeming confused.  Inside, the goddess fought not to laugh herself sick.  "Whores, run very fast, pull cart to market?  We have none in north, but you have here, ja?  Jord has seen."

"Horses, Iolus."  Hercules said brightly and returned their new friend's smile. "Hey Jord. We were going to head to the baths anyway.  Care to join us?"

Iolus almost broke his neck shaking his head.

"Ja, ja.  Is good company to have when naked.  Easier to get done."  Iolus just rolled his eyes as the tinker went back to the bar to collect his things.

"Why'd ya go and do that, Herc."  Iolus pouted.  "I was hopin' for a little session of 'Lord and bath slave', if ya know what I mean."

"He's a stranger here from a far away land."  Hercules frowned down at his lover.  "It's our responsibility as Greeks to make him feel welcome."

"Right."  Iolus growled as he stomped off towards the baths.  "Herc and Iolus, icons of Grecian whoresbrutality."

Across the room, the goddess in drag grinned into her beard.  She'd make
herself very welcome, but if all went as planned, Hercules wouldn't be feeling quite as Greek as before she'd started when she was finished.

Strife watched through the mirror as Hercules leaned back into the chest-deep hot water.  The demi god had needed this more than he thought.  Iolus entered the bathhouse and sat down on a bench by the steaming pool but made no move to take off his clothes.

"What are you waiting for, sexy?"  Hercules flirted.  Iolus looked at the door, then back at his lover.  He shrugged and slipped out of his pants and vest and into the steaming water.  He was just about to go investigate exactly what was under that water when the door to the bathhouse banged open to admit Jord Njordson. 

"Jord is here!"  The goddess grinned, digging a bottle out of her "pack".  She laid her towel near the edge of the pool.  "Having special treat for good friends."

Ignoring Iolus half uttered protest, Munin emptied the bottle into the bath. It foamed up at once into a soothing frothy bubble and she slipped into it with a heart felt sigh of relief.  There was no water left in Alfheim for bathing, and none in Hades either.  She could keep clean with magic, but it wasn't the same.

"Hey, that smells nice."  Iolus commented after waiting to see if it turned him green.  He shouldn't have been surprised.  Frigga, queen of Asgaard had made this bottle, and Frey had stolen it for his sister after she'd returned from Niflheim with the Brisings necklace.  Loki'd said she smelled like a Svartalfs' catamite, and not surprising considering what she'd done to get the necklace.

"You like, ja?"  She said, ruthlessly quashing memories of the past.  For Asgaard, dead was dead.  "Is good for skin."

It was also excellent camouflage.  While keeping up a stream of sociable
banter, she began washing vigorously.  Under cover of scrubbing her long red hair and beard, she liberated the golden arrow of gender preference alteration from where she had hidden it in her thick braid.  Before they had finalized this plan, she had done quite a bit of research.  This thing didn't just flip gender preference; it made the infected individual forget or ignore anything that didn't fit in with their new worldview.  The only antidote was a second scratch from the same arrow.

"Back washing help?"  She looked to the companions.  "In a circle is best, ja?"

She allowed Iolus to maneuver them so that he ended up behind Hercules, while she was behind Iolus, and Hercules was behind her.  Then she started scrubbing.  She scrubbed and was scrubbed for several moments, waiting for the perfect moment.  Eventually she had her chance.  She reached around until the tip of the arrow was on Iolus side of Hercules and jabbed the son of Zeus in the thigh.

"Ow."  The demi god peered down at the bubbles.

"What?"  Iolus queried his lover, peering down as well.  But the golden arrow was already hidden under the goddess ass.  It didn't matter if she got pricked, she knew the antidote.

"Nothing."  Hercules replied.  Jord finished scrubbing Iolus back, thanked Hercules and pulled back to her side of the tub, stretching and yawning ostentatiously.  If the arrow worked, she should just have time to make an unsuspicious exit before the fireworks had a chance to begin.

A few more comments, broken by yawns and Jord Njordson announced he was ready to retire.

"Long journey today.  Even longer tomorrow.  So, Jord go to bed.  Get it up early."  The goddess grabbed the towel by the pool and stepped out into it, concealing the arrow in a fold of the fabric.  Iolus was too busy making cow eyes at Hercules to notice, and Hercules was beginning to look vaguely confused.  "Honored to be naked with you."

It was all she could do to make herself walk out, and the second the bathhouse door closed behind him, Jord Njordson ceased to exist, and a laughing naked Goddess wrapped herself in a Munin feather coat and flew away. 

Strife watched the place she had stood for several long moments before turning his mirror back to the dipshit duo in the bath.  That was one seriously well-formed girl.  In fact, he'd have wagered she was every bit as flawless as Aphrodite, and that shouldn't have been possible.  They were going to have a very long talk indeed. 

The lord of Mischief watched the lovers just long enough to see the look on Iolus' face when Hercules said, "You know what I could really use*Another wife."  Then he darkened his mirror and waited for his maidservant's return.  He could afford to miss this part, the real fun would begin when the rest of the gods heard about Herc's lifestyle change, and the mirror would record all that happened in the meantime.  Besides, this puzzle was rather distracting.  Who or what had he invited into his house?

TITLE: A Saucer Full of Secrets 4/?
SERIES: Dark Side of the Rainbow Bridge
AUTHOR: Raven4 ( arcadian13_2000@y... )
ARCHIVE: Feel free, but I wanna know where
FANDOM: X:WP, H:TLC
PAIRING: Hercules/Iolus, Strife/Cupid, Ares/Joxer
RATING: PG-13 (mild nudity) OC, POV
WARNINGS:
1. DeadStrife tm (thanks a lot script writers)
2. Slight angst ahead. Some chapters will be all humor and some will be very angsty, but I promise to try and make them all be good.
3. She's not Mary Sue; she's my goddess.

DISCLAIMER: Actual Gods and Monsters are public domain. So there! Herc and Xena Original characters (Joxer, Strife, etc.) belong to Ren Pics and Flat Earth Prods. Translation; We can dream, but hands off, dammit!

NOTES: For those of you that don't know, Njord was the Norse god of the North, father of the twins Freya and Frey. Jord Njordson was the goddess formerly known as Munin in disguise. Ragnarok is the Norse end of the world. And THERE'S NO SUCH THING AS SANTA CLAUSE!!! Bwahahahahahaha!!!
Just kidding, don't cry.
For Questions about other Norse names and terms used by the goddess, visit http://www.pantheon.org/mythica.html or
Flames will be cheerfully ignored or used to keep Asgaard burning.

SUMMARY: Revelations and a bombshell

Strife, god of mischief was lounging indolently on his chair when the bird swooped in to perch on her usual spot and cocked Munin's head to regard her lord. She was surprised to find his mirror dark. She was sure he'd be laughing his ass off. Instead, he was sprawled on his chair, smirking at her sardonically, looking for all the world like a smaller, paler copy of Ares. The goddess' heart twisted in her chest. Life, but he favored his father.

She tried very hard not to think about Asgaard before Eris, before Loki's sin. Thinking of it only resulted in a terrible pain beneath her left ribs. Scowling on the inside, she forced all of her attention onto her lord. Yes, he resembled his poor father, but wishing and weeping wasn't going to bring either of them back from the dead.

"Did you see it, my lord?" She panted, her feigned delight falling flat on her own ears.

"I did indeed." Strife responded seriously. "Would you care to explain?"

The goddess considered resisting, denying, but then Munin's wings slumped. She would tell him part of the truth, but not all of it. Parts of it she simply couldn't face yet. Not even for the child of the wronged one.

"If we're going to have this conversation now, can I at least get comfortable?" She croaked. Strife waved his hand like a gracious chieftain. The goddess took a deep breath and then removed the feathered skin of Munin. She was naked as a babe, and she knew she was beautiful, but Strife's expression never changed. She was impressed by his control. No one had ever held their expression when she disrobed. It was the work of a moment to clothe herself with a touch to her necklace and then she sat down on the floor using the feathery coat for a pillow.

"Comfy?" Strife asked. The pale blonde goddess nodded. "Good. Now explain to me why you lied to me while at the same time you swore loyalty."

"I did not lie, my lord. What I told you was true." She raised her eyes to meet his and he was startled by the color. "I am come fleeing a far away land. And if I am discovered, my life will be very short."

"So? You're a goddess. You'd end up here, just like me. Or somewhere just like it." The woman shook her head.

"No, my lord Strife. I am a goddess, but when my family dies, we're consumed by the void. When we take the dirt nap, it's into oblivion, and only other gods remember our names." He read the sadness in her eyes. "Even our own priests forget we existed."

"That sucks." Strife commented.

"It sucks dead baby bears." She nodded ruefully. "I came to you because I don't want to die, and because it seemed to me that maybe you needed someone too."

"Well, I'm still pissed at ya' fer not comin' clean right off the dock." He crossed his arms and changed from an Ares clone to a pouting child.

"I am sorry, my lord." She cajoled him, blue eyes wide. "But I was afraid you'd refuse me."

Strife bounced up out of his chair and sat on the ground across from her, his anger evaporating like frost in the sun. He grinned at her.

"That's ok." Strife giggled. "The way you hooked in Jercules and his side kick was pure art. I mean really*Heracles and whores? After all this family has gone through over the whole bastard son thing, that was almost too harsh. So I forgive ya."

The goddess grinned right back at him and scooted a little closer. "I thought you'd like Jord Njordsson. He's a very old character of mine. I used my necklace to dress. Other than that I did it without powers so that Hercules couldn't smell my godhead."

"So what did you do? That yer hidin', I mean." He asked her. She froze at the subject change, her mouth suddenly dry.

"Do I really have to tell you?" She whispered.

"Hey, if somebody's gonna come after ya at some point, I wanna know in advance. I need yer name too, so I know what ta watch for." He spread his hands to either side in front of him. "I mean, come on, trust is a two way street, ya know?"

"I*" she paused. She had never revealed her crimes to anyone. And hadn't even spoken her own name since the birth of the triplets. Strife looked at the battle on her face and decided to offer an easy to keep compromise. After all, who was he gonna talk to down here.

"I won't tell anybody what ya tell me." He said at last, brushing a stray lock of hair out of her eyes. "I promise."

The goddess searched his face, then nodded and squared her shoulders, eyes closed, head bent before raising her head and opening red rimmed eyes. When she spoke it was in a calm, unshaken voice.

"My name is Freya Njordsdattir." She locked her gaze on his face. "And I brought about the end of the world."

TITLE: On the Turning Away 5A/?
SERIES: Dark Side of the Rainbow Bridge
AUTHOR: Raven4 ( arcadian13_2000@y... )
ARCHIVE: Feel free, but I wanna know where
FANDOM: X:WP, H:TLC
PAIRING: Strife/Cupid, Eris/Various
RATING: NC-17 OC, POV
WARNINGS:
1. WARNING WARNING: Non-Consensual sex ahead. This tale will include mention of the multiple rape of Discord. I'm not planning on being very graphic, but I am planning on being very emotional. If this squicks you out, don't read it. Skip this chapter.
2. Very little DeadStrife tm. This is mainly Freya's edited account of the conception of Strife, Joxer and Jett/Jace and the last days of Asgaard.
3. Heavy Angst ahead. The recollection of rape, torture and deicide is not a happy smiley story. If you don't like Angst, see warning 1.
1. Darkside 5A is written in the poetic style of Icelandic sagas. If you find it difficult to follow, there will be a normal version of the story labeled Dark Side 5B. If you are really enjoying this series, I recommend reading both as there are some details particular to each.
4. She's not Mary Sue; she's my goddess.

DISCLAIMER: Actual Gods and Monsters are public domain. So there! Herc and Xena Original characters (Joxer, Strife, etc.) belong to Ren Pics and Flat Earth Prods. Translation; Don't break 'em and make sure they've been washed when you return 'em.

NOTES: Freya is the secret identity of the goddess formerly known as Munin. Ragnarok is the Norse end of the world. For Questions about other Norse names and terms used by the goddess, visit http://www.pantheon.org/mythica.html Flames will be cheerfully ignored or used to keep Asgaard burning.

SUMMARY: Freya confesses her crime while protecting the innocent


"My name is Freya Njordsdattir." She locked her gaze on his face. "And I brought about the end of the world."

For the second time in as many hours, Strife, god of Mischief stared at his servant with his mouth hanging open. Long moments passed before he closed it with a snap and looked at her skeptically.

"Care to run that by me again, birdy girl?" He asked. "'Cause I don't think I heard ya right."

"You heard me, my lord." She said softly. Her eyes were far away, fixed on sights that she had once seen and no one would ever see again. "In the ages long passed, when Yggdrasil bloomed with life and fed on death, the gods of the north, both Aesir and Vanir, lived in peace on Asgaards plain. Fair Frey and his sister Freya were Vanir among Aesir, with their father, Njord they travelled; hostages to seal the peace.

These were the times of mighty deeds, when Thor's hammer smote the Jotun giants and Odin, the Allfather ruled o'er Asgaard and it's children. From his meadhall, Gladsheim he ruled o'er all the worlds. The einherjar, those blessed to die in valiant strife feasted. In Valhalla nights they feasted, and then fought throughout the day. They prepared for Ragnarok, when Odin god would lead them.

For it had been told, by a holy Valla how Loki would come with fire and anger, with the fire giants led by Surt, the sons of Muspel, the frost giant horde and all those dead by peaceful means to raze the mighty halls of Asgaard, burning all the worlds in his rage.

Fathfull Heimdall would sound his horn Gjaller. To warn of the horde's approach. Loki's hand would kill bifrosts gaurdian, but Heimdall would take the godkiller with him. Ragnarok it was said to be, and no one doubted it's coming.

Fenris Wolf would devour Odin, then vengeful Vadir would kill the beast. Mighty Thor would subdue the World-Serpent, but poisoned in the fight quickly fall. Frey will die in battle glorious, beauty laid low by fiery Surt. Tyr would do battle with Garm, the hound, and dying both would the other fell.

The Einherjar, the hallowed dead would war with those from Hel's dominion. Dead fighting dead on the plain of Ida, until none were left to tell the tale. And Surt enraged with old complaint, would fling his hands about the world, and all would die in his anger's flame. The nine worlds burning, reduced to ash. Friend and foe would die together, and leave no one there to weep or toast.

From these ashes a new world rises, green and free of any gods but these. Them who lived through Asgaard's burning. Never more to taste its' mead. Gladsheim long ago forgotten, never more it's memory seen.

This was the prophecy told by the vala, and all named in it feared it not. It was fate and none could change it. Therefore we drank in Aegir's home. Making merry as unschooled children and counting not the cost of slaughter.

I remember that final battle. I saw it clearly from Aegir's hall. I watched the finest and basest falling. Their blood co-mingling on the ground. For Asgaard had sinned, and so Asgaard paid the price.

There came in the time before our fall, a foreign Aesir, a goddess lost. She came to Svartalfheim and asked to join the drawves in their arcane play. She was comely, fair and clever, and her company much desired. So they sat her at their table and back to feasting turned their minds. They had freed godkiller Loki, from his justly earned lament, and brought him down into their grottoes, to make them laugh by his rudeness and art.

The foreign girl of him knew nothing, not of his pride or of his rage. She looked on him and thought him handsome, and so she drew his speech and gaze.

But soon was Loki, cruel and nimble, offended by her wit and look. For she refused to name him wiser. So he plotted vengeance harsh. Wicked Loki, giant kin, he beguiled the Grekkenmaid. He posed her riddle after riddle and each one came she to with glee. Answering godkillers challenge almost before he gave them out.

Arrogant Loki would not see it as other than insult and purposely given, so he conspired against the Grekmaid to see her fall beneath his foot. Odin, one eye and Loki the giant bloodbrothers were by Odin's oath, but Loki banished for killing Baldur was out of favor with Aesir's lord. But Loki knew of Odin's habit, to break any maidenhead he found, and so to the allfather Loki petitioned, and so was the fate of the Grekmaid sealed. Loki drugged her youth with godmead and bore her away to Gladsheim's door.

Come see, he said to Odin's anger, come see what tribute I have brought. A foreign god for you to plunder with treasures never touched by ought. She is ripe and fine and lovely, and I would give her firsts to you, as a token of the honor that I offer you and yours. Odin grinned and followed Loki to the place where Grekmaid lay. And he found her shape most pleasing, and would break her, yay or nay.

With war rough hands they took her out and bound her to Yggdrasil's roots. There to take unwanted license and water the lifetree with virgin blood. Loki mocking held her open, scoffing at her cries and pleas, and drank her tears as Odin broke her. First of Asgaard to plunder her trove.

When Odin's lust had been emptied in her, then did Loki take his turn. And laboured hard, did cruel godkiller to make the Grekmaid scream with pain. All through his rutting his fists fell on her. His pleasure could be read in her bruised flesh. And laughed he together with Odin, Betrayer about the lewdness of the view. When he had finished using the goddess, he wiped his spear in her sable hair and laughing went to find another who would use her just as rough.

Odin stayed to beat her further, finding this a wondrous sport, 'til Loki returned with Frey the lovely, blindfolded to see neither blood nor pain. Then the silver tongued godkiller whispered in my brother's ear. Here is woman, warm and willing. Tis her wish, your heat to feel, but in secret, you not knowing, whose sweet body you may touch. Gentle Frey listened for objection, trusting not in Loki's word, but Odin's spear was lodged in her throat, his girth did silence the GrekMaiden's cry. So deluded, blinded Frey, trusting that the girl was free, thought this was a game of loving, and thrust inside with single stroke.

And so did Loki in this way, violate not one, but two. For sweet Frey's heart in two would break, when he learned the truth at last.

To Grekmaid's horror and godkiller's glee, Frey a giving lover was, and sought to bring his partner pleasure, using all a love god knows. And so she, helpless pinioned between blind Frey, Loki and Odin's spears, was made to come against her will, and even worse this made her shame. Frey did climax close behind her and ran his hand along her flank as one would a tender lover begging her to give her name. Then Loki led him from the garden and back to Aegir's feasting hall, and handsome Frey returned to drinking, with not a clue of what he'd done.

For Frey's love seed was strong and fertile and bound the other two within, so in the moment Grekmaid came three lives were in her belly wrought. One, the son of one eyed Odin, one, the get of Loki was and lastly came a child of Frey all bound to grow within her flesh. So was the fate of Asgaard sealed at the base of Yggdrasil.

They brought her into Aegir's meadhall and of her suffering made they sport. And Loki laughing told fair Frey the truth of his ecstatic touch. Frey to Alfheim fled in shame, full sick that he'd turned love to hate. Freya in her rage did challenge this offense with wrathful words. All maidenheads were hers by right because she ruled o'er pleasures all. But Odin overruled her words, and disregarded all her censure. The grekmaid would not go, he swore, but would remain to be their sport. And Freya's suit being denied, she left that place and journeyed home. To her hall, where she called forth power to swear a solemn vow.

She could not free the godly Maid, being to Odin subordinate, but she could share the poor girls suffering and suffer with her in kinship's spirit. So she watched through all the horrors that the captive Grekmaid bore. And never once did Freya turn her face away from Grekken's pain. Nine months she kept her anguished vigil, while Loki and his brother played. Though her eyes were red and weary, never did she move her gaze. She daily sent a missive harsh, demanding the Grekkenmaid go free. And to her side came Odin's Frigga, and covered all the worlds with snow. Spring would not come, the god-queen swore until the Grekkenmaid was freed.

At long last, as Grekkenmaid grew heavy with the forced fruit, sickened Freya could not bear to merely watch her sorry fate. She could no longer countenance godkiller's sin against poor virtue, and so her falcon cloak she took, and set to search the world's throughout, to find the Grekkenmaid a champion who could take her from Asgaard.

Long searched Freya through the void, seeking vainly for some sign that she would find the Grekmaid's champion and lead him to her captive place. Til, unable to journey further, Freya fell to rest upon the shores of a country, warm and fertile, and there she met a searching god. His quest was for a missing sister, lost nine months before. Her heart rejoiced, yet she said nothing, unsure what to tell this god. Til finally, she through art made heavy the storming thunder of his eyes. He fell to sleeping, and she took him, wrapped him in her falcon coat, and bore him through the void asleep, to the foot of Asgarrd's slopes.

There she let him wake and wonder, keeping hidden from his sight. She contrived a trail to lead him unto the hall where his sister lay. The Grekkenmaid was big with child, and sleeping, chained on straw and stone. Bruises stood out on her face, and scratches marred her milky arms. Her ebon hair was lank and dirty and her eyes were dull with pain, but when she saw her brother come, a smile sublime spread on her face. Grekken god did lift his sister gently in his mighty arms, and bore her out of Gladsheim's door away across the plain of Ida.

Odin's wolves, Geri and Freki would have howled to wake their lord, but Freya in her anger slew them, breaking their necks with her milk white hands. Hugin and Munin, Thought and Memory, Odin's ravens saw this act, their warning croaks also were silenced by the twist of Freya's arms. The corpses of allfather's pets, she hid beneath the meadhall stones. And then she followed the grekken pair to conceal their fleeing path.

Freya let her long hair down and off she took her golden kirtle, followed by her tunic gown, and nude she stood beneath the moon. Slowly raising up her passion, she wove the spell of lover's flame, and dancing on the plain of Ida, concealed the trail beneath her feet. Her rising passion warmed the ground and with her art she summoned flowers, that the scent of fleeing Greklords would be lost in odor sweet. Then unto her hall returning, Freya brooded through the night, hoping that the Grekmaid's family might heal her broken, wronged heart.

Through her mirror, she did watch as maid and lord their homeland reached. His sister Grekkenlord did carry to a hall of marble white, and leave her in the care of women while he to his siblings went. Freya watched the Grekgods' anger kindle when the tale was told. Then she saw them, raging Grekken girding all for battle fierce and she knew the end was coming, brought about by Loki's sin.

Fair Freya being such a lady as from war and love was made, saw the Grekken rage was righteous, and could not bear to see them die. So when the Grekken host approached Bifrost, the rainbow bridge to Asgaard, Freya stole godkiller's knife and threw it into Heimdall's breast. Heimdall, thinking Loki slew him, sounded Gjaller, his world-end horn. And all the gods were roused from slumber to meet and fight on Ida's plain. But not as Vala had pronounced it went the final battle there. In the place of Vala's killers, Grekengods were come to war. Loki's Fenris they had slaughtered for his father's heinous deeds. A dog with three enourmous heads did swallow Odin one eye down. Then this unknown Grekkenhound dissappeared from battle's view before Vidar could take revenge and slay him in his father's name.

A lovely god as gold as sunshine struck down Frey with golden fire, and Thor was felled not by the serpent but by a mighty hunteress Grek after he had vanquished midgaard's serpent with Mjollnir's blow. So each fell who had been spoken of in Vala's prophecy, but not as she had seen it done within her vision of this time. Loki's death came not from Heimdall, who lay dying at the bridge, but from the Grekkenmaid's dark brother, who tortured slowly foul godkiller 'til he died in agony.

Thus did Ragnarok come justly bringing doom on Asgaard's host. As they, the gods, had wronged Grekmaiden, price was paid in holy blood. Loki's sin caused Ragnarok, but Freya's efforts killed the gods. She was pinned by Nemesis' two arrows to the meadhall's board, and welcomed death most lovely Freya, for she her fellows had betrayed. But the final arrow golden, from the Grekken's bow was stayed, and Nemesis her shot abandoned, leaving Freya still alive.

Freya freed herself with effort, and left the shattered Asgaard halls, wandring far and wide in penance for the world she helped to end. Now kind Baldur, best of Aesir rules o'er newborn Nordenland while faithless Freya the betrayer hides in Grekken Hades' realm. This, the tale of Asgaard's ending. This, the end of Asgarrd's tale."

Freya's voice trailed off, but her face was pale and streaked with salt and her reddened eyes were still distant, fixed on the sights she alone had seen. The best and the worst of her kind had perished together. This was the cause of her hate for Loki, but it was also the cause of her hate for herself.

Strife looked at her long and hard. He'd have to think about this.

TITLE: On the Turning Away 5B/?
SERIES: Dark Side of the Rainbow Bridge
AUTHOR: Raven4 ( arcadian13_2000@y... )
ARCHIVE: Feel free, but I wanna know where
FANDOM: X:WP, H:TLC
PAIRING: Strife/Cupid, Eris/Various
RATING: NC-17 OC, POV
WARNINGS:
1. WARNING WARNING: Non-Consensual sex ahead. This tale will include mention of the multiple rape of Discord. I'm not planning on being very graphic, but I am planning on being very emotional. If this squicks you out, don't read it. Skip this chapter.
2. Very little DeadStrife tm. This is mainly Freya's edited account of the conception of Strife, Joxer and Jett/Jace and the last days of Asgaard.
3. Heavy Angst ahead. The recollection of rape, torture and deicide is not a happy smiley story. If you don't like Angst, see warning 1.
4. Darkside 5A is written in the poetic style of Icelandic sagas. If you find it difficult to follow, there will be a normal version of the story labeled Dark Side 5B. If you are enjoying this series, I recommend reading both as there are some details particular to each.
5. She's not Mary Sue; she's my goddess.

DISCLAIMER: Actual Gods and Monsters are public domain. So there! Herc and Xena Original characters (Joxer, Strife, etc.) belong to Ren Pics and Flat Earth Prods. Translation; Don't break 'em and make sure they've been washed when you return 'em.

NOTES: Freya is the secret identity of the goddess formerly known as Munin. Ragnarok is the Norse end of the world. For Questions about other Norse names and terms used by the goddess, visit http://www.pantheon.org/mythica.html Flames will be cheerfully ignored or used to keep Asgaard burning.

SUMMARY: Freya confesses her crime while protecting the innocent


"My name is Freya Njordsdattir." She locked her gaze on his face. "And I brought about the end of the world."

For the second time in as many hours, Strife, god of Mischief stared at his servant with his mouth hanging open. Long moments passed before he closed it with a snap and looked at her skeptically.

"Care to run that by me again, birdy girl?" He asked. "'Cause I don't think I heard ya right."

"You heard me, my lord." She said softly. Her eyes were far away, fixed on sights that she had once seen and no one would ever see again. "See, it went down like this; long ago, there was a set of worlds ruled over by gods called the Aesir and the Vanir. These two clans of gods had been beating on each other forever, and we were all kinda sick of it, so we decided to work it all out. As was our way, both clans exchanged hostages to live with the other. That's how we used to help cement peace in the north.

My brother, Frey and myself went with our dad, Njord, left our Vanir home and moved to the lands of the Aesir, where we were treated like long lost family. Odin ruled over the Aesir, he's also called Allfather or one eye on account of he gave up an eye at the well of Mimir to get smarter. His Meadhall was called Gladsheim. It's the Einherjar party, ya know, those who bought it in combat. All night they party in Valhalla, and all day they fight each other stupid. Then at night they'd get all healed up and started the cycle all over again. Odin set that whole deal up cause he needed the best troops rallied and trained for the day when Ragnarok, the doom of the gods came down.

An oracle, we call them Vala's, had given out a prophecy that one day, Loki was gonna escape from his punishment for killing Baldur. She said that he would come with an army of the dead, leading the fire giants and the ice giants, plus his half-breed kid, Fenris Wolf.

All these folks were gonna meet in Asgaard on the plain of Ida to do battle on that final day. Fenris would devour Odin, then be killed by Odin's son Vadir. Thor, the thunder god would kill the Midgaard serpent which had been coiled around the earth, then he was s'posed ta die of the snake's poison before he could take seven steps. Surt, the leader of the fire giants was gonna kill my brother, Frey at the outset of the battle because Frey, like an idiot had given away his sword to buy a wife.

At any rate, some of the gods would die and some of us would live and then Surt was gonna burn the worlds to ashes. Then when it was over, Baldur, son of Frigga the god queen would return from the dead to rule over a re-born world that was s'posed ta be a paradise. Sounds kinda stupid, huh?

But nobody ever doubted a Vala's words. Prophecies were fate, and no one could change them. So the Asgaardian's pretty much stuck with the whole Eat drink and be merry for tomorrow we die philosophy. I did the same, until Loki returned.

Baldur was the son of Odin and Frigga, see and Loki had killed him cause he though it would be funny. So we tied him up in Hel. That's like your Hades. Unfortunately for all of us, some of the Svartalfs, the evil dwarves found Loki's prison and let him out. They though he was funny and since he didn't have any other place to go, he stayed with 'em.

Loki figured it was as good a place as any to lie low until he could figure out a way to either topple the Aesir or find some way to be reinstated as on of their elders. His chance came along in no time in the fetching form of a beautiful runaway Grekkengoddess. She'd run away from Grekkenheim, that's your Olympus cause of an argument or somethin'. Anyway, she discovered the Svartalf's city since she was easy on the eyes and fun to hang with, they invited her to join their party.

She accepted and lo and behold, there was another god at this shindig. It was Loki, and she thought he was hot from the moment she laid eyes on 'im. See, this Grekchick was still a virgin, and appeared to be looking to fix that, if ya know what I mean, so she started flirtin' with him. Loki enjoyed it for a while, but got irritated with her really quick because she acted like his equal an' didn't let him win all the time. So he challenged her to a contest of riddles.

She said okay and they got to it, but every riddle Loki asked, the Grekkenmaid could answer. Eventually, Loki, being a prick, decided that she was insulting him on purpose, and he got really pissed off. He decided that he'd teach her a lesson and get back into Asgaard at the same time. He slipped a mickey into her drink and when she'd passed out, he carried her from the Svartalf's realm to Asgaard.

Loki and Odin were blood brothers and Loki knew what turned Odin's crank. One eye's favorite game was bustin' maidenheads. He'd do it whenever he could get away with it. So Loki took the unconscious virgin goddess to Aegir's hall, where the Asgaardian gods were, as always, getting drunk and eating. He hid the girl outside then disguised himself and entered the hall.

Once he was in, he revealed himself only to Odin and begged him on the strength of their long friendship to come and see the gift he'd brought. Odin went out and damn if his tongue didn't drag the ground. It wasn't often he got divine maidenheads, because there was always someone looking out for the local goddesses, but Loki told him that this one was alone and far from home.

The Grekkenchick was stirring by this time, an' she put up a hell of a fight when Odin put his hands on her, but the two gods dragged her to the base of Yggdrasil, which is the tree that gives life and holds up the worlds. They tied her up on her belly to the root of Yggdrasil. Loki was a right bastard. He was cruel and clever and humiliated the poor girl by forcing her thighs open and displaying her sex to the hungry eyes of the lord of Asgaard as casually as you'd open the mouth of a horse to look at it's teeth.

The poor goddess started to cry, and it made Odin even hotter to break her open. Her pleas and tears were like music to him, and so he broke her maidenhead while Loki licked the tears from her face. Odin was cruel, but at least he finished quickly. Loki Godkiller took a turn next. He took his time and beat her up while he raped. He was as brutal as possible, and didn't spend until he heard her scream in pain. Then he came inside her and wiped dick on her long black hair.

But it wasn't enough for Loki. Oh hell no. He said he was going straight back into the party to find another cock for the slut to ride. Odin stayed, pig that he was, to beat on her some more. She cursed him and swore, threatening everything from blighted crops to athlete's foot 'til, at last he got tired of her whining and took her mouth with brutal force.

That's when Loki returned with my brother, Frey."

Freya took a deep breath, her jaw tight. Strife could hear the shaking rage in her voice and tried really hard not even to breath. He figured she had to get through this story more for her own sake than to keep him informed.

"My brother was a sex god, yes, but he was also the male god of true love. If he'd known the truth, he'd have beat Loki stupid, but he'd allowed himself to be tricked.

Loki told Frey there was an Aesir girl who wanted to have sex with him, but was too shy to ask. Godkiller told him that the lady would only meet with him if he could not guess her identity. She wanted him blindfolded, and wouldn't speak during the encounter. Frey, like an idiot, believed him, so Loki covered his eyes and led him out to Yggdrasil, chuckling all the way.

Now when Loki laughs generally everybody gets nervous, so Frey was concerned by Loki's mirth. He though it might be a trick, so when he came to the girl's body he called out to her to speak to him and tell him who she was. Naturally, the goddess couldn't talk with fucking Odin filling her mouth, so Frey heard not a peep. He called again, asking her to tell him that she wanted him, but he got no verbal answer. Loki, the tricky little shit reached out and stroked my brother's body like a lover, and he thought this was the unseen goddess maintaining her anonymity, so he got ready to give her all the pleasure a sex god can bestow.

A final time he asked the goddess if she wanted to join with him, and this time, thinking she was playing he said he's take her if she didn't speak to stop him. The poor Grekchick fought like a monster, but Loki and Odin were too powerful, and all Frey felt was what he assumed was an aroused trembling.

So he slid into her passage in one liquid thrust. She was slick with the seed of Odin and Loki so he figured that she was ready and hot. And being a god of love and sex, he used all of his powers to give her pleasure. This only made the poor kid's torment worse, ya know. Cause she started coming in spite of herself. Godkiller could hardly contain his glee at the fresh bout of cryin' this new indignity caused. Though she fought to feel nothing, no one can resist the touch of a sex god who's giving it his all.

One last time my poor brother brought her to orgasm and then he spilled inside her as well. Loki caught him as he sagged to the ground and carried him back to Aegir's party. Poor stupid Frey didn't know what he'd done. Our bodies, Frey's and mine, are more fertile than any of the other gods'. We are god and goddess of love and fertility. His seed coming in on top of Odin's and Loki's caused all three of 'em to catch.

So the girl was implanted with a child from each of them. Odin and Loki laughed like hyenas and carried their torn and bloodied prize in to Aegir's Meadhall. They thought the whole thing was hilariously funny, and Loki really enjoyed getting up on the table in front of everyone telling Frey what he'd done.

My brother was horrified and he hauled ass out of the hall and back to his haven in Alfheim like his tail was on fire. He didn't ever return to Asgaard until the start of Ragnarok. My poor brother.

Naturally, this pissed my shit off but good. Bad enough they'd hurt Frey like that, but dammit, all girls first times are s'posed to be mine, on account of I'm the goddess of love. So, I threw a royal fit and demanded that the girl go free. Odin told me to fuck off and started in on her all over again. What was I gonna do, challenge the king of the gods?

I left and Odin's wife Frigga went with me. Pregnancy and childbirth are hers, so she was pissed too. We went to my place and I brought out my mirror. We couldn't make Odin let her go, but we didn't have to add to her shame by being there. By the same token, if we had turned our faces away completely it would have seemed like abandoning her, which we weren't willing to do. So we watched, Frigga and I. We watched the whole thing from beginning to end.

Frigga denied the spring for eight months. Winter ruled all the worlds. Every day we sent the boys messages telling 'em to cut it the fuck out, and finally, when the poor girl was heavy with pregnancy, Odin and Loki started beating on her again and I just couldn't take it any more. I snapped and Frigga snapped with me. She told me to get that girl out of Asgaard no matter what it took or cost.

I wrapped up in my flacon coat and headed out. I searched a long time for someone I could help to rescue the girl, and I finally found him. He was her brother and he was searching for her. So I drugged him and wrapped him in my coat and carried him to Asgaard through the void so Heimdall wouldn't see him. I laid out a trail that a blind elephant could have followed and set the Grekenlord down at it's beginning, then I hid.

He grabbed the girl an' took her home and I went home to watch what would happen. He took her to a marble temple and turned her over to a gathering of Grekkengoddesses. Then he went to another temple and gathered all his kinsmen. He told them what had happened and they started preparing for war.

Now this put me in an untenable position. Frey may have been just a love/ fertility god, but I was a love goddess and a goddess of war. As such, I could see the right of the Greks rage. I mean, hell, if I coulda killed Loki for what he did to Frey I woulda in a heartbeat. But I didn't want the poor kid to loose any of her family in battle, and the Aesir were nothing if not incredible fighters. I figured I'd give 'em just a little help.

When the Grekkenhost reached the foot of bifrost, I stole Loki's dagger and threw it at Heimdall. I guess I musta missed his lung cause he saw Loki's dagger in his chest, figured Loki was tryin' ta kill 'im and sounded his horn, Gjaller to start Ragnarok before he died.

That was pretty much it. The Vala was wrong. It wasn't the fire or ice giants that attacked us. It wasn't the dead and the children of Loki who fought against the Einherjar that day. It was a whole pantheon of pissed off Grekken. Odin fell to a three-headed dog. The Grekken war god took hours to let Loki die. And my poor stupid brother refused to fight back and was immolated by your fiery sun god. Some Grekken golden archer chick killed Thor after he scotched the Midgaard serpent. I just sat there, in Aegir's hall in front of the fallen meadtable where they'd tortured that poor girl and waited for death.

That golden girl, your Nemesis came striding through the door arrow fist. I just jumped and held my arms outstretched. I wanted her to kill me. I think I may even have thanked her as two arrows flew, but neither of 'em hit me anywhere useful. Her first two shots pinned my wrists against the table. She nocked the third, but she didn't fire.

Do it! I said. Dangling three feet above the floor, I was lusting after that third arrow as I never had for any caress. I raised my voice.

DO IT! I shouted. Nemesis just looked at me with unreadable eyes. She lowered he bow as I cursed her. The pain from the arrows was nothin' compared to what was goin' down inside my soul.

"COME ON, DAMN YOU! KILL ME! I shouted, hanging there, feeling the shattered bones in my wrists grind as I flailed. I tried every move I could to get free and attack her so she'd just let that fucking arrow fly. But I couldn't get loose, and my tears burned my face as she turned her back and left the hall. Through the door I could see, the whole world was burning, and I couldn't really find it in me to care.

I wanted it all to burn. It needed to be purified.

That was pretty much it, my lord. I was rescued from the flames by Baldur when he rose from the dead. He hid me in a knot in the Yggdrasil. I was unconscious or I'd have resisted. I woke up, saw the paradise that was born from Asgaard's destruction and ran like hell, and I've been running ever since."

Freya's voice trailed off, but her face was pale and streaked with salt and her reddened eyes were still distant, fixed on the sights she alone had seen. The best and the worst of her kind had perished together. This was the cause of her hate for Loki, but it was also the cause of her hate for herself.

Strife looked at her long and hard. He'd have to think about this.

TITLE: One Slip 6/?
SERIES: Dark Side of the Rainbow
AUTHOR: Raven4 ( arcadian13_2000@y... )
ARCHIVE: If ya wanna, just let me know so I can blush.
RATING: PG (Nothing graphic, but rape is controversial subject matter) OC WARNINGS:
1. Never stick a pencil in your eye. It hurts. Ask Odin, he'll tell ya.
2. I'm not sure if this is humor or angst. I'll label each installment so y'all can be fairly warned.

DISCLAIMER: Strife isn't mine. If he were there'd be a whole lot of suddenly fat supermodels. Greeks for the Greeks, Norse for the Norse, being a pagan, they're all mine of course. Pthbbbbt!!!. Herc and Xena folks belong to Ren Pics and Flat Earth Prods. Go ahead, sue me. I'd have more time to write in prison.
NOTES: (Deep breath) This is the sixth installment of Dark side of the Rainbow Bridge, which itself was a follow up on Scorpio's Pathos of Joxer. If you haven't read 'em, don't come cryin' ta me if ya don't get this one. Mega-thanks and a Strife/ Raven sandwich to my dearest friend, GarouGrrl. Without your support, none of my words would ever have been seen by human eyes. Flames will be cheerfully ignored or used to keep Asgaard burning.

SUMMARY: Strife takes time to think, and we all know how dangerous that can be.


Freya flew out over Olympus, once again clad in Munin's hide. Strife had sent her out to spy on his relations, but she knew he really wanted time to process her tale. He had to decide whether or not he could trust a confessed godkiller as his personal servant. The details of her telling were already fuzzy to her. It seemed as though she'd been having a nightmare, and had only just escaped it.

That story couldn't have happened to her. It had to be a dream. Surely Freya the lovely, Freya the kind, Freya the re-uniter of lovers could not have betrayed Asgaard.

She didn't deceive herself long. It was a pleasant diversion, but she would not sustain it. She had watched Frigga do just that. Repeat a false version of the tale for so long that she believed it herself. The former queen of the gods had driven herself insane. Freya's last view of her had been her wide eyes and laughing face right before she'd leapt into a chasm of fire.

It was difficult to keep to reality, but if the destruction of Asgaard had been a dream, Freya wouldn't be wearing the allfather's pet as a jacket.

Strife was brooding in his chair. He'd sent Freya off to Olympus for a bit o' spyin' and also so he could think over what she'd said. Somethin' about it was makin' him nervous. He decided to tackle it bit by bit.

One of his family members had run away at some point and gotten herself captured. His new servant had aided in her rescue. That was good, right? You bet.

Then war had been waged on the Norse and won, largely because the Norse were unprepared, and the Norse were unprepared because Freya had killed their watchman. So, total death to the bad guys and no deaths in his family. That was good too, right? Right again.

There were new Norse god's now. Presumably they would be very angry if they knew that Freya had let the Greeks in the door, but she was with him, so they would never learn. So, that was okay, he thought, but also a little confusing. He decided to focus on the more personal aspects of the situation.

Freya was a major goddess and she was in his service. That was definitely good. One of his cousins or aunts had been raped and that was definitely bad. Freya knew the identity of the victim. Which could be good. He wondered if he could get her to tell him.

"Hell," he said out loud. "She's given me enough clues whether she meant to or not, that I bet I can figure it out on my own."

"Let's see*" He made a mental list. "It's obviously a woman, and she has or had a brother. She was a virgin at the time. That leaves out Hera and Dite. The rescuing brother was dark, so Artemis is toast. The brother wasn't Apollo cause he killed Freya's brother. Waitaminnit!!!"

Strife leapt to his feet and began pacing rapidly, no longer caring about the shortness of the walk.

"It wasn't Apollo or Hephestus, they're not war gods." He spoke aloud as he counted Olympians on his pale, thin fingers. "It wasn't Deimos or Phobos cause they only have Harmonia and I've known her all her life. If she'da been raped they'da invited me to the butt kicking party. Freya said it was a goddess, so the demi gods are out. It wasn't any of the Asphodelian's cause the rescue god wouldn't have brought her to Olympus. It's a dark haired goddess from the house of war. She has a dark brother. And she was pregnant*"

"She was*pregnant with the sons of *three different foreign gods." Strife's litany slowed to a stop as he fell to his knees on the cool, rough stones.

"Oh shit." He murmured. "Oh really, really shit."

TITLE: Childhood's End 7/?
SERIES: Dark Side of the Rainbow
AUTHOR: Raven4 ( arcadian13_2000@y... )
ARCHIVE: If ya wanna, just let me know so I can blush.
RATING: R (Naughty words, don'cha know) OC
WARNINGS:
1. Never stick a pencil in your eye. It hurts. Ask Odin, he'll tell ya.
2. Light angst, I think. I'll label each installment so y'all can be fairly warned.
3. Canon, what's canon? And who needs it anyway? (This might as well be an AU where none of the events in Herc or Xena that followed Strife's death ever happened.)

DISCLAIMER: Strife isn't mine. But I can dream, dammit. Greeks for the Greeks, Norse for the Norse, being a pagan, they're all mine of course. Pthbbbbt!!!. Herc and Xena folks belong to Ren Pics and Flat Earth Prods. Suing me would be an exercise in applied physics, namely an experiment to try and squeeze blood from a stone.
NOTES: (Deep breath) This is the seventh installment of Dark side of the Rainbow Bridge, which itself was a follow up on Scorpio's Pathos of Joxer. (Bet yer getting' sick o' ME by now) If you haven't read 'em, don't come cryin' ta me if ya don't get this one. If ya don't like it, blame the divine Garou_Grrl, who has threatened me with evisceration if I don't finish it. Go ahead, flame me, see what happens.

SUMMARY: Strife and Freya have a visitor and Strife learns more of his family history.


Hades was sitting quietly in his favorite oversized chair and gazing out the window. His wife was gardening again, as if anything would grow down here. She always spent the last portion of her visit doing this, and the plants were always dead when she returned, but it pleased her to do it, and secretly, it pleased him as well. It was her silent promise to return and her way of caring for him in her absence.

She was beautiful, his 'Sephe, and every year it became more and more difficult to let her go back to the living world. He ventured to guess it was growing harder for her as well. Perhaps one day Demeter would be persuaded to lift her curse.

Down in the garden, Persephone grinned into her flowers. Her hair was loose and fell around her shoulders, for which she was glad. It would not do to let Hades see her grinning over his regard. Their parting was only made bearable by the constant charade they played. His part was the dour gaoler and hers' the resigned captive.

She knew that he knew her heart, but until her mother ceased this tyrannical assault on all life every time Persephone went to her husband, their dynamic could not change. She was deeply grateful to Hades' part-time lover for keeping him occupied and amused in her absence. Besides, the god of dreams made the long summer months of separation more interesting for her as well as her lord.

She was pondering the erotic dreams Morpheus had promised to send her in her absence when she heard a strange sound. It sounded like someone keening, but this garden was on the Elysian side of Hades' palace, so there was no one to mourn. Where could it come from?

She looked up to her lover curiously only to find him frowning at a different part of his grounds.

"Hades?" She called up to him. "What is it?"

"Go inside, my love." He answered distractedly taking his golden helmet in hand. "I'll find out."

"But*"

"Inside." He reiterated. "I'll come to you anon."

Persephone heaved a sigh and left her garden for the black marble halls of the house of death. She hoped he would tell her what had happened. If only she was dying to know, then she would never have to leave this still, cool place.

Hades strode across the grounds to his construct of Strife's domicile. At the door, he donned his helmet and was instantly invisible to all eyes, mortal or divine. Silently he crept toward the strange sound. It was coming from Strife's study. Could the young god be mourning his lost life at last?

Careful not to make a sound, Hades peeked around the arched doorway. The sight that greeted his imperious eyes dropped his jaw into the region of his breastplate. Strife was sitting on the floor in the middle of a complete ruin. Everything in the room had been smashed to tiny bits and then presumably stomped on. The dead god of mischief was rocking slowly back and forth calmly arranging the debris into some kind of pattern on the stone floor.

The awful noise was coming from him, as he alternately laughed and sobbed. At this close range, there were words in the sound.

"So, so, so. So clear now." The pale god giggled. Hades slipped into the room for a closer view. "No wonder. No wonder. I wondered why they didn't bring me back. Why no one comes to visit."

Hades crept around his grandnephew. Strife's face was streaked with tears, and his expression shifted from ghastly grinning to contorted pain as he panted and crooned to himself.

"Of course she didn't want us*" He laughed again and it grated on Hades nerves like the broken glass Strife was arranging. "How could she possibly want us? Why were we even let to live at all? Well, s'remedied now. And I don't blame them one bit. Everyone must've known. But why didn't they tell us. My poor brothers."

Hades eyes narrowed. Strife continued to ramble on.

"The psycho kids of pain and hate. No wonder we're all so fucked up. The stamp of Loki's in our blood and we're the get of rape." Strife had cut himself repeatedly on the glass and metal shards he was so carefully arranging. The crimson stains streaked the floor and stood out intensely against the godling's pale slender hands.

As Hades watched, aghast, Strife took another bit of glass, looked at it for a long moment and then laid it gently into his pattern. From this angle, he could see it. Strife was building a fair likeness of his mothers' face out of the broken and twisted remains of his furnishings, and painting it in with his own blood. Hades was just about to interfere when there was a fluttering at the window.

A raven flew into the chamber, and then seemed to split into two beings. A lovely woman emerged from the breast of the bird, which fell to the floor like an emptied wineskin. He'd barely had time to notice the split before the woman had skidded across the floor and wrapped pale arms around Strife's rocking form.

"Please, no." She murmured into the dead god's wild hair. "No, love, no. Dearest, precious child, please."

Strife struggled against her embrace, trying to continue his self-destructive artwork, but She clung to him, and he grew quiet as she rocked with him. She waved one perfect hand and the portrait was gone, only the blood on his hands testifying to it.

"It wasn't your fault." The woman's voice was thick with tears. "It wasn't your fault. No one ever blamed you. She didn't even blame you."

With a shock that he felt all the way through his divine being, Hades knew her, but he contained his reaction to further observe this scene. He knew that Nemesis had left her alive, but he trusted her judgement and never thought to question her mercy. The goddess of Justice kept her own council these days. Strife raised wild eyes and trembling lips to gaze at the goddess' face.

"Why didn't they tell us?" He sobbed. "Why?"

"They wanted to protect you." She hugged him close. "Ares suggested it and all agreed. Eris did not blame you for your fathers' sins. It was all so long ago. Most of the gods don't even remember it now."

"We got older, and we started to resemble them, didn't we?" Strife hiccuped. "That's why she stopped coming around. I remember. She used to play with us when we were babies, but then she just stopped. Joxer went to live with aunt 'Dite. Jett went to Morpheus and I stayed with Uncle Ares. It was because we looked like them, and she could never see us without remembering."

"My poor darling child." Freya kissed his flushed forehead softly, holding him to her breast. "I watched you through your whole life, from conception to now. Your mother is ill, but she never blamed you three. I heard her tell Ares over and over."

"Tell me all of it." Strife looked up at her, sniffling but somewhat calmed. "Tell me, so I can know the truth."

Freya paused for a long moment, fresh pain on her face, and then she nodded and sat cross-legged in front of him, taking his bloodied hands in her own.

"I was there, you know, when you were born." She smiled sadly. "It was part of my silent vow to watch your mother's pain. I was dressed in the newly skinned Munin and I hid in the high arches of your grandmother's temple. First born was Joxious, son of Odin One-Eye. He was silent at birth, just grinning myopically at the world. There was no malice in him anywhere, and his gentleness, even as a baby endeared him at once to your Aunt Aphrodite, who took him up to nurse with her own new baby boy until your mother's delivery was over."

"Next came Jetticles, giggling and cooing and then shrieking rage to the skies. His duality was already obvious. Another of your divine aunts took him up and he nursed at first, then bit her fiercely. Finally, there was a long pause. You were not overly eager to come into the world. Then there you were, wiggling and red and perfect." Freya smiled at him through her tears. "You didn't cry aloud, your tiny face was very serious, and even at that early moment you gazed around at your surroundings and took all of it in. Your love for your mother was as clear as your eyes to anyone with senses to feel it. Mighty Hera gasped at its' strength. And you were lovely; quite possibly the most beautiful infant I've ever seen."

"All three of you were offered to your mother and she nursed you each in turn. Jetticles bit her just as fiercely as his surrogate, so he was nursed on goat's milk. Joxious would nurse from anyone, and I think his gentleness eased some of her suffering. His love was less focussed, directed to everyone. His presence was instant balm to every wounded conscience. But you, my fine fellow, my own dear nephew, you would not nurse from her. She offered you her breast, and though you clung to her and all could feel your infants' devotion, you would not take her milk."

"For a time, you three lived with your mother in Ares' temple on Olympus, but soon it was clear that you would favor your father. Loki's seed was as sneaky as he and both your siblings favored him in the face, though only Jetticles bore his malicious madness. It was as if each of you had taken something from the father of his brother. Joxious had his Loki's face, you had Odin's hard won wisdom, and Jetticles, in his calm moments had Frey's lighthearted desire for fun. Death finally take me, sweet, but physically you are the exact copy of my poor Frey. It was thought that you would be a love god as well, and so you might have been."

"Though she loved you all, Eris could not bear to look on Loki's borrowed face day and night, so Joxious went to your aunt, who adored him. He was raised in keeping with his nature, and became Grekkengod of redemption. Jetticles was handed over to Morpheus, as he alone could hold the child without being hurt in some way. Since all madmen are dreamers as well, it worked well, and so your brother matured into god of madness."

"But what about me?" Strife interrupted. His eyes had dried and Hades could see that he was calmer. "You said I was supposed to be a love god."

"Not necessarily supposed to be, my love." She smiled on him again, touching his pale cheek gently. "You might have been a god of Malice or of Love, but instead became something in between, mischief maker of divine proportions. I think your godhead developed as it did because you wanted to make your mother laugh, for you alone, Eris kept by her side. Everyone thought she had given you into Ares' care, and to a certain degree she did. But think back, nephew. Remember how often you have been in her company in your life."

Strife frowned thoughtfully. Hades expression mirrored his. It was true. When the other brothers were sent away to live with relatives, Jopanis had stayed in the House of War. He'd assumed, like the rest of Olympus, that Eris had turned him over to her brother, but she had maintained her dwelling there as well.

"What does that mean?" He asked and even the Deathgod's heart lurched at the searching pain in his pale face.

"I don't know, angel." Freya whispered. "But I truly believe that she loved you all, as much as she was able."

"But that's why, isn't it." Strife whispered hoarsely. "That's why I'm still dead. That's why no one visits me. That's the reason, of all the god's who've died only I am left alone here."

"I don't know." Freya's face twisted in frustration. "I've been searching constantly to find the answer. I don't believe that you've been abandoned. Zeus has refused all requests to bring you back, but why they do not visit? I have no answer to that."

Strife's voice was so wretched with hurt and self-recrimination that Hades couldn't bear it any longer. He stepped to the door, then turned and removed his helmet.

"I can answer it, Strife." He intoned in his rich, hollow voice. The reactions of his tenants to his sudden appearance would have been hilarious had the situation not been so grave. Both Strife and Freya moved to stand protectively before the other, reaching to pull each behind the other. This scramble caused them to end up in a tangle of arms and legs and flashing eyes.

"Be at peace." The lord of hell raised his hands before him. "I mean no harm. I just couldn't be silent on this point."

Strife won their battle and stepped out in front of Freya, who stared at the deathgod with something like hope. Perhaps, at long last, she would be freed from existence.

"What d'ya mean, unc?" Strife asked. His arm was out before his aunt, holding her close behind him.

"Only that I know why no one has come, and it is not that you are abandoned." Freya looked at Hades coldly over Strife's leather and steel clad shoulder. Strife just looked confused. "Sit back down, and I'll explain what's been going on as best I can."

Slowly, not taking their eyes off of him, the two younger gods slipped back to the floor. Strife sat sprawled and leaned back against Freya's breast, while she perched cross-legged behind him and wound her arms around his neck. Slowly, as he would with skittish animals, Hades sat across from them.

"When you died, there was a great hue and cry from many directions, Strife." Hades began. "Many voices clamored for your return. Ares, Hercules, and Xena buried their enmity completely to join forces and hunt down that mad blonde bitch, Callisto. This they did, and before they killed her, they slowly roasted her for days over Hephaestus fire."

"Waitaminnit* Jercules the pure ac'shully tortured somebody?" Strife looked skeptically at his grand uncle. "Pull the other one or I'll walk funny."

"It's true Strife. It was his idea, in point of fact, and only Xena objected. But then, she feels rather responsible for the girl. Anyway, as I was saying*"Hades leveled a pointed glance at Strife. "Aphrodite and Hera took turns wheedling my brother to get him to allow you back, but he refused their every suit. Cupid was beside himself, he practically lived at the base of Zeus throne, but his begging and weeping did not move the king of the gods."

Strife still looked confused. Freya was looking angrier by the second.

"But, most importantly to you, I would think, was the behavior of your mother."

"She ignored it all, huh?" Strife slumped.

"Not so, my boy. Quite the opposite in fact. She stormed into Zeus' throne room like a raging bull and demanded your resurrection. When Zeus refused her, she threatened to kill every child of his that she could lay hands on, but Ares dissuaded her from that, citing Hercules' assistance in the death of Callisto. Then she begged him, as his daughter, to raise you back to her. Again he refused. Eris has spent every moment since your death petitioning Zeus on your behalf. She might as well be living at his temple."

"I don't buy it." Strife said. "And if it is true, why doesn't anyone come down?"

"They can't." Hades sighed in irritation. "Zeus has forbidden it."

"What?!?" The Norse goddess and the mischief god exclaimed as one.

"It's true, I'm afraid. And there's not a damned thing I can do about it. Zeus decreed that there would be neither visitation nor communication between you and your family. He's made it so, and I cannot undo it."

"That fucker!" Freya shouted, her lovely face tinged a becoming shade of red as she leapt to her feet and began to pace the room wildly. "Of all the underhanded, unfeeling, totally LAME-assed things to do. Pig headed godking. They're all alike. No care for the damages their will can wreak. I'll* ooooh, I'll just* I mean really."

Strife had risen and took his aunt into his arms. He stopped her pacing and placed one finger on her lips.

"Patience, birdie." He giggled at her, then nodded his head towards their visitor. "There will be time for that later."

She paused, looking at him suspiciously. Hades could not see Strife's face from his position, but suddenly a wide and not entirely pleasant grin spread across the goddess' perfect face. She nodded and turned to Hades.

"If you would excuse us, O Lord of Death." She curtseyed formally. "We have some rather pressing business to discuss that you would probably rather not be party to."

Hades answered with a grin of his own, and returned her reverence with a deep and courtly bow. His brother had grown into a fairly good man, but in this, Hades agreed he should be taken down a peg or two. If anyone could do it, he was sure it would be these two. He strode off towards his home, whistling a lively tune and wondering what in Hades to tell his wife.

Behind him, he heard Freya ask a question of her nephew. He couldn't make out the answer, but he heard her delighted laughter all the way across his realm.

"Oh, hell yes." She chortled, and Hades, Lord of the Dead, smiled.

TITLE:  Wish You Were Here 8/?
SERIES: Dark Side of the Rainbow
AUTHOR:  Raven4  ( arcadian13_2000@y... )
ARCHIVE:  If ya wanna, just let me know so I can blush.
PAIRING:  Strife/Cupid, Morpheus/Hades/Persephone
RATING:  NC-17 (SMUT ALERT) PWP
WARNINGS:
1. Never stick a pencil in your eye.  It hurts.  Ask Odin, he'll tell ya.
2. Light angst, I think, but mostly smut.  I'll label each installment so y'all can be fairly warned.
3. ALERT:  This is my very first attempt at Slash smut.  I make no guarantee as to the quality of this smut.  Plus, I am a hopeless romantic and somewhat addicted to sappy-ness of all kinds.  Deal with it.
4. This is just smut.  Strife threatened to bitch slap me if somebody didn't get laid.  Who am I to refuse the God of Mischief?  So, this doesn't really further the plot at all, except maybe the last paragraph.  It's just an excuse to have naked, sweaty Strife/Cupid pixies loose in my head.

DISCLAIMER:  Strife isn't mine.  But I can dream, dammit.  Herc and Xena folks belong to Ren Pics and Flat Earth Prods.  Suing me would be an exercise in applied futility, namely an experiment to try and squeeze blood from a stone.
NOTES:  (Deep breath)  This is the 8th installment of Dark side of the Rainbow Bridge, sort of.  Which itself was a follow up on Scorpio's Pathos of Joxer. (Bet yer getting' sick o' ME by now)  If you haven't read 'em, don't come cryin' ta me if ya don't get this one.  This is smut, pure and simple, and to be honest, it's my very first attempt at slash.  If ya don't like it, blame the divine Garou_Grrl, who has threatened me with evisceration if I don't finish it.  Go ahead, flame me, see what happens.

SUMMARY:  I'd better not.  Just smut.


Strife gripped Cupid by his wing joints.  It was a place he had loved to stroke when he was alive.  Cupid was so sensitive there that the lightest touch could bring an instant erection.  Now his fingers were hard and he dug them into the joints, holding tightly and pulling the bleeding god against his body.

"Was this what you missed, lover mine?"  He whispered, grinding his leather covered erection against Cupid's naked ass.  "You always loved me rough.  Just a little piece to pass the time, then off again among the living."

"Strife,*I*"  Cupid sobbed.

"Ya finally come ta see me, and the first thing you want is a good fuck.  Well fine."  Strife wished his clothes away and surprisingly enough, they went, but he was too furious to notice.  "Fine, Cupie.  I'll give ya what ya came for."

He kicked the blonde god's legs apart and took position between them.  Then he released one wing to grip a fistful of shaggy blonde hair.

"Please love."  Cupid begged and Strife paused.  "Let me look at you?"

The god of mischief grinned widely, then quickly covered it with a sneer as he flipped his winged lover onto his back.  Cupid gasped and arched up against Strife's grip.  Strife pressed Cupid's shoulders back and bent over his prone body, staring coldly into his eyes.

"You'd better make it worth the trouble."  He whispered and crawled up the love god's bronzed body.  Cupid groaned like a starving man and strained his neck trying to reach the sweet cock that hung tantalizingly out of his reach. Strife grinned down at him and swayed his hips from side to side slowly, tauntingly.

"Is this what you want, lover?"  He chuckled at Cupid's blushing nod.  "You want to suck my cock?"

"Please*"  Cupid whispered brokenly, tears standing in his luminous eyes. "It's been so long*"

"I like the way you beg, angel boy."  Strife knelt over his prone visitor, pinning Cupid's outstretched arms and wings to the floor with his shins.  "Time to see if your pretty mouth is good for anything else."

Strife lunged forward like a striking snake, thrusting his diamond hard cock between Cupid's perfect lips.  The love god could only moan helplessly as his lover took his mouth.

Strife was fighting desperately not to come.  He had forgotten how hot Cupid's mouth really was.  Slowly, making sure Cupid could see his every move, he ran his pale hands up over his own abdomen to his nipples.  He pinched them hard, then rolled them gently between his fingers.  Feeling the trembling wings under his ankles, Strife grimaced.  He wasn't done yet, dammit.  Leaning into his thrusts, he let go of his controls and fucked Cupid's face like he paid for it.

The winged god's moans told him that they were both nearing their peak, but Strife wasn't ready to come yet, and he knew that Cupid's heart, at least, wasn't either.  Before either of them could fall over the edge, Strife yanked himself back from Cupid's reach, eliciting a heartbroken moan from his flushed lovers' bruised mouth. 

Gripping the bases of both their leaking cocks, Strife applied pressure to the spot Cupid had shown him eons ago, the spot that halted orgasm.  Cupid cried out in frustration.  Strife only chuckled and gripped his balls as well.

"Not yet, pretty boy."  He snarled.  "Not until I'm ready." 

Roughly, he flipped the love god back onto his stomach.

"Are you mine?"  He hissed.

"Yours."  Cupid sobbed.  "Always yours."

"Do you want me?"  Strife's voice was cold and hard as marble.  His cock was easily that hard, but hot as Hephaestus forge.  He ran burning hands possessively over Cupid's sweaty frame.

"Yes."  The love god's chest heaved and he writhed under Strife's touch.
"Gods, yes.  More than I ever wanted anything."

"I hope you left my cock wet enough, lover, 'cause it's all the lubrication you're going to get."

Cupid convulsed, his breath escaping him in one continuous moan.  Strife
conjured oil and slathered his bursting cock.  In spite of his words, he
wouldn't actually harm Cupid.  Not this time anyway.  That wasn't what this was about.  He did not however take his time entering the prostrate god.  Cupid needed this, and by Cronos, he was going to give it to him.

Cupid screamed as Strife pushed into him fast and hard.  He was given no time to adjust for the manic godling began pumping immediately.  The sensation of being taken so roughly was enough to drive him to insanity, but the knowledge it was Strife, his beloved, thought-lost Strife, who was using him so thoroughly; that was enough to carry him past madness and into an ecstasy so profound that he was helpless before it.

He wept and cried out Strife's name like the sacred prayer it was to him, pushing back into his beloved as hard as he could.  It was as if Strife's cock was reaching up through his body and piercing his heart with each motion of his hips.  Strife gripped his lover's belly with one hand, pressing him back, while his other kept hold of Cupid's wing, using it as leverage to move still more deeply into him.  The mischief god was panting now as well, sweat running in rivulets down his pale, smooth back.  Cupid became aware of a constant stream of whispered words flowing from his lover's mouth.

"Mine.  Mine.  Gods, so beautiful.  Your ass is so sweet.  You're mine."
Strife punctuated his plundering of Cupid's perfect ass with each syllable.

"Yes.  Lover.  Yess.  Yours."  The love god moaned.  "Take me.  Have me.  Love me."

"Whatever you want,"  Cupid whispered.  "It's yours.  Anything.  Everything.  Just please*never*stop*fucking me."

Strife pulled Cupid up onto his thighs by his wing joints and bounced him on his cock, making a feast of the back of his neck while whispering to him.

"You want me?"

"Yes."  Cupid sobbed.

"You need me?"  Strife's growl was louder.

"Always*need you so bad*please."  Cupid's head lolled back on Strife's white shoulder.  Strife turned his face until his lips just brushed Cupid's shell-like ear and reached one hand around his lover's waist, never easing the rhythm and depth of his pounding cock in Cupid's ass.

"Do you love me?"  He asked in his deepest tone.  Cupid stared up at him, dropping all his masks and letting his gaze show every instant of agony and longing he had suffered.

"More than Godhood."  Cupid swore looking deeply into his eyes.  "More than Life."

Strife kissed his lips gently and smiled possessively.

"Then come for me, now."  He whispered, grabbing Cupid's weeping cock and stroking it in time to his frenzied thrusts.  "Show me you love me."

And Cupid, god of love, wound one arm back around his lover's neck and came with all his soul.  Strife groaned.

"Yes, my love."  He whispered as the muscles inside Cupid's body clamped down on him, bringing him to the edge.  "Come for me.  Come with me.  Yes, love. Yes."

For one perfect instant they froze, and they weren't two gods.  They weren't even two men.  They were just two souls entwined into one, clinging to each other as the calm center of a universe gone unto chaos.  Then the moment passed, and they were once again just two young gods.

Cupid groaned as Strife slipped from his body and collapsed to the floor. Strife pulled him into his arms and covered his forehead with tender kisses.

"Gods, how I love ya."  He panted.  Cupid looked up at him with luminous eyes.

"I wanted to die too."  Cupid whispered.  "I missed you so much."

"Me too."  Strife whispered.  Cupid extended his wing until it covered them both.

Cupid suffered a moment of extreme disorientation and sat up in bed as if burned.  He looked around wildly for a moment, then reality set in and his wailing rent the night shrouding his temple.  Just a dream.

On another plane, Morpheus grimaced at the beautiful goddess.  She was watching Strife brood and glower in another mirror.  The mischief god had leapt from his bed, searched the room swiftly and then punched the wall with enough force to crack the stone.

"I'm sorry, love."  He murmured, gathering her into his arms.  "I told you it wouldn't work for them the way it does for you and Hades.  They don't know that it's real, and we aren't allowed to tell them."

Persephone nodded against his chest and he led her back to the palace.  The day when she would be forced to leave Hades for the year was rapidly approaching. Morpheus decided to visit Demeter with a few dreams of his own design.  He hated it when his lover's suffered.

TITLE: Welcome to the Machine 9/?
SERIES: Dark Side of the Rainbow
AUTHOR: Raven4 ( arcadian13_2000@y... )
ARCHIVE: If ya wanna, just let me know so I can blush.
RATING: R OC
WARNINGS:
1. The Surgeon General of Sparta has determined that long term exposure to Fanfic can rot your brain.
2. Angsty (big surprise)
3. Canon, what's canon? And who needs it anyway? (This might as well be an AU where Strife didn't kill Herc's family and none of the events in Herc or Xena that followed Strife's death ever happened.)

DISCLAIMER: Strife isn't mine. Herc and Xena folks belong to Ren Pics and Flat Earth Prods.
NOTES: (Deep breath) This is number nine of Dark Side. Probably best to have read 1-8 as well as Scorpio's Pathos of Joxer, on which this series is based. It has become a labor of love. I can't abandon these incarnations until their story is told. Go ahead, flame me. This particular chapter title is taken more for the feeling of the song than the words in the title. Try listening to it while you read. The chapter itself is dedicated to Helen, HB, Shadowgrl, the magnificent Scorpio, and, of course, the muse of all my work, Nyx Invictus. Enamorata eternum.

SUMMARY: Freya gets an assignment that proves to be more than she expected.


Strife stalked back and forth across the room like a caged panther. To any ordinary observer he might have just looked pissed, but Freya had been watching him from before birth, and she recognized a master plotting when she saw one. She was sprawled comfortably, upside-down in his favorite chair; her shapely legs crossed at the ankles against the chair back, her glorious flame hair trailing on the floor. She'd appropriated one of his leather tunics and altered it slightly to fit and reveal her body.

Strife's tunic was comfortable, not made of god power, and tight enough that she could wear it under her Munin skin. The magic of the ***** necklace, which she used to clothe herself were incompatible with the truth that was held in Munin's skin, so she'd usually simply run around nude in between flights, but Strife had said that it would be better if she weren't nekkid should she be discovered.

Strife turned back towards his chair and she rolled out of his way, perching on the arm when he sat. She was smiling coldly, knowing the scent of planned vengeance when it rose from his pale skin. She ran one hand fondly up his arm and through his wild tangle of black hair. Now that she was "out", so to speak, her natural urges were re-asserting themselves. Though, to be honest, the events of her past colored them much darker than they had ever been.

"Alright." Strife said at last and turned to sprawl more comfortably in his chair while talking to her. Freya raised one feathery brow with a grin. He grinned back. "Here's how we'll do it. You'll need to raid Cupid's place again. Yer gonna need more than the golden arrow."

"I'll wait 'til he's gone to Zeus for another round of supplication." She bit the word off like the end of a cigar and spat. "Then I'll do what's needed, love. And thank you for the privilege."

"Ain't it great when nature and necessity are so closely allied?" The godling giggled madly and Freya joined him, feeling alive for the first time in centuries. Then she kissed him fiercely and swept off his chair, into her Munin suit and out the window in one fluid motion. Strife shifted an erection.

"She looks as good in my clothes as Cupid. What is it with me an feathered love gods?"

Freya flew low over Olympus, exulting in the pressure of wind and the weight in banked turns for the first time since Asgaard fell. She had forgotten what a pleasure it was to fly, and she was sure that she'd never known what a pleasure it was to fly on a mission of mischief. She must remember to tell Strife the story of the time Thor had dressed in drag to get his hammer back.

Ahead of her she saw the pale marble edifice of Cupid's temple. The stone was grayed and dirty, as though under a pall of smoke. The gardens so perfectly manicured to artful wildness in the past were overgrown and untended. There were no servants to be seen when she alighted. Carefully, she fluttered into the hall, searching for any sign of motion. She saw nothing, so she made her way forward, toward the altar where the quiver of love was kept.

The quiver was placed in a hollow of the altar and covered with a grate of wrought gold and Hephaestian metal. She would not be able to open it in Munin's shape. She looked around carefully and then removed Munin's skin from her body

She crept forward, bare feet silent on the marble tiles. Strife's prize was within her grasp. Reaching down beneath her tunic, she retrieved the key that Cupid had given Strife in their childhood. It had been the first deal between love and mischief, given on the occasion of a first kiss. The key fitted into the lock, she turned it slowly, conscious of any noise.

"Who the hell are you?!?" A hoarse voice rasped out behind her. She whirled toward her Munin suit to escape, but the cloak was held in the grip of a very disheveled love god. Cupid looked at her with swollen, bleary eyes. She was shocked at the change in him.

He'd lost weight. His robust, golden chest and face were gaunt, almost emaciated. His hair was dirty and matted, and as she stared, a feather fell from his shaggy, filthy wing. His eyes were dull, containing only the barest gleam, and that of madness. Her voice caught in her throat to see him. He had bandages around his forearms and his body was covered with scratches. He shambled towards her, then stopped, eyes wide.

"That's Strife's shirt!" He hissed. Freya broke for the door, horrified, but he caught her wrist and held her fast. He took a deep sniff of her hair, her neck, and her mouth. "I can smell him."

Freya trembled in Cupid's grasp. Hades description of his condition had obviously been edited. This was a god on the quivering edge of complete madness. She could taste his rage, like acid on her tongue.

"Let me go." She gasped, pulling against him, but he only held her tighter, drawing her into an embrace of stone.

"Who are you?" He demanded. "What are you doing here?"

He took another deep breath of her hair.

"You've been with Strife." He accused, shaking her, his eyes narrowing. "You kissed him within the last hour. TELL ME!!!"

Freya went limp in his arms. To struggle with him would only enrage him, and she had to get those arrows.

"He sent me." She whispered. Cupid froze, glaring at her suspiciously. "I'm his servant."

"Don't try to run. I'll just catch you again." Cupid growled and placed her on her feet. She rubbed her wrist where he'd caught her. Purple bruises were rising already. She was lucky he hadn't broken her arm. "Sit down and tell me."

Freya looked skeptically at the refuse-strewn floor, but one glance at the love gods' stormy face and she sat quickly. He crouched in front of her like a hunting animal, his bedraggled wings dragging in the muck.

"I don't know how much I can tell you without endangering his plans." She whispered. "He sent me to retrieve some necessary items."

"How*" Cupid's eyes grew lucid for a moment, crystalline tears swimming in their deep blue depths. "How is he?"

"He's fine." She promised the broken god and flinched away from the pathetic gratitude in his still lovely face. "I can't carry communication for you without bringing down Zeus wrath, but I can tell you what I've seen with my own eyes."

Cupid grew wild again with her mention of his grandfather, but he calmed at these words, and curled up to rest his head on her thigh like a lover. He gazed up at her and she made a decision. It would do no good for Strife to be re-united with his lover if that lover were mentally damaged. She ignored the dirt and stroked Cupid's head soothingly.

"He paces a lot. He's always plotting something, either prank or escape. He sometimes stares out the window with a wistful smile. That's when I know he's thinking of you." Cupid smiled like a four-year-old child. She nodded at his expression. "Yes, he does think of you. Quite often. He watches your temple, and talks about you."

She allowed her eyes to grow distant as she recalled every word Strife had told her of Cupid.

"He tells me how much he misses you. How wildly he loves you. How desperate is his devotion. His voice is thick with longing for you. Often, we'll be planning and he will say," Freya mimicked the young gods' voice perfectly. "Damn, but Cupie would love this."

Cupid sobbed and she saw the damn burst in his heart. He wept and she held him, rocking him just as she did Strife.

"It will be alright, Cupid. I promise." She whispered into his hair. "I'll fix it. It'll be all right. When there is love as pure as yours even God kings can't stop it. We'll fix it, I promise. We'll fix it."

Slowly he calmed in her embrace, then slipped off to sleep. She disentangled herself from his arms and looked around her. The place was shielded well. Surely the risk was small. Surely it could do no harm.

She reached out with her full divine strength, unused since Ragnarok, and pushed gently at reality. The dirt and grime burned away, broken furniture became whole. The temple was clean in a moment, and she bathed Cupid gently with the power of his own love. Then she carried him to his bed and laid him in it gently. She removed Strife's tunic and tucked it into the love gods' arms.

"I'll see you again soon." She promised, kissing his brow and taking up one of his shed feathers. She cleaned it with a thought. Then she turned, fetched the arrow she needed from the quiver and left the temple, clad once more in Munin's body. In one claw was clutched an arrow, in the other, a white quill. A shadowy figure watched her progress in a mirror. He smiled a sad smile.

"I'm so sorry, my boys. If there were another way, I'd take it." Then Zeus rose from his throne, darkened the mirror and went to seek his bed.

TITLE: Two Suns in the Sunset 10/?
SERIES: Dark Side of the Rainbow
AUTHOR: Raven4 ( arcadian13_2000@y... )
ARCHIVE: If ya wanna, just let me know so I can blush.
RATING: R (there's that damn same sex phobia again…) OC
PAIRINGS: Strife/Cupid, ?F/?F
WARNINGS:
1. The Surgeon General of Sparta has determined that long term exposure to Fanfic can rot your brain.
2. Mostly humor for once.
3. Canon, what's canon? And who needs it anyway? Call it an AU where Strife didn't kill Herc's family. He just messes with him 'cause the hero takes himself WAY too seriously. None of the events in Herc or Xena that followed Strife's death ever happened. (Duh! Archangels, my pasty white ass.)

DISCLAIMER: Strife isn't mine. Herc and Xena folks belong to Ren Pics and Flat Earth Prods. As far as Freya and Ares…I'm theirs', just ask 'em.
NOTES: Number ten. We're a gettin' there. Once again taking license with canon. As always, dedicated to the muse of all my work, Nyx Invictus. Enamorata eternum.

SUMMARY: Strife's master plan is put into motion by one black birdy and an old rivalry.

Freya's Munin wings broke the night air as she sped across the sky. It was night on Olympus, and she had a mission. In one of her claws was an arrow; in the other was a feather. She circled down to a nest she had hidden on the War God's grounds. This was where she kept her hoard. There were bits and pieces that she had salvaged here and there, but she ignored them.

Tonight was special. Carefully, she hid the feather she'd taken from Cupid. She would take it to Strife when her mission was fulfilled. Until then it would be safe here. She smiled as she took up a golden arrow. Its' powers had already been tested on Hercules, now it was to have a different and more effective purpose. Munin chuckled as she left her nest. The God king would pay.

It was very late on Olympus, and though gods don't need sleep, they do enjoy it. The only sound to be heard was the faint whisper of Dionyses party, which never ended. A raven's wings made no sound that would disturb a sleeping god.

All was silent and dark in the joined temples of Hera and Zeus. The king and queen of the Grekkengods had long since retired to their separate rooms. Freya was tempted to duck down the lightening-streaked hall, but Strife had been adamant, so she turned her flight down the other as Strife had directed. A short glide down marble corridors and she came to the area she wanted. This was the sanctuary of a great temple. Everything was draped with blue and green silk, fine gold, and peacocks' feathers. Freya grinned to herself.

This was gonna be perfect. She would owe Hercules an apology, but she would deal with that if she survived. Taking a deep breath, she called on Munin's nature and glided through a side door.

Just as Strife had said, it was a bedchamber, and in the bed was a handsome older woman. Freya grinned and shed her cloak. Phase one.

A few moments later, Freya was flying through the ether towards the Grekken Midgaard. Strife called it Greece. She was looking for a particular place. Strife had pointed it out to her. She winged her way over land and river, field and swamp, and she found it.

It was a simple farm, but well kept. The house was neat and tidy and it exuded an air of homey comfort. Freya alighted on a tree branch near the open bedroom window. She was glad the evening was fair. The already open window would offer no clue as to who had taken the woman. Silently, the goddess glided across to the windowsill and there perched and shed her cloak.

Phase two.

The mortal woman sleeping in the small bed was still as lovely as any goddess Freya had ever seen. Her face was kind and gentle, and wisdom showed there even in sleep. The long hair, tousled with sleep, was still golden, though heavily threaded with gray. The figure under the coverlet was still round and firm, showing little of the ravages of age, though she was clearly no longer young.

Freya gazed down on her. The mortal was largely an innocent, and Strife had told Freya to see to it that no harm befell her. Freya would not have harmed the old mother in any case for this was a woman who both loved and fought, in her own way. Freya was astonished that such a lovely one slept alone, but Strife had said that her life had been dedicated to her sons. Freya grinned. This one was as long overdue for a new love affair as she was, and she knew just the one.

Very gently, the goddess lifted the mortal woman from her bed and wrapped her gently in the cloak of Munin skin. Careful not to wake her charge, she took to the air and from thence to the ether. She should have plenty of time to deliver her offering, complete Strife's plan and get back to his side in time to watch the action unfold.

Freya stood back and observed her work. The two women were still sound asleep and lay on their sides facing each other. She had taken the hand of each and placed it in the others'. She'd been tempted to do more, but she didn't dare. Even with the tincture of honey and poppy she had administered on her first visit, the sleeping goddess would be easily wakened, and Freya's task was not yet done. It was time for the dangerous part.

Grimly, she took one of Cupid's arrows in each hand. One was the blood red arrow of true love. The other was the golden arrow of gender preference alteration. She grinned and approached the bed. The goddess first, lest the mortal wake her with a noise and get obliterated. After all, until they were treated, Freya was juggling nitroglycerine.

Carefully, Munin scratched the goddess on the back of the hand that was held by the mortal with both arrows at once. She moaned in her sleep, then subsided. Freya fought not to laugh out loud. Gotcha. Moving to the other side of the bed, she reached down and repeated her maneuver on the mortals' hand. Then she stepped back to check her work.

There were two older women in the bed. Check.
One specific mortal, one specific Goddess. Check.
They'd both been pricked with both arrows. Check.
They were both positioned to see the other first thing upon the moment of opening their eyes. Double check.

"Rock and roll." Freya whispered to herself and withdrew to the door. Phase three. Holding her Munin cloak ready, she reached out with her mind to feel for any observers.

There was only Strife, at the back of her mind, giggling like a mad thing. She grinned at him mentally before donning her feathered garment. There was just one thing left to do, but she wanted it to wait until she could watch the result. She flew like a thing possessed o retrieve her feather, then she doubled back until she reached Cupid's temple. There she risked transporting; hoping that the love god's confusion would cover the rush of her power. She appeared with a pop of violet light and landed right on top of a very impatient Mischief god.

He glared up at her. "Ya wanna watch where yer landing, Birdy?" He groused. Freya grinned down at him, shifting to a more comfortable position on his lap.

"I was." She challenged. His pale face flushed and he wiggled under her.

"Get off." He grumbled, rolling her off of him. She rolled to her usual perch on the arm of his chair, crossing her shapely legs. "Did you do it?"

"What do you think?" She beamed down at him. Strife crowed like a rooster at dawn and jumped up to do an impromptu dance around her. He grabbed her hands and dragged her up to shimmy with him, which she did. Then he threw himself back into his chair, pulling her down beside him again but drawing her closer.

"Shall we?" He asked, indicating the mirror.

"Surely." She responded with a wide, wicked smile. Freya waved her hand over the mirror and the image of the sleeping women appeared in it. They were still in the position she'd left them in. "This was too easy, love."

She placed her white hand on the glass and pushed with her power, while letting out a croak that the real Munin would have been proud of. It rang out through the mirror, into the chamber, and across the sleepers' ears.

Freya and Strife gripped each other's hands and watched as the Queen of the gods and the mortal mother of Zeus' semi-divine son woke with a start and then stared at each other.

TITLE:  A Momentary Lapse of Reason  11/?
SERIES: Dark Side of the Rainbow
AUTHOR:  Raven4  ( arcadian13_2000@y... )
ARCHIVE:  Feel free, just let me know where, eh?
RATING:  NC-17 but not graphically so.  OC
PAIRINGS:  Strife/Cupid, Hera/Alcmene
WARNINGS:
1. The Surgeon General of Sparta has determined that long term exposure to Fanfic can rot your brain.
2. Humor alert!!!  Not much angst here.
3. Canon, what's canon?  And who needs it anyway?  None of the events in Herc or Xena that followed Strife's death ever happened. (Duh!  Archangels, my pasty white ass.)  Hera didn't persecute Hercules openly, she just snubbed him, and really, who could blame her.

DISCLAIMER:  Strife isn't mine.  Herc and Xena folks belong to Ren Pics and Flat Earth Prods.  As far as Freya and Ares*I'm theirs', just ask 'em.
NOTES:  Eleven, eleven chapters of Strife, ah ah ah. *thunder crash*  Sorry, Sesame Street moment.  Making progress, my dears.  I'm thinking this tale could end with thirteen, but it's still too early to tell.  And there's always the sequel, which has leapt, like Athena, fully grown from my poor brain.  Hope you're ready to pay on that bet, Nyx.  This bird is coming home to roost.

SUMMARY:  Zeus isn't the only god who takes lovers and Cupid isn't the only god who uses love arrows.  The morning after.


"Oh Goddess, your husband is an idiot."  Alcmene gasped.  Her lovely eyes were wide as she stared at the dream she'd woken up next to.

"Tell me something I don't know."  Hera chuckled, then smiled almost shyly. "Do you really think so?  Because right at this moment, I find his taste in women superb."

Alcmene blushed under the frank regard of the queen of the gods while far away in Hades a certain troublemaker laughed his ass off.

"Oh, good one, Grandma.  Point for you."  He snickered.  Freya shushed him as the women in the mirror drew closer to each other.

"I always hoped you knew.  You have always been beautiful to me, but" Hera murmured softly, reaching out a hand to stroke the mortal woman's face.  "I hoped you would realize that I understood."

Alcmene leaned into the touch, but turned puzzled eyes on the exquisite goddess.

"He is almost impossible to resist, I would know."  Hera whispered.
"Infinitely more so for a mortal."

"He could walk through the door right now and I don't think I'd notice."
Alcmene whispered, her face drawing nearer to Hera's.

"Me either."  The goddess breathed and then their lips were joined.

Zeus made his way quietly along the hallways towards his wife's hall.  It was time.  He had decided it was time to tell her the entire plan.  He needed her advice on something, and he was going to need an accomplice in this anyway.

Surprisingly, her hall was empty.  Usually she beat him awake by hours.  But her favored priests weren't even about.  Zeus frowned, confused.  Ah well, he could surprise her awake.  It had been eons since he'd done that.

Grinning to himself, Zeus crept silently down the corridor on tiptoe.  Down in Hades, Strife was on the floor, gasping for breath.  Freya's lips were white with biting as she fought to keep her composure.  She knew that Zeus couldn't blast the mortal.  Hera wouldn't allow it.  So it was perfectly safe and entirely too hilarious.

Strife dragged himself back into his seat and pulled Freya back onto his lap. Cuddling her tightly in his arms, the two watched with undisguised glee as the King of the Greek gods approached his Queens' boudoir.  With a grin, Zeus threw open the chamber door and stopped short, jaw on the ground."

His lovely wife was on top of his equally lovely girlfriend, locked into a passion-filled sixty-nine that would have done Aphrodite proud.  At the sound of his entrance, Hera lifted her head and licked her lips.

"Do you mind?"  She growled at him in exasperation.  Zeus stammered for a moment, then a slow grin spread across his face.  He sauntered across the threshold, desire in his face.

"Not at all."  He murmured seating himself on the edge of the silken bed.  "But do you mind if I join you?"

"As a matter of fact, I do."  She smiled sweetly and pushed him off the
mattress.  He fell through the floor and landed back in his own quarters to the sound of her voice.  "Go get your own."

Zeus sat in a disordered pile on his own bed and blinked around him like a myopic toddler. 

"What the fuck was that?"  The old god wondered.

Back in Hades, Strife was beside himself.  He clutched Freya in his arms hard enough to bruise even her and laughed until tears squeezed from his pale eyes. Then he covered her face in loud delighted kisses.  She squirmed.

"Ah, cut it out."  She pretended to whine.  He only laughed and kissed her again.

"Perfect."  He crowed after some minutes.  "God damned, fucking perfect."

He couldn't sit still, but jumped up, swung Freya around twice then dropped her into his chair on her perfect ass.  He jumped around the room, wiggling his butt and nodding his head, looking for all the world like a giant duck headed to water.  Then he stopped and stared at the goddess.

"Yer naked."  He noted.  Freya winced and nodded biting one corner of her lower lip.  Strife leapt back and skidded to a halt on the floor beside her.

"Where's my tunic?"  He asked sweetly, still barely controlling his mirth, but preparing to deal with trouble.

"Well, it was like this."  She hedged.  Telling him of Cupid's near insanity would only make him worry, and if he worried he wouldn't be as sharp on the points necessary to get him out of here.  A partial truth would be better than the whole depressing tamale.

"I got to Cupid's place and it was deserted, right."  Strife nodded.  "So I snuck in and headed fer the altar.  Well, the quiver was there, just like ya said, but it was under that grate thingie, right?"  Strife nodded again.

"So, I had to take off my feathers, 'cause you know, I can't really turn things too well when I'm in 'em and plus, the key was inside the tunic."  She risked a look up at his face.  He was nodding impatiently, so she went on.  "Well, I ditched my Munin suit and stepped up to the altar and was reachin' for the arrow when I heard this voice."

"Oh shit."  Strife slumped.  "He saw ya."

"Yeah."  She answered nonchalantly, slipping out of his chair.  "But I don't think he had a clue who I was.  Anyway, he looked sad, and since he had my Munin suit in his hand and he'd recognized your tunic, I figured I'd better tell him who I was.  So I told him I was your servant and that you sent me to get some stuff.  He asked after you an' I was really friggin careful how I answered on account of I don't wanna break Zeus' ban accidentally."

"So ya saw him, huh?"  Strife asked, slipping back up into his chair.  Freya nodded.  "How'd he look?  Was he okay?"

'Careful.'  Freya commanded herself.

"He looked fine*" she paused, he looked up at her.  "For somebody whose lover is locked away in Hades.  How d'ya think he looked, ya goof?!"

Strife smiled softly and patted his chair arm.  Freya settled in next to him.

"Well anyway, I gave him the tunic, 'cause he noticed it smelled like you.  And I grabbed this and the arrow and split.  Ya could see the rest in here."  She indicated the mirror with the feather.  Strife snatched it from her hand and held it under his nose with his eyes closed.  After a few deep breaths, he looked at her again.

"K.  Cupie won't tell anybody he saw ya.  He wouldn't wanna mess up my plans. Did anybody else see ya?"

"No way."  The goddess grinned down at him, chuckling smugly.  "I was
in-vis-I-bull."

"Good girl."  Strife smiled back, but then he pulled a stern face.  "Not let's not get cocky.  We still have a ways to go."

Freya giggled and settled down most comfortably on her perch.  She couldn't wait to hear the rest of the plan.

"CUPID!!!!!"  The winged god raised his head, blinking rapidly.  Warm sunshine was pouring in on his back like oil, and his muscles were perfectly relaxed.  Grunting, he clawed his way up from sleep.  What had awakened him?

"CUPID!!!"  That was it.  Some bloody, inconsiderate bastard was shouting fit to wake the dead.  Wake the dead*why was that funny?  Frowning sleepily, Cupid rolled to sit upright on the edge of his bed.  He was in no pain, so he couldn't have a hangover.  What had he done last night?

"Think, Cupid."  He told himself.  That's Zeus' voice, so you could be in the shit.  There was a woman?  Yeah.  A stunningly beautiful woman.  She'd smelled really good to him, like something familiar.  He was smelling it now, what was it?  He looked down at his bed, saw Strife's tunic and was instantly awake.  Strife's servant.  He looked around at his now clean temple.

"CUPID!!!"  Zeus voice bellowed for the third time.

"Oh, I am SO not putting up with this!"  The love god growled and grabbed his bow on his way out the door.  Enough was e-fucking-nough, and he had more than had it.  Perhaps it was time to remind Zeus that he was a god of love AND war. 

Zeus was sitting in his throne room, staring at his wife and former lover.  They were snuggled up together on Hera's throne as cuddly as two kittens and neither of them was paying him any attention.  He'd managed to get the story of how they'd woken up together out of them, but that was about it.

He'd shouted for Cupid, as he was god of love and the young god had yet to appear.  The king of the gods was rapidly becoming more than cross.  He was just getting ready to shout again when Cupid appeared in a flash of violet light.

"You bellowed, grandfather?"  Cupid asked sardonically.  Zeus stared at him in shock.  In his mirror the night before he had seen a broken godling.  Cupid had been a mess, incapable of taking care of himself.  Now he was up, clean, dressed and looked to be ready to take on the king himself.  What power the Norse woman had.  Zeus reflected.  His plan HAD to succeed.

"Do something about your grandmother."  He ordered.  Cupid glanced over at Hera's throne, then stared, his eyes widening.  He fought to keep an enraged expression but it was absolutely no damn good at all.  He recognized the sure hand of his lover in the tangled pair of women who seemed to have forgotten dignity and were tasting each other's tonsils in spite of the scandalized observance of half the gods on Olympus.

It was too much.  The young god of love, morose to the point of depression for months, collapsed to his knees, clutching his belly as he laughed.  Cupid didn't just laugh, he roared until tears streamed down his face, and with every one he felt his burden lightening.  It would be okay.  Strife had help and he was still doing what he did, and as long as he was, there was hope.

Regaining control, Cupid turned his attention to his slightly befuddled looking grandfather.

"Sorry Gramps."  His voice rang out deep and strong again, as it hadn't for months.  "But I can't help you."

"What do you mean, lad?"  Zeus' voice held a warning.  Cupid shrugged and shook his head, appearing to fill out a bit even as those gathered watched.  In Hades, Freya glanced over at the forgotten mirror and then clapped her hands over Strife's mouth just in time for them to hear the love god's announcement.

"The only antidote for what's been done is for them both to be scratched by the same arrows that infected them."

"Well then give them over."  Zeus rumbled.

"Sorry, no can do."  Cupid said sweetly.  "I don't have 'em.  I lost my heart to Hades realm, and he's the only one who knows where those arrows are now.  You'll have to go there and ask him."

With that, the golden young god turned and walked calmly from the room.  His head was high, his eyes were clear, and he just knew that somehow, Strife would be back with him soon.

Back in Hades, Strife stared open-mouthed at his lover's exit.  Freya was grimacing next to him.  Slowly, the god of mischief turned to face his shrinking servant.  She was backing away.

"What did you do, birdie?"  He asked, stalking after her. 

"Nothing.  I.."  She tried to skip out of the way, but her caught her by the wrist; the same wrist Cupid had gripped the night before.  She cried out in sudden pain and he released her arm at once, pinning her against his naked chest with one arm while he examined her bruised wrist.

"I think you'd better tell me that story again, love."  He whispered into her hair as he held her.  "And maybe this time you won't leave anything out?"

Freya nodded, her head hanging low and Strife led her back to his chair and seated her on his lap again.  Seeing the improvement in Cupid eased her fears somewhat, though, so she faithfully recounted the entirety of her experiences the night before, only leaving out the actual contents of her nest.

Strife nodded thoughtfully when she was done.  Freya just waited to be sent away.

"No harm done, birdie."  Strife said at last, giving her a quick and gentle squeeze.  "Just don't do it again.  In order for this plan to get us both out of here, I need to know what's going on up there."

Freya nodded and Strife grinned down on her.  Together the gods watched through Hades' mirror as the soap opera of the gods paraded before them.  Their plot was still young.  They had not yet begun to torture the Greek god king.

TITLE: The Thin Ice 12/?
SERIES: Dark Side of the Rainbow
AUTHOR: Raven4 ( arcadian13_2000@y... )
ARCHIVE: Feel free, just let me know where, eh?
RATING: PG-13-R (It's got some toasty bits, but they happen in that dark) OC PAIRINGS: Strife/Cupid, Hera/Alcmene, Freya/Morpheus
WARNINGS:
1. The Surgeon General of Sparta has determined that long term exposure to Fanfic can rot your brain.
2. Getting to the wrap up point. This one has some toasty bits in it.
3. Canon, what's canon? And who needs it anyway? None of the events in Herc or Xena that followed Strife's death ever happened. (Duh! Archangels, my pasty white ass.) Hera didn't persecute Hercules openly, she just snubbed him, and really, who could blame her.

DISCLAIMER: Strife isn't mine. Herc and Xena folks belong to Ren Pics and Flat Earth Prods. As far as Freya and Ares*I'm theirs', just ask 'em.
NOTES: Here we go. We're on 12 and there's only one chapter left. We'll see what we end up with when we're done. Then there's always the sequel, which has leapt, like Athena, fully grown from my poor brain. Hope you're ready to pay on that bet, Nyx. This bird is coming home to roost.

SUMMARY: Everything looks like it's coming to a head as the pawns get ready for a party.


Cupid wandered through the gardens behind his mother's temple. It was a lovely place for an assignation, but if the god or goddess who'd sent the message was hoping for that they would be sorely disappointed. Cupid wasn't fucking anybody until his Strife was back where he belonged.

The message had been simple and anonymous. Burned onto every day parchment and left on his throne. Come to Hera's temple gardens an hour before noon. He wondered if it was from Strife's servant. Maybe she had some news for him. At any rate, the mysterious writer was late, and Cupid was getting irritated.

He was just about to leave when a hand snaked out of a bushy hedge and pulled him into it. He was caught in a powerful embrace and held.

"Don't make a sound and don't try to escape." It was Zeus with his hand over Cupid's mouth. Cupid struggled vainly, but his grandfather held him fast. "I have something to say to you."

Freya was bored. Now that Strife's plan was up and running, she didn't have much to do other than a tweak here and a tweak there. Without much thought, she started tweaking things in this realm as well. She'd taught Charon some of the mystical sexual arts of the far far east and then introduced him to the virgins from Elysia.

She'd gone on a cleanliness trip that had all the souls in Tarterus wearing frilly white aprons and scrubbing walls while singing popular love songs in multiple harmonies. When poor Cerberus came running to Hades smelling like a floral arrangement with little red bows on the top of each of his heads, the Death god decided that Freya needed some useful occupation.

Realizing that a bored goddess in his realm was trouble he didn't need, Hades had conscripted her to help Persephone with the packing and preparing she had to do before she left. The time of her return to earth was drawing nearer every day.

The Norse goddess spent several days with her hostess, and she could certainly sympathize with the woman, having been separated from her husband for months at a time as well. It was long ago now. He would get restless and she would go seek him. They would return and all would be well until he got restless again. He'd gone wandering just before the capture of Eris and he'd never returned. Freya had buried him after Ragnarok.

"I just wish she'd let me go." The golden-haired goddess lamented. Freya nodded gently. She was patroness of all separated lovers, but she had also heard this same phrase several times in the last hour. She sighed and continued helping the goddess fold clothes.

Ares took a mouthful of wine and then spit it all the way across the room when he realized what he was hearing.

"What?!" He spluttered, rising quickly to his feet.

"Ewww, DAD." Cupid used his powers to get wine out of his feathers as he nodded. "You heard me."

"ERIS!!!" Ares bellowed, then pierced his son with a glower. "You'd better be right."

Freya looked up at a knock on the door and watched as a tall, thin, and pleasurably familiar god entered. Freya was not the least surprised to see him here given the timing. Her presence however was quite unexpected. Morpheus, the god of dreams had taken charge of baby Jetticles when he was just a few hours old. He was also Hades, Persephone's and sometimes her own lover.

"Morphe." Persephone threw herself into his arms and he held her close. She started to cry and he shushed her gently.

"Sweet girl." He whispered into her hair. "I know. But I swear, you will dream of him every night, and of me whenever you wish. The time will pass."

He noticed the other goddess in the room and straightened suspiciously. Freya stepped forward and saw him recognize her.

"I don't believe I've had the pleasure." The Dream god intoned, pretending puzzlement. "I am Morpheus, god of sleep and dreaming. You are?"

"Don't be stupid, Morphe." 'Sephe admonished. "This is Freya. The one who serves Strife."

The dark god's face lightened considerably and he took Freya's hand at last, gripping it like a comrade.

"So you finally decided to let my other lovers know of your existence." He said wryly. "'Sephe had told me much about Jopanis' little bird friend I was sure I would give the game away."

"Thanks for the effort." She smirked up at him. Damn, she always forgot how tall he was. The god turned back to his departing lover.

"Actually, 'Sephe, I'm here early because Hades called me over. He said it was urgent, but he isn't in his study. Any ideas?" The dream god seemed to include her in the question, so Freya answered it.

"He got some kind of letter from Zeus. Said something about hitting the law archives." Morpheus looked at her, then nodded.

"We must have words at some point, Freya." He said, bowing over her hand. "Your dreams have become quite fascinating."

He kissed 'Sephe's cheek and strode out the door, leaving Freya frozen still with ice in her belly. Morpheus knew she was Norse, but of her guilt in Ragnarok she had said nothing. How much of Asgaard had haunted her dreams?

Hera raised her head from Alcmene's breast and threw a power charged pillow at Zeus as she climbed out of bed.

"Why didn't you say so sooner?" The mortal woman asked.

"Old goat!" Hera added, dressing quickly.

Freya helped death's bride finish her packing and then, begging pardon, she excused herself to find the dream god. She had to know what he meant about her dreams. She was sprinting down a tunnel when she heard Hades and Morpheus talking. She slowed to a walk and approached more carefully.

"Yes, but do you really think it will work?" She heard the dream god ask. "I mean, Demeter can still swear to keep the world shrouded in winter until the girl returns to above."

"Yes, but I think he may have though of that." Hades voice lowered out of her hearing for a moment. "*raise things to this fever pitch up there?"

"So what do we do?" Asked Morpheus. "You know I want her to stay more than anything else. Having both of you all the time is my sweetest fantasy."

There was a decidedly biological slurping noise and Freya grimaced. Honestly, some people had no self-control. She heard muffled moaning and was just about to call out when it stopped.

"Thanks, love." Hades murmured. "I needed that. As for what we do next, I think we have to try it. The festival is tomorrow. If it's going to work it has to be then. If it isn't, well, we'll be no worse of then we are now."

"I'll go tell our extremely nubile young Norsewoman and she can carry your invitation to Strife." Hades chucked and Morpheus came back down the tunnel towards her. Quickly, she whistled softly at first, as if distantly, then more loudly until she held volume and approached the Dream god.

"Ahk, Morpheus." She smiled up at him, one hand on her breast, as he loomed out of the darkness. "You scared me to death."

He stepped deeper into her personal space and stared down on her with his black eyes.

"No I didn't." He whispered and Freya trembled. His voice was like honey or cinnamon, spicy and sweet. It was the kind of voice you expected from a dream. She controlled her breathing carefully. This was a dance they had done before. He took her arm and wound it through his own, leading her down a different branch of the archive tunnels. "Walk with me. I think we need to deepen the understanding between us, you and I."

Aphrodite sat very calmly, not trusting her self-control to handle the news. It was incredible, it really was. Eris was crying and Cupid looked grimly determined.

"So that's what this is all about then. I had no idea. We should have dealt with this long ago." The godess of love smiled coldly. "We'll just see about that."

The façade of airheaded foolishness that Freya had worn slipped away and was gone and Morpheus was left holding the arm of a goddess who had obviously been created before the world was. She looked deeply into the black, pupilless, whiteless eyes.

Morpheus had first found her when she was still hiding in her nest on the grounds of the hall of war. He had sensed her foreign dreams and had hunted her by them as if they'd been tracks. That was in the days when she still craved death, and she had not hidden her nature from him when he found her.

The dream god had read her nature even better than she did though, and kept her secret because he could see her devotion to Ares sister and her children. When Jetticles had been sent to him to raise, Morpheus had sought and received her advice on how best to see to the infant gods' needs. In return he had always seen to some of hers'.

"You know me." She whispered and pressed against him in the dark tunnel. "You know my dreams and you know that the safety of those four are the most important thing in my life."

"Yes." His voice caressed her mind as his hand moved over her borrowed dress. "And yet you were not here to save Jopanis from Callisto, were you?"

Freya hissed at him. He had sworn to kill her all those centuries ago, if she ever betrayed her charges. Her only response had always been that if that happened she would crave death. Connected, they could both sense the truth of each other's intentions. She reached out to him now, body and mind.

"I left to hunt down what I thought was a greater danger." She moaned slightly as his too warm lips ranged over her throat. His black shrouded knee slipped between her legs as he pressed her back into the cavern wall. "I found nothing but ashes and old ghosts."

"And so you returned to find Jopanis dead." He whispered into her hair as he ground his body against her. "And you followed him to Hades, to what, set him free?"

"I had no plan when I came here. But I had to come." Freya looked up into his strange, all black eyes. As quickly as she had begun it, their usual dance ended. "I want to find a way to bring him back, Morpheus. Back there it almost sounded like there might be one."

"There may be, at that." The dream god said softly, still closer and softer than just friends. "Are you willing to pay the price?"

Freya strode into Strife's chambers with an armload of grayish fabric.

"What's all that then, birdie?" He asked.

"Costumes." She answered. "We're going to a party tomorrow, and it's just possible that we may have found a way to bring you back to life with or without Zeus' approval."

Morpheus took himself away to Olympus with a thought. What in his own name did Zeus think he was doing keeping things from the very people who needed to know the most?

TITLE: Is There Anybody Out There? 13/13
SERIES: Dark Side of the Rainbow
AUTHOR: Raven4 ( arcadian13_2000@y... )
ARCHIVE: Feel free, just let me know where, eh?
RATING: R but only for language. OC
PAIRINGS: Strife/Cupid, Hera/Alcmene, Freya/Morpheus, Hades/'Sephe/ Morpheus, Ares/Joxer and much much more
WARNINGS:
1. The Surgeon General of Sparta has determined that long term exposure to Fanfic can rot your brain.
2. Canon, what's canon? And who needs it anyway? None of the events in Herc or Xena that followed Strife's death ever happened. (Duh! Archangels, my pasty white ass.) Hera didn't persecute Hercules openly, she just snubbed him, and really, who could blame her.

DISCLAIMER: Strife isn't mine. Herc and Xena folks belong to Ren Pics and Flat Earth Prods. As far as Freya and Ares…I'm theirs', just ask `em.
NOTES: Here it is and aren't you glad. Chapter thirteen, final chapter in Dark Side. However, for those of you who enjoy this kind of thing, I will post the ending sex later, when my brain doesn't hurt. Three Chapters in one day is too much for this clay. I do have the ideas for a sequel running about in my noggin. Hope you like it, Nyx. This little one has run its course.

Feedback please, I'm barely fighting the urge to hide.

SUMMARY: Resolution, the end and a beginning.


The Festival of Re-Birth had been kept as long as men had recorded time. There were some gods who remembered its' origins, but not many. It was born when Hades had first abducted his wife and she had been returned. Hera planned it to be a neutral environment where Persephone could pass from her husband's house into her mothers' without conflict. So much for plans.

At some point Demeter had suggested that there would be less trouble for the girl if the party were to be held at Demeter's temple every year. In spite of Hera's cautions, it was made so. It wouldn't do this year though. Not at all.

Demeter wanted her little darling to progress socially. It was her perspective that Queen of the Dead was not prestigious enough for her girl. Hera knew her well. The elder goddess knew just the carrot to use.

Cupid strode eagerly up to the doors or Demeter's temple. He had sent a note by dove earlier asking if he could drop by and see her. She agreed at once, and so here he was.

No wonder `Seph doesn't wanna come back here. The love god regarded the gardens and the temple. Tacky, much?

The door opened, revealing the older goddess, and Cupid became every bit his mother's son. He was charming, gay, polite, and debonair, if he did say so himself. Demeter was more than gracious with him, and gradually, carefully, he baited his hook.

"So you see, Auntie Dem, it was just too ridiculous." He laughed, even as his heart twisted inside him. "I mean, me? In love with one of Eris' kids?"

He held up his fingers in a `w' shape. Demeter beamed at him. She'd known he'd wise up one day. A son of Ares had no business sullying his hands with one of Eris little monsters.

"So, anyway, I was remembering how much fun `Sephe and I used to have when I was a kid, and I just wondered…well…" He blushed beautifully and grinned inside when she fell for it hook, line, and sinker. He turned vacant blue eyes to her adoringly. "Would you please let me hold the Re-Birth party at my place this year?"

Demeter caught her breath. Looking into his eyes carefully. She found nothing there but a rather becoming supplication. She caught herself wondering what his father's face would look like begging. Cupid shuddered and pressed on.

"I just want `Sephie to feel welcome." He signed and stared at nothing, the perfect image of smitten youth. "To know that even though she does have to spend half the year in an awful place, there are still those up here who lo…er, care about her."

"I'd be delighted, my boy." Demeter grinned at him, and it was true. If she could get her darling and Ares son together, Ares himself would fight to keep her from that fiend, Hades. Besides, that would put her on intimate terms with the handsome war god. Very intimate terms indeed. "Consider the festival yours, Cupid."

"Oh thank you so much, auntie." Cupid gushed, steeling himself to give her a big hug. She returned it enthusiastically. Cringing inside, he extricated himself. "I really must dash. I have to make everything perfect for Persephone."

Demeter smiled as the lad scampered off. If she were a little younger… But no, let the whelp get her child free for her, she would keep her target where it always had been. Ares' perfect, leather-clad ass.

"The party is a raging success." Eris muttered to her nephew as he greeted his guests. He nodded, smiling, then turned his face to the wall and grimaced.

"If I have to say one more nice thing to that cow, I'm totally gonna hurl." He growled. Eris stifled a chuckle. Cupid looked at her seriously. "It's worth it though. It would be worth anything."

"Just watch it there, flyboy." She smiled at him. "Let the incredible sulk get one whiff of how you really feel and this game is over."

Cupid nodded and went back to greeting guests.

Once the banquet began in earnest, Ares pulled his father aside for a moment.

"You'd better be right about this dad." He growled.

"Not to worry, my son." Zeus smiled at his eldest while keeping his eye on the room. "You do your part and all will be as it should."

Zeus turned away from him just in time to see Hera drag Alcmene under the table for the third time. The banquet in Cupid's hall had only been going on for an hour or so. The two women were constantly slipping away to couple. Zeus hoped they didn't wear it out before he had a chance to watch them.

Almost every god of Olympus and several from other realms had come to this celebration. It was usually held at Demeter's temple, but Cupid's version was already more fun. Across the hall, Zeus spotted Demeter trying to mingle with the high gods of other lands. The growth goddess had always been more interested in pedigree rather than quality.

Demeter worked the room like a pro. It was obviously as clear to all the other powerful deities in the room that now the little freak was dead; Cupid might make a bid for her girl. Since everyone knew her baby's marriage to Hades was a sham, it was easy to make inroads based on the influence that would soon be hers.

After tonight, she would have the whole spring and summer to convince her girl that she'd made a mistake in marrying the cold old fish. Having Cupid host this party was just the first of the ploys she had arranged. She scowled across the hall at the Asphodelian table, where her daughter, her poor deluded Persephone, sat next to her monstrous lord.

Hades had all of his usual rabble with him. Thanatos, another freak, was dancing with Deimos, and it was just another example of why that trollop, Aphrodite should be barred from Olympus. Really, to see what her disgusting lusts had done to poor Ares seed. It was too much.

Ugh! It got worse, what was that god-awful slut, Eris doing talking to her dear boy, Cupid? This would never do.

As far as Demeter was concerned, all of Ares siblings and their spawn should be sent to Hades. There they could stay, with the rest of the freaks, while decent gods lived free of their tainting influence. She huffed and turned her back on the spectacle of Hades caressing her poor daughters' hand only to come face to face with that disgusting boatman, what was his name? Charon. Foul creature.

"Nice night, eh toots?" He asked in passing and then he actually pinched her. The little cockroach had pinched her. The only reason she didn't blast him into oblivion right here was that she had other plans for vengeance on Asphodel. Off to the side she spotted Ares and made to head in his direction.

As Zeus' heir, he alone was worthy of the title god, and as such proper company for her. She glanced around. The ditzy love goddess and Ares simpering brat sister were nowhere to be seen. Demeter put on her best come hither look and slinked up beside the dark god of war.

"Oh Ares." She breathed. Ares tensed up and grimaced before turning to face her with a smile pasted on.

"Good evening, Demeter." He said shortly. Zeus had said not to fluster her, but he hadn't said exactly what constituted flustering. If she kept looking at him like that his lunch was going to fluster…Right out onto Cupid's carpets.

"I was so distressed to hear about your dear nephew, Strife." She had said it so often that the name automatically translated to freak in her mind. "However are you getting on?"

Ares was tempted to let her know exactly how he was getting on, but he caught his father's gaze and swallowed the desire to just kill her and be done with it.

"As well as can be expected, Demeter." He answered with a formal smile, long arming Eris from behind him while he was at it. "My sister has, of course, been an invaluable aid in this, as in all things. Eris, you simply must tell her all about it."

Then he was gone, having spotted Joxious, more commonly known as Joxer, entering the party. The god of redemption was mostly blind and as such tended to need a supporting arm at parties. That and Ares was perishing for a kiss.

Eris looked at Demeter with thinly veiled hatred.

"What, come to offer false sympathy for the death of my son?" She asked. The softness of her voice masked powerful venom from anyone listening except Demeter.

"You've never told him have you?" Demeter smirked at the younger goddess. Her expression turned cold and hard as one of her winter nights. "Those three abominations should never have been allowed to be born. All four of you should have been cut into pieces, boiled in hind's blood and tossed to the wolves that got them on you."

Demeter looked to where Ares was already dancing with Joxious and Morpheus had just entered with Jetticles.

"It's very simple, even for you. Zeus is finally fixing one of his mistakes." She glanced at Hera and Alcmene. "He's made so many after all."

"Yes, I suppose so." Eris grinned a smile full of teeth and looked pointedly to the empty chair where Persephone would sit after midnight. "Some worse than others."

Demeter hissed and stalked away. Disgusting brat, she should have been strangled at that party then her three, disgusting, half-breed spawn would never have darkened any door, let alone Cupids' and Ares'.

From across the room, old eyes watched her thoughts and waited. Not much longer now. Not much longer at all.

The hour of midnight approached, the fateful hour when Persephone would be returned to her mother's embrace. All the guests were gathered as they had gathered here for this since before recorded time. Everyone watched the moon dial raptly.

Thanatos cuddled Deimos. Xena and Gabrielle sat between Hercules and Iolus. Ares sat snuggled with Joxer right beside them. Morpheus held Jetticles tucked under one arm. Zeus had finally managed to break up the portable orgy for two and was now seated firmly between his two women, fighting distraction. Hades watched grimly as the shaft of shadow slid inexorably toward separation while Persephone clung to him.

At last, in silence, the shaft fell on the midnight mark and Demeter let out a great cheer. This would be the year she would keep her daughter. She was sure of it. Cupid would be her key to Ares and he would hold Persephone for her by force if necessary. The earth goddess was just moving forward to claim her prize and gloat a bit when the shadowy form of Morpheus blocked her passage.

She flinched away from the giggling Eris spawn that moved with him and looked up to meet his disturbing eyes. Freaks, both of them.

"Get out of my way, you great cloud of madmen's ravings." She hissed, attempting to brush him aside without actually touching Jetticles. Morpheus pushed the mad boy gently out of her way, but did not move himself. "My daughter is mine and we shall continue this feast with her in her proper place."

"I am sorry, indeed, most noble goddess of plenty, but I must insist that you observe a ritual first." His voice was as smooth as ever it was and she saw in his eyes that he knew her deepest dreams. She glared at him suspiciously and fell back to her seat. Morpheus bowed low to her and again all she could think was; freaks. "There is a petition that I bring before this gathering, as it must be put before and witnessed by all."

"What is this petition?" Hera raised her eyes from Alcmene's and asked, suddenly interested in the proceedings.

"In the ancient and unbreakable laws, there is provision, that if any such dead lie in Hades that cannot be judged by him, for whatever reason, they can petition for life." Zeus scowled and rose to his feet.

"This is that save Strife drivel again, isn't it?!?" He exclaimed and those seated near him leaned away as lightening danced on his fingertips. "I have made my position clear on this many times."

"Ah yes, my lord Zeus." Morpheus smiled and bowed low. "But I'm afraid that this provision of law supercedes even your august will. May I bring him before you?"

"He's already here." A voice rang out, followed by a high pitched giggle. One of Hades innumerable servants threw off it's cloak and strode to the center of the hall to stand next to Morpheus, a huge black raven on his shoulder. "Hello, Grandpa. How's your love life?"

Cupid strained forward, but was restrained by his father and his Aunt Eris. "Not yet." She whispered, and he could see the tears standing in her eyes. He controlled himself at last and relaxed under their hands. Eris turned to Ares.

"I can't." She whimpered. "I just can't."

"It's okay, sis." He whispered and pulled her into a hug. "We've got this end covered. Go on outside. You'll be able to hear for sure when it's all over."

Eris nodded and raced out the side door. Nobody saw her go they were too busy waiting for Zeus to fry his grandson.

"So you see, my lord," Morpheus was continuing. "It is law that any supplicant can be released from Hades provided that a supplicant of equal standing takes his or her place.

Strife looked at him in shock. The black bird almost fell from her perch.

"Trade places?" Strife gasped. "Not just poof yer free? Somebody has to be willing to trade places?" Morpheus nodded and the silent room was treated to the sound of Demeter's derisive laugh.

"You stopped my procession for that?" She addressed the dream god. "Waste of good breathing time. No one in their right mind would trade their life to spring that pathetic little half-breed worm."

Again, Ares wrestled Cupid into submission. Strife scanned the crowd, searching for a friendly face and trying to ignore the cackling of the fertility goddess. Not one of his family members would meet his eyes. Aching, he sought his lover's face. But Cupid had his control back, and all Strife saw was a cold mask, faintly tinged with derision. It struck his heart with the force of Zeus lightning, and Jopanis, called Strife, felt a part of himself die.

He raised his pale eyes to his shoulder where Freya was perched in her Munin suit and smiled sadly as silence ruled the hall. Nobody spoke except Demeter, who continued to chuckle.

"Looks like its back to the dirt for us, birdie." Strife murmured. Freya looked at him for a long moment, tears running down her black beak to drop onto his leather-clad shoulder.

"I love you, son." She muttered in a croak that was so low no one could have heard it but him. He straightened and looked at her sternly. He shook his head, and she offered him the bird equivalent of a shrug, then she reached up and undid the clasp on the Munin suit.

She heard the gasp as she dropped Munin's body to the ground for the last time. But when she raised her eyes, all she could see was the back of Morpheus' shroud. Everyone was talking at once and none of them were talking about her.

"I will go in his stead." Persephone said and Demeter's face lost all color. Freya spun around to stare at her and found herself sandwiched between Strife and the dream god.

"What?!?!" Demeter and Hades chorused together. Persephone nodded, smiling at her husband and turned to address Zeus.

"I will return to Hades in Strife's place." She said, smiling. "It is my free and willing desire to do so."

Demeter screeched in rage and threw herself at the standing gods.

"No!" She bellowed. "Not possible."

"Take heed, Demeter." Zeus voice rang out. "The girl has promised to go in sight of all these people. I have no more power over the old laws than have you. As she has said it, so it is done."

"But the laws say one of equal standing!" She protested. "What is this, some kind of joke?"

"Hardly." Ares growled, but Eris put her hand on his shoulder.

"I don't know." She said softly, her eyes glowing. "I think it's a riot, myself."

"You bitch." Demeter spat at the war goddess. "I don't know how, but you will be paid for this, I swear it."

The goddess shook off those who had grasped her and left the hall on a blast of icy wind.

Strife gasped as he felt his diving powers rush back into him like a waterfall. Freya smiled at him, but caught him frowning. She followed his gaze and saw Cupid and Ares holding Eris tightly in their embrace. Strife turned his face away from them and gathered his servant into a quick hug.

"I'm a god again." He said softly. "And I thank you for it."

"It was…" She fell silent. Strife had turned away and pulled a cloak out of nothing. She placed one hand on his arm. "Won't you even try to speak with them? I'm sure none of this is their fault."

He kissed her cheek and stroked it with one hand.

"I'm not needed here." She saw him look again to his mother who had just received a kiss on the cheek from Cupid. When she looked back, he was gone and Cupid's two arrows were on the ground at her feet.

Behind her she heard the exultant songs as Hades and his entourage processed with their queen back to hell. Seeing that the guests of honor were gone, Cupid shooed the guests away until there were only a few left.

He'd left her. In spite of his promise, her chosen lord had left her. She found she wasn't surprised. Everyone left her. All except for Morpheus, who took the arrows from her limp hands and gave them to Joxious to give to his grandmother. Morpheus, who still stood near her with an arm around Jetticles.

Freya stood there in shock, rooted to the spot while Morpheus moved to hide her from view. Zeus rose from his chair. He'd left her. Strife had left her. What would she do now?

"STRIFE?" Zeus called out. Closing her eyes, Freya called on her necklace and was instantly clothed in breeches and doublet of fine black silk. She was tired. She was tired of waiting for the other shoe to fall. Sooner or later either the Greeks would kill her for her family, or the Norse would kill her for what she'd done to them. If she was already dead, she might as well lie down and act like it. She stepped out from behind Morpheus in spite of his attempts to shield her.

"He has gone, My lord." She answered the king, and she was proud that her voice didn't shake. The king of the gods looked down on her. Seeing her in person for the first time.

"Gone?" He repeated, his face growing grim.

"Gone?!?!" Cupid echoed and spun in a circle. "FUCK!!!!"

"Quite." Hera said, rising from her chair and grabbing a dessert tray from the table. "Quickly my children, you must find him. If Demeter gets to him before either the sun rises or we can feed him something, she can undo the whole damn thing."

Zeus looked at her in shock. She only smiled back at him tightly and handed him a cookie. "You never did do your homework, dear."

Alcmene laughed and planted a big kiss on the confused god king's face. "Gotcha."

A slow smile began to spread over his face, but a furious Norsewoman suddenly interrupted it.

"You planned it this way?!?!" She shrieked, flying at him with her fists. "You intended for no one to claim him?!? For him to think he'd been abandoned by his family? His lover?"

Zeus looked at her as if she'd grown another head.

"Persephone took his place." Zeus said simply, looking baffled. "Where's the problem?"

Freya rolled her eyes and spat a string of Icelandic curses known to raise room temperatures five degrees.

Hera looked at her husband with growing dread.

"Don't tell me you didn't tell the poor boy you were going to do this?" Alcmene gasped. Zeus looked at her as if she'd grown another head. "You let him think you'd just given up on him?!?!"

"You asshole!" Hera shouted, smacking him in the back of the head. "Hit the byways, kids. Daddy fucked up. Strife thinks we don't want him and we have to convince him otherwise."

At that, Freya was suddenly left alone with a very puzzled god king.

"That was a very thoughtless thing to do, Lord Zeus." Freya said softly. The man looked up at her sadly.

"It was the only way." He protested. "If I had told any of them what was going on their grief wouldn't have been genuine. Hell, I didn't even tell Hades until yesterday."

"I know, but given that all things hellish are anathema to Demeter, and she would certainly never visit Hades, did it never occur to you that you could tell Strife?" Zeus looked up at her in shock, then grabbed her hand and dragged her outside.

"Put on them Birdie wings, Norsegirl. I have a grandson to apologize to." Freya complied and soared over Olympus. It wasn't hard to find him. He wasn't really trying to hide from her. He was sitting cross- legged in her nest. She glided to a halt beside him and undid the clasp on her cloak.

"Hi birdie." He said listlessly. "I realized how much I owe ya, so I decided to wait for ya here." Freya smiled at him gently and sat down beside him.

"Do ya mind if we wait a little bit longer?" She asked, swinging her naked legs back and forth through the leaves. "There's someone on their way who wants ta talk to ya."

"If yer talkin' about Cupid, I met up with him half way here." He gave her a teary grin. "You damned wing gods. He was spinning me a line so I told him to get lost."

"Nope." Freya said simply. Wiggling slightly, she cuddled up against him from behind and wound her arms and legs around his body. Zeus should be along just…about…now.

"Grandson?" Zeus called up. Strife tried to teleport away, but Freya held him fast with her power and her flesh.

"Whattaya doin', Freya?" Strife giggled nervously. "Yer gonna get me killed again."

"Never." She whispered. "Just listen to what he has to say."

"Go ahead, Zeus!" She yelled and clung to Strife like creeper vine.

"I just want to say, I'm sorry." Strife went totally still. "Your grandpa fucked up, my boy, and I'm sorry."

Strife clambered free of Freya and flipped down to hang upside down from a tree branch next to Zeus head.

"Could you run that by me again there, Gramps?" He asked.

"It was my plan to trade `Sephe for you from the moment I learned you had died, my boy. I wanted you happy and I wanted her and my stiff- necked brother happy. But I screwed up. The plan was sound, but I should have told you why I was keeping you dead. That I didn't was foolish." The older god looked at the young. "Will you forgive me, Strife? Will you stay here in Olympus with your family?"

Strife appeared to be considering it, peering up at Freya through the trees. Deciding, he finished his flip and landed before his Grandfather, gathering the older god in a hug.

"Are you kidding?" He giggled madly. "Do carrion-birds love battlefields?"

Zeus laughed and clapped the boy on the back, pulling a cookie out of his pocket.

"Eat this." He said.

"Why?" Strife asked him, leaning away from him to glare suspiciously.

"Because I said so, brat." Zeus smiled again.

"Oh." Said Strife and popped the cookie in his mouth. As the two gods jabbered away, one with a mouth full of Ambrosia cookie, Freya felt a great sense of peace.

She saw Cupid re-enter the clearing with his Grandmother. This time Strife stood and opened his arms wide. They came together so fast no one could ever tell which one moved first. One minute, they were separated, the next they were kneeling on the ground under Freya's nest, bodies pressed together, whispering and crying, kissing and holding.

Freya looked down on the pair, watching over them as the other gods realized that they wouldn't be doing any talking anytime soon. She watched over them as the other gods left. Then, when there was no one left around, she shifted her power and transported the coupling pair to Strife's rooms in the hall.

She was tired, she realized as she shimmied down the tree to fetch the things Cupid and Strife had dropped. (Like clothes) But it was more than worth it.

In another part of the gardens, Eris worried and tracked her son's scent through the gardens of War. He hadn't been in his room. Where could he be?

TITLE: What shall We Do? (Post Script)
SERIES: Dark Side of the Rainbow
AUTHOR: Raven4 ( arcadian13_2000@y... )
ARCHIVE: Feel free, just let me know where, eh?
RATING: NC 17
PAIRINGS: Strife/Cupid, Hera/Alcmene/Zeus
WARNINGS:
1. Sorry ya'll. Ya just can't get rid o' me, can ya?
2. THIS IS SMUT, WHOLLY SMUT, AND NOTHING BUT SMUT. There are no redeeming plot points here whatsoever. It's just two guys who've been through hell getting it on. You got a problem with that?
3. BTW, anybody ever seen fiddler on the roof? Ya know that song Golde and Tevye sing together: Do You Love Me? Well, that's the dynamic I see for Zeus and Hera. They both have their foibles, but they are honestly fond of each other.

DISCLAIMER: Strife isn't mine. Herc and Xena folks belong to Ren Pics and Flat Earth Prods. As far as Freya and Ares*I'm theirs', just ask 'em. (The Monty Pyantheon glee club is running around singing a la spam: Smut, Smut, Smut, Smut, Smutty Smut, marvelous smut!)
NOTES: All right, folks. I re-read Dark Side last night and figured I'd been stingy on the smut side. Especially at the end. So, for the adventurous, here's exactly what happened when Cupid walked into that clearing with Hera.

Feedback is good, it let's me know that I'm not just masturbating my ego up here.

SUMMARY: Lovers reunited, don't even try to get a word in edgewise.


"You're just going to have to try again." Hera said simply, ruffling the young gods' hair. "If you love him and want to keep him, you're going to have to try again and again until you make him listen to you."

Cupid raised tear-streaked eyes to his grandmother's face. His poor heart had been carried from despair to exultation and back again so many times in the last few days, it was a wonder he wasn't unconscious. Now she was asking him to risk it again. As if he had a choice. He snorted, following her through the gardens of war. Who wouldn't give up everything they ever had for everything they'd ever wanted?

"Can you feel where he is?" Cupid asked.

"No." She smiled at him. The young god of love was one of her favorites, that his lover was one as well was less well known. "But I can feel the old goat, and he's stopped moving about. That means he's found something. 'Course, it could just be a nice piece of ass."

"Grandma!" Cupid seemed shocked. Hera smirked at him. How she loved to keep her children on their feet. Chuckling she led him down a slight path, and finally, they broke into a clearing to the sound of Strife talking with his mouth full. Hera released a breath she hadn't known she was holding when the Mischief god caught sight of his lover.

Strife stared at the vision of all his dreams. Zeus and Hera, Ares and his mother, even Freya and her family were totally forgotten on the view of Cupid's beautiful eyes in the moonlight. The mischief god opened his arms and his lover gasped, almost a sob, and raced across the clearing. Cupid hit Strife's embrace hard enough to knock them both to the ground. Strife lost control of his knees and they both tumbled together onto the soft grass beneath Freya's tree.

"Now then," Hera grinned at her husband, taking his arm and heading back to their temple. "Let us discuss an Alcmene, you, and me sandwich, shall we?"

Zeus stared at his wife in shock. She only grinned smugly as she led him away.

"The day I let a Norse love-goddess sneak into my temple with Cupid's arrows unobserved, you can send me to Tartarus, my love."

Strife held Cupid's face tenderly in his hands. The love god's tear filled eyes swam with the bliss of fulfilled devotion. Gently, slowly, Strife kissed each of those eyes then pressed his lips to Cupid's forehead.

"I missed you." He whispered and his winged lover trembled in his arms. Cupid sobbed again and sealed Strife's mouth with his own. Each tasted the others' desperation, the salt of their tears and the sweet agony of long awaited reunion.

Ravenously, Cupid covered Strife's pale face with kisses, murmuring adoration as he went. Strife surrendered to his lover's caresses and nuzzled Cupid's neck, nipping gently at his neck and collarbone. Cupid gasped and pressed his body more tightly to Strife's leather covered chest, reveling in the lean strength beneath the warm black hide. Too long denied, Strife waved one hand and their clothes melted as if they'd never been. Naked skin to naked skin, the two young gods rolled on the long grass, rubbing against each other with the uncontrollable need born of desperate longing.

Freya looked down on the writhing young gods, and on the shocked faces of those who had come to greet them. Aphrodite was gaping open mouthed. Joxious was snuggled under Ares' arm. The war god had what looked suspiciously like tears in his eyes at the sight. Joxious couldn't remember why this was so important, but his heart swelled with the feeling of rightness in the scene.

Morpheus looked up at Freya in her nest. Their eyes met for a brief moment and he bowed slightly. Then he took Jetticles by the hand and vanished from Olympus. He had his own reunion to attend. Smiling wearily, Freya waved her hand and the divine lovers popped through space and into Strife's real rooms, in the halls of war.

Neither Strife nor Cupid noticed this change of venue. They were both totally absorbed in exploring the flesh too long denied them. Tender and slow, they re-acquainted themselves with each other's tastes and feelings.

Strife moaned as Cupid's sweet mouth closed on the lobe of his ear. Cupid moaned at the sound and bit down, just a little, laughing with delight when Strife arched under him. The mischief god locked his blue eyes on Cupid's green and shifted his balance, rolling the beautiful love god beneath his and settling between his wide spread golden thighs.

"I can't wait." He murmured, rubbing his face across Cupid's abdomen like a cat. "Have ta taste ya. Have to have ya. Been needin' ya so bad."

Dropping to his belly, Strife lifted the perfect globes of Cupid's ass and bit one downy golden cheek then the other.

"Oh please." Cupid groaned, his muscles twitching under Strife's tongue. "Please, love. I need you."

Strife smiled and proceeded to worship Cupid's ass with lips, teeth and tongue, laving every inch with devotion. The love god writhed under the tender assault, and his voice rumbled a litany of need and adoration. Strife was awash in remembered scents, suddenly come real. The heat that rose from Cupid's skin scorched his soul as he slid his quick, pink tongue into Cupid's opening.

Cupid cried out in helpless bliss while Strife licked and teased his body's entrance, relaxing the muscle with mouth and hands. Strife called on the power he had missed in death to anoint his lover's passage with slick oil. First one finger, then two, Strife eased into his winged god.

"You are my god of love." He whispered as he slipped another finger into Cupid's tight heat. The love god was tight as a virgin, and Strife didn't want to hurt him just now. "Do ya have any idea how perfect you look?"

Cupid moaned and looked down at his lover.

"Tell me." He gasped then arched off the bed as Strife found his sweet spot.

"I dreamed of you." Strife murmured, scissoring his fingers inside Cupid's body. Almost there. "I dreamed of you like this, naked sweaty, riding my fingers and begging for more."

Cupid groaned and thrust his hips down to get more of Strife into him, pre cum sliding down his gold and purple cock freely. Strife lapped at it quickly, the barest brush of tongue on cock, then crawled up Cupid's body to face him.

"I dreamed of your sweet mouth, open to mine." Strife whispered, licking Cupid's lips but not deepening to kiss, drawing another ragged moan from the winged god. "I dreamed of your moans in my ear, your sweet body under me."

Cupid cried out in distress as Strife removed his fingers from his depths, but the mischief god just moved over him and pinned his lover's body under his own, lining Cupid's ass up with the tip of his hard and leaking cock.

"But most of all, lover," Strife bored into Cupid's eyes with his own. "I dreamed of this."

Strife thrust inside his lover with one long stroke, pushing until his balls brushed Cupid's ass. Cupid arched underneath him, screaming in ecstasy, his strong hands gripping Strife's ass and pulling him even deeper as his pretty cock spurted long jets of pleasure between their bellies.

Strife silenced his scream with his mouth and began to thrust in earnest, spurred on by Cupid's helpless wailing and the scent of his lover's come. His tongue plundered the love god's mouth while his cock plunged in and out of the quaking immortal.

He wouldn't last long, he knew. It was too good, too long, and it was Cupid under him. It was Cupid leaving long red scratches down his back. He shifted his angle to hit Cupid's prostate on every stroke. It was Cupid's blood dark face, thrashing from side to side in inexpressible pleasure. It was Cupid's sweet ass gripping him like a fist as the love god was filled with his cock.

"Mine." Strife snarled, grabbing the love god's shoulders and pulling him up off the bed.

"Mine!" He shouted as he reached around his lover to press his fingers at the junctures of Cupid's wings while bouncing the limp love god on his cock.

"MINE!!!" Strife howled and Cupid joined him as mischief thrust fast, madly, jerkily into love several times before freezing, muscles locked as he strained into Cupid's body. Cupid opened his green eyes just enough to see the expression on his lover's face as they both came.

Strife's eyes were wide open and locked on Cupid's face, his damp brow constricted as if in pain, his mouth was wide open in a primal scream as a mad grin played across it. Cupid exulted as he felt Strife's hot come shoot deep inside of him. Strife cried out when Cupid's seed struck his chest, hot and quick. Then they were coming and coming and coming and there was nothing else in the universe except their conjoined bodies. After a forever moment, the Mischief god collapsed back onto the sweat damp sheets, bearing Cupid with him, still impaled on his cock.

Desperately, Strife covered his lover's face with kisses, whispering his devotion.

"Oh god.*kiss* I missed you.*kiss* I love you. *kiss* I need you." Cupid devoured his lover's mouth, wildly at first, then slower and more gently, lavishing affection on Strife's tongue and lips.

"I love you." He answered at long last, his forehead pressed against Strife's. "Don't ever leave me again."

"I won't, Cupe." Strife held his lover close as he slipped out of him. "Not ever."

Cupid smiled and settled in next to his living lover. Strife's servant had promised it would be all right, and it was. They were together, and everything would be fine.

"Strife?" Cupid asked as they drifted drowsily down from ecstasy.

"Yeah, wing boy?" Cupid grinned.

"Next time you're on the bottom." Strife looked his lover in the eye and giggled.

"Oh hell yeah!"
end

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