Archive of Our Own ^beta

The air is thick with the sound of thunder and crackling of electricity.

Alex flinches at each bolt of lightning that flashes around them. He doesn’t bother to hide them in front of his crew. They are not his anymore; not when they had so willingly turned themselves over to Luca. Not when Fermin had shamelessly stabbed Alex in the back.

He knows that they are looking to him for guidance. Now, in the face of Zeus’ ire, they are looking to him to save them, to be cunning and brave and get them out of harm’s way just as he had with Poseiden.

Alex refuses to.

They are not deserving of his stoicness, or his courage, or his wisdom anymore. He barely is. He is not their captain anymore, and he won’t be treated as such. No, instead he joins them in cowering.

He flinches at every lightning bold and he whimpers at every clap of thunder. His breathing is laboured as the wound in his stomach aches and he fears for his life.

All he has wanted for twelve long years is to get back to his husband and brother. How is that too much to ask? What has he done to be truly unworthy of that in the eyes of the gods?

He can no longer guarantee he will bring all of his men home. He can hardly guarantee it for himself, let alone the thirty–only thirty out of six hundred, oh Polyphemus, Poseidon, Scylla, what have you done–that are still with him. At this rate they will wander the ocean for eternity, never being allowed home, struggling for food and survival against the wrath of the gods and their monsters, being picked off one by one.

Or maybe Zeus will kill them all now.

The seas aren’t his domain but the sky affects them all the same, as they are wrapped up in a storm that rivals Poseidon’s own. The water and the air are so interconnected; Alex should’ve realised this meeting was inevitable long ago.

The bursts of lightning and thunder get closer together until they are almost instantaneous. The storm is on top of them; Zeus is on top of them. He emerges from the clouds and Alex is– Alex is terrified.

Even if he was the man he was two years ago, or twelve, Alex would still be trembling when faced with Zeus like this. The thing is, Alex knows gods. He is descended from Hermes and the trickster likes to visit from time to time. For help or pranks or whatever he feels like, much like he did at Circe’s island. He is–was–Athena’s protégé. He knows that, even in their most mortal forms, gods are still larger than life. They are still, very clearly, gods.

Zeus makes no effort to hide this from them. The form he presents to them is made entirely from the clouds of his storm. It’s just his bust and his head but it takes up most of the sky. Alex is certain that his ship is not even half of the length of Zeus’ hand.

We're all going to die, Alex realises with sudden clarity. Zeus isn’t going to let any of them out of here alive; again, a storm will be their downfall. He can’t describe himself as a sentimental man anymore, though he knows that’s what led to this. Still, he thinks of the home he hasn’t seen in twelve long years. I’m sorry, Pecco. I’m sorry, Marc. I tried to get back to you, I promise. I wish I could see you again.

“Tell me,” Zeus’ voice booms. Alex can barely resist the urge to cover his ears against the noise. He’s disrespected enough gods, and no matter how unlikely, he still wants to make it back to his homeland. His family is still waiting. “Alex of Ithaca. If I were to make you choose between the lives of your men and crew or your own,” he pauses. Thunder rumbles across the sky. Alex flinches again. “Why do I think they’d lose?”

Alex gasps. His breathing turns ragged. Luca, Fermin, all of them, look towards him. He can understand what Zeus is saying, knows what he wants, but he refuses to believe it. He can’t lose more men today. He can’t keep carrying on.

"Enlighten me, King of Ithaca. Since your hunger was too great, I wonder who would take the weight and suffer a gruesome fate to me,” he smirks. “Choose.”

“Choose?” Alex can barely muster up the courage to speak, and when he does, it’s the lightest whisper. Zeus still hears him.

“Somebody has to die today, and you have the final say. You?” lightning strikes the water to Alex’s right. “Or your crew?” It strikes again on his left.

Please don’t make me do this, Alex begs in his mind. He remembers castle walls ten years ago; an infant in his arms; an eagle circling above him. Zeus is always going to give him an impossible choice, and he is always going to know which side Alex will choose.

“Captain?” It’s Luca who speaks. Oh, Luca. Alex cannot fault him for anything he’s done. Even after all of this time, he still loves Luca like a brother. He’ll miss him like he misses Marc. He almost does already.

“I have to see them,” Alex says. He stares straight ahead at the crashing waves and feuding clouds. He doesn’t look at Zeus’ grin or his stricken faces of his crew, his brothers. He can’t. He can’t look at them and do this.>

“Captain–”

“–My brother–”

“–Pedro–"

“–My wife–”

“–My daughter–”

“But we’ll die.” Alex doesn’t want the last thing he sees of Luca to be a look of utter betrayal. Still, he forces himself to turn around. There are tears in Alex’s eyes clouding his vision. There is only fear in Luca’s.

Alex takes one deep, harrowing breath, and then another. I’m sorry, he mouths to Luca.

You promised Valentino, Luca mouths back. Alex feels sick to his stomach. If he ever does make it home again he will never be able to sleep. Maybe that was the gods’ true goal.

“I know.”

The storm had quieted, for just a moment, but it ramps up again the second the decision is made. Alex is– lifted off of the boat, suspended in the clouds, stuck as the waves crack the boat in two. Alex’s eyes won’t close and his neck won’t turn and his body won’t move an inch as he’s forced to watch the rest of his crew be killed, again. Again and again, they die because of his mistakes and his choices. Again and again, all he can hear are their screams.

One by one his men drown, or are smited into smithereens by super-charged lightning bolts. But of course, Luca is the last one left standing. He stares straight at Alex, his blue eyes the colour of the ocean as he bobs up and down in its swell. A wave crashes down over his head, and he– he–

He doesn’t come up again.

Alex’s tears flow freely now, mixing with the rainwater. It feels cruel.

“Remember, you choose,” Zeus says to him. “Are your precious husband and brother worth it?”

I don’t know, Alex despairs. They have to be. I have to get back to them. I can’t let this all be for nothing.