CHAPTER EIGHT

ONCE AN MENACE…

(Always a catch)

After her second divorce in four years, Cassidy buried the girl she was growing up that dreamed of being a wife and mother. She was past due for that now. At thirty-nine, and technically barren and after rounds of IVF and a growing sense of futility and despair, she gave up the fight. She had been on a hormonal roller coaster for years and only had a few left before menopause took hold. She did not want to waste any more of them on the same old, same old ups and downs. The vicious cycle of working to afford treatment and hopefully a family, followed by the disappointment and the impending conversations about “trying again” took their final toll the day she signed on the bottom line of her last divorce agreement. Cassie did not even wait for the ink to dry before she cashed in all her remaining retirement and investment benefits and booked a cruise. Enough of being the practical, level headed daughter her mother had insisted upon. Enough of being the conscientious wife and reliable, industrious employee working towards the office with her name on it. Enough of being the trusted friend everyone could count on whether they returned the favor or not. Cassie went on a shopping spree for sexy sundresses and short shorts. Two days later, she headed for the airport and from there, the Greek Isles.

While on a stopover on Mykonos, she met an international man of mystery named Atem. She never made it back to the ship. She cancelled the rest of her cruise and spent the next three days in the throes of passion. Casting caution to the wind, she took up with a complete stranger and expended every ounce of pent up energy she had been keeping inside while trying to fit the mold of acceptance and success. The sex was secondary for her. The utter abandon was the point. He indulged her every whim in bed. The hotel room was extravagant, the food was ordered in and they only left long enough for housekeeping to change the sheets. He would go catch up on some work and she would access the spa on his credit card. She wondered why a man like that would choose her to spoil, but she ignored the obvious and chalked it up to “no questions asked and no strings attached”.

On the morning of the fourth day, she awoke to seeing him fully dressed and standing over her with a look of resignation on his beautiful face. She understood immediately that this had run its course for him. He had obligations. She did not. It was a short and sweet, slightly bitter goodbye. Check out was at eleven. They went their separate ways and their ships passed in the day. Once outside the hotel, she climbed in a cab and went straight to the airport, took a connecting flight to Athens and headed home. She had never felt more or less alone. She had tried not to expect anything from him, but it had been very difficult. She was hard wired from birth to be loved or lost. Once, safely back home and in the new, one bedroom apartment that was all she needed, she burst into tears. She wanted to die. Her long awaited flight of fancy behind her, the familiar shame and embarrassment had kicked in and feeling the fool, again, she nearly took her own life. Something stopped her. A sense of resilience and determination crept up through her cowardly spine and she soldiered on. Three weeks later, she discovered she was pregnant.

Cassie never searched for the father. She happily became a mother in her own right. This was her own, personal blessing in disguise. She resisted the urge to name her daughter Serendipity. That was too extra and over the top. Instead, she settled on Wren Odessa Wilder. She had gone back to her maiden name after her divorce. Wilder was how this had happened so it seemed all the more fitting. She enjoyed the poetic justice.

Theirs was a good life for as long as it lasted. Three months before her daughter’s eighteenth birthday, during her yearly OB/GYN check up, Cassie was diagnosed with a rare form of blood cancer. The news was shocking. This had been routine. The prognosis was not good. By the time they found it, it was already too late. She was given a matter of weeks to live. She thought she looked fine. She felt a little off, but nothing her age and working two jobs could not account for. Some dizziness now and then. A lack of appetite and resulting weight loss that she was actually happy for at the time. There were other concerning factors, but she had failed to notice them. Her skin had been turning crepey and her hair had been thinning, but that was a part of getting older.

With every ounce of resilience she still had in her, Cassie held on until Desi turned eighteen so her daughter could be an adult and receive and be her beneficiary. They had moved in with her mother, reluctantly, and Cassie fought the fight of her life to keep her death at bay long enough that Desi would be the only one that benefitted from her passing. Cassie had made sure everything was taken care of for her funeral and cremation. She continued to fight with her own mother up until the very end, but Cassie made it across the finish line. By a matter of hours. She gave up the ghost midday on Desi’s first day as a lawful adult.

Cassie had done everything she could to insure and ensure that her daughter would have a long and happy life. But then her father came back into the picture because he had other plans for her. What goes around, eventually does come back around and so does he because Metatron knows that Serendipity is a double-edged sword.

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What does it mean for a God to be an Archetype? Who is indicative of whom? Are the Gods personifications and representations of mortals, or do mortals reflect the deities on earth who then aspire to their higher form? I try to answer this for myself by asking myself which of the two would best help me ascend to greater heights. Someone who represents me, thereby, validating my existence or someone who is paving the way for me, not as a placeholder, but as a source of inspiration? I decided that both work for different reasons and it is like having to decide which came first etc…both being valid in argument, theory or application.

There doesn’t need to be as many different types of Gods as mortals since they are omnipotent and can represent vast swaths of the human race at any given time. They develop certain archetypes early on in their inception for their own furtherance. They can adapt their Archetypes to meet the changing needs and times. As mortals evolve, so do they. Unfortunately, if mortals devolve, so can they. To preserve their position and place, they may need to remove themselves until such time as the pendulum swings back in their favor.

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Maggie had recently been contemplating changes. She was beginning to feel like her Archetype of inception was becoming a dying breed in light of increased understanding by mortals that certain constructs may no longer serve. Recently, it had felt like there was something in the air that weighed a little heavy on her. Others seemed not to notice, but her marriage was suffering as a result. For instance, here she stood, watching Orestes in the yard, practicing his swing to and fro. There was a time when always doing so excited her and spurred her to wanting him. So why, now, was she more annoyed than horny? What had changed? Not her and not him? She was still in keeping with herself upon entering into consort with him. He was very much still himself. They had retained their own love and desire for each other for eons. If it was not holding up, then it was the environment in which it existed that had changed. The environment was waning and not supporting her in her effort to sustain their relationship while he seemed unaffected by it. That could only mean one thing. Women were changing while men were staying relatively the same.

He turned around and smiled at her. She knew what that smile meant but it didn’t land. “Swing and a miss,” she thought to herself as she smiled back anyways. She immediately detested herself for this as she did not appreciate the deception she had engaged in. That was not genuine on her part. It was insincere. What was the word she was searching for…fake?

Orestes approached her, now also looking concerned. She stepped towards him and embraced him warmly. She might need to adjust her traditional Archetype. She would not give him up without a fight. But how much of herself would she give up to keep him? Something women everywhere had begun asking themselves for a while now.

Orestes stepped back and dropped his hands to her waist while he looked into her eyes. She lowered them, slightly, but still detectable to him. This is a God that would slay monsters for her, or grow her favorite flowers from seeds to weave into her beautiful hair. Before her, he had favored many and left quite the trail of broken hearts. But deep down, he was wanting to meet his match. The day after he knew he did, he declared himself a one woman man to himself. Eventually, he admitted it out loud to others. But only after he told her first. Never in all that time and since, had she dipped her eyes slightly to avert his gaze. Something else deep inside him stirred nervously. Then she lifted her gaze back to him and stared boldly into his eyes.

This was a defining moment for them.

She spoke softly, gently but firmly. “Orestes, my beloved. I know our time together is coming to an end.”

He stepped back in dismay. That deep down feeling was loss. This was not a feeling he was familiar with. He did not like it.

Santos, meanwhile, was staring at the last photo of Desi he had on his phone. The seconds ticked by. With a shaking finger, he deleted it. He knew he had to let her go.

Maggie continued as best she could. “Our once strong connection has dissipated. Something is missing.”

Rhe looked at Blaze looking to her for something she wasn’t sure she had in her. Then she blinked. She took a step forward.

Santos put his phone down and looked at his empty ring finger. They hadn’t made it quite that far. He had wanted to. She was the holdup there. She called marriage a “horrendous undertaking”. She assured him that did not change the way she felt about him. He wished he could say the same, but it kinda did. If only he had let that go instead. Tears formed behind his eyes but stopped there. No more making an issue out of it. Especially not today.

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Orestes turned and walked away without so much as a word, his eyes burning.

Maggie took a deep breath and let out a wail only she could hear.

For some unknown reason, Rhe wanted to scream. Instead, she asked him, “Why are you here?”

That is an example of how Archetypes work, until they don’t.

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In response to her question, Blaze did, in effect, apologize for how things transpired earlier that day. He recognized that as First Co-Chair, and in conjunction with Polly, they had a responsibility to maintain decorum and see to it that all voices were equally heard and regarded fairly, so to speak. Allowing an argument to ensue was unacceptable. This would be further addressed. Etc…etc…

He did this in his kindest of manners. Forge wasn’t buying it for a second but Rhe decided to let the things slide for now. She wanted to get back to working on a solution. Blaze sensed the heat coming off the forge to his side and cast a glance in that direction. Both Blaze and Rhe knew that diverting attention towards the shop was the best way to change the subject for each of their own reasons.

“What is the work being done?” Blaze asked, tipping his head in the direction of the glowing heat radiating from within the smelt. Forge motioned him towards the door and began to explain the process of creating a source of inspiration that superseded whatever energy was resulting in their being a growing fervent uprising in the world that had a sense of malice at its heart. He showed Blaze the mold for the upcoming cast. This medal would compel those that looked upon it to strive for gold in and of themselves. The addition of the Platinum was to enhance the value and spur the momentum even further.

Blaze pondered the process and while he appreciated the thought behind it and the effort that went into it, he could see that the result was lacking but did not want to say so. Forge jumped ahead and pointed at the samples that had already been dismissed. The work was ongoing. They had not yet quite hit on the final design.

“The medal itself is just the beginning.” Rhe said. Once we get that right, he will know. And then we can figure out what energy to imbue it with. The medal is the vehicle. The means but not the message. A way to get their attention and appeal to the winner inside we all want to be.”

Blaze furrowed his brow and pursed his lips in deep determination. Everybody does want to be a winner by nature. Somebody was very much tapping into that and creating a fervor around it. That fervor was leading them to the edge of extinction as humankind. But into what instead?

Forge did not like Rhe explaining his work, but had to accept that this was their work. He had always worked alone. How he had allowed this to happen, he did not know, but had an idea. He had let his guard down and had to admit that alone was not ideal. He felt the need to reestablish his position as the Forge and further explained.

“This medal will be symbolic of everything Olympus represents and stands for and will mark every weapon and armor in its name. We will imbue this with the energy that best conveys to those that look upon it the spirit of Olympus and the return to the Golden Age of her glory.”

Rhe thought he was being a little too extra. She also did not like that he was stepping on her point. This had been her idea. She was not backing away from it this time.

She spoke up, looking directly at Blaze as he was about to speak on this. “We need to fight fire with fire. If something or someone is dangling a fairy tale carrot in front of their upturned noses and they are falling for it, hook line and sinker, we have to get a carrot of our own that’s the real deal. We are the real deal. It has to look more real and feel more real. A gold medal is easily recognizable world wide because of the Olympics that still exist. We have to tap into that energy, not just because it ties to us, but because it is an institution with history and prestige.”

“Prestige? That could work to our detriment and remind them only too well of our past indiscretions where they saw us as…” Blaze started.

“Elitists.” She finished his thought. “I know. But prestige gets a shitty rap. Prestige has an inherent value, doesn’t it? If it isn’t corrupted or exclusionary? If it was something everyone had a right to and access to in their own way and in their own life?

Something was bothering her. She felt that angst she got when her memory was being triggered but there was nothing there. The void where her memories used to be sometimes needled her while she tried to fill it again by making new ones. Did she even know what she was talking about? And where did the underlying resentment come from?

Thankfully, Blaze turned his gaze from her and back to the medal. Forge was trying to prevent a scowl from clouding his judgment. He felt the pull of the prestige of which she spoke. For a moment, the three of them stood in silence.

“What would that Prestige look like?” Blaze asked the air around them.

They all turned their attention to the medal. They all began to imagine. Rhe noticed it and felt vindicated, but still bothered. “Like that.” She said to herself.

Later that evening, over his last drink to cap off the night of what had been a long day, Blaze contemplated. Prestige in your own right. Now that was something he could take to Apollo. They were on the verge of finding a way forward by offering everyone a prestigious life of their own. He knew their Counsel would approve of the concept. They only had to match the means to the message and he had to rely on Forge for that. The question was, could he?

Rhe had no doubt they could and she was growing tired of the doubt others had in them.

Forge set to work. If anybody could cast the first stone, it was him.

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For the time being, he was Dr. Emmet Norton. Metatron wished he really were just Dr. Emmet Norton. However, it was a facade. One of so many along the way, he had lost count, but still could recall them all if he so desired. He did not so desire. Being a clinical psychologist was by far and above, one of the easiest facades for him to pull off. A lifetime study of human behavior was his job. He could write the definitive book on it if it would help. Things were past that point right now, but not entirely out of the realm of possibility. He still might, he told himself. Dr. Norton, for appearances sake, looked like a busy and successful practicing psychologist with a full schedule and clientele. Really, he only had one patient. He looked at the appointment book on his desk. Only one name stood out among the notations. Santos DelFuego. He was due to arrive any minute now. This would be the first time he ever came face to face with the man whose life he destroyed to save the long lasting life of his last chance for arrival.

This was his time of reckoning. He only had a small window left to set things right before he fell from grace entirely. He was repulsed by the idea of that enough to suck it up and do what needed to be done. Face to face. That was the only way. He had needed to wait for Santos to be released from prison to effect his own release in return. The interim had taken its toll and he teetered on the edge. He did not want to fall. He knew only too well what a fallen angel looked like. Lucifer.

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ArchAngels are the mediators between Gods and Mortals. They are aspects of both. They link the Archetypes in both directions, one to another, whichever way that goes. They are not supposed to work independently of either but serve both fairly. Once, there was an ArchAngel who was not satisfied with being just another middle man. One who felt the Gods were too esoteric in their approach to mortals and mortals were too rudimentary to appreciate what was being offered. The ArchAngels needed more jurisdiction. He felt that they should be the governing body politic of both Gods and Mortals and that both should look to them and answer to them for peaceful coexistence. Both should go through them to access the above and below. They would be the border guard between heaven and earth to keep the channels open but maintain the necessary balance of power. They would protect the borders and see to it that only what was right and served the interest of either side accordingly was able to cross. They would keep out the riff raff. They would be sent back to improve upon their circumstances first before being allowed access.

He campaigned heavily on his agenda and was able to convince a faction of angels to agree with him before he was ousted as a malcontent and cast down along with his legion. What ensued was horrific. When an ArchAngel falls from heaven, their wings are ripped from them and burned in the fires of what we know as hell. Lucifer chased after them in anger and fear, trying to save them. He was too late. He gathered up the ashes of his former wings and spread them over himself in an effort to retain them. The darkness spread instead. He swore vengeance on those who had turned against him and exacted justice on him. Retribution would be his.

In the MeanTime, Prometheus began an illicit affair with Hera, who, being a Goddess of renown, immediately raised him up to suit her and her plan to unseat Zeus for his treatment of her. She did take everything personally. And no better rival for the Sky God that Prometheus. Off they went to start their own reign, taking several of their own followers with them. Prometheus the mortal became Jehovah the God and they had a son. Soon, their following took hold and all Hera had to do to see it through was take a back seat to her husband and son. She had underestimated his ego. She went from the frying pan into the fire. She did remember that Prometheus had stolen the fire but never thought that he would use it against her.

Lucifer, seeing the changing of the guard on high became even more bitter. That should have been his reign. But not one to sit around and stew, he seized upon the opportunity to attach himself to their dominion. He would be the Anti to their Christ and serve their misfortune with his own. He gathered even more legions and spurred them on, using their own hypocrisy to his advantage until it got to the point where you could no longer tell the difference between them. He would whisper in their ears and cajole them and stroke them with flattery. He would reward them with wealth and play on their fears. He would raise some of them up to help him in his ill-suited measures. And the sheep would turn his way, the once black sheep becoming lily white. He would whip them into a frenzy, a fervor. Then in the ultimate act of revenge, he would let them destroy themselves while he watched, licking his lips and tasting the ashes of his wings and basking in the remains of the day.

Metatron knew that the only match for an angel that fell downward from heaven would be an angel that fell upward to even the score. Even if it cost her wings. So he protected them from day one, in a cocoon attached to her by her silver chord of life. Her wings were her allure. She would need them some day.

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