Stronger Together chapter 168

Gard was of course onboard. The weapons we had were all we needed for  this show down. With the exception of the Beast killing flintlock,  which pretty much didn't do anything anymore except fire subpar  ammunition, all the rest of the gear was long term viable. Granted I was  pretty sure I'd end up having to return some of it in exchange for my  smithing lessons from the Svartalves (there was no way they would pass  up the excuse to get some of it back) but still we would have it at  least through killing Fenrir and the twins wouldn't know what hit them.

I  had to admit imagining the looks on their smug punchable faces when we  killed them was pretty satisfying. Nobody called my Raven demonspawn and  got away with it. Well, maybe me a few times in bed, but only if she  asked. The point was their casual denigration of my girl was all the  excuse I needed to shove my foot so far up their pompous asses I left a  boot print on the top of their scalp. Three days passed in a blink and  finally it was time to go. We all met up at Michael and Charity's to go  over the game plan.

Michael was out of town on a mission  from God so Charity volunteered her place as a staging ground. It was  ideal for having meetings and making plans because the angels here  stopped anyone from eavesdropping. I absolutely was not taking the  chance of the twins using their god powers to pull the same kind of shit  on us Lord Raith did. Operational security was a must now that we were  big players. I took stock of our forces. For heavies we had Morgan, Kara  in the robe of the fire rat, Raven,Cinder,Gard, River and me. On the  lower but still terrifying end of the spectrum we had Sam, Harry, Yang  in the feather cloak, and Barb in the silken mailcoat."

Inari  was staying home for this one with Andi to help guard the kids and  remain under the protection of the angels. We had even had Gabby's  parents bring her over for the day, and Susan had swung by with Maggie  to help play guard too. The twins were planning something and we didn't  want to leave our flank undefended until we dealt with them. Chastel had  more than proven how effective hostages could be at mitigating power.  The weapons had gone to Barb and Gard. The valkyrie should be able to  use the sword best so she got the Xiphos considering all her training,  and Barb was pretty much the perfect assassin so we gave her the fang.

Everyone  huddled around me. "Ok, we're about to get ready to leave but I do have  a few things to say. Stick to your groups, we split up the power  concentration so everyone is covered, don't let your guard down  obviously, whatever they're planning I'm sure it won't be good for us.  Everyone stay close to Gard when the fighting starts so she can protect  us from their time shifting." I made a face and looked at Kara  apologetically "Sadly Kara that robe protects from mental influence of  any kind, while it doesn't work on the god ability that lets them mess  with the time stream it definitely prevents Gard's counter from  working."

Kara shrugged "No big, I'm fast enough to make  up for it, they were probably only moving at about my speed with their  hocus pocus anyway. With the magic resistance in this thing I'm not too  worried about their spells either. I should be able to hold them off  with you of the two of fight them together. We can buy some time for  Barb to get in position and shank one and then gang up on the other."  Kara was normally pretty anti killing, but she had kind of a thing about  evil gods because of Darkseid and her ex Power Boy. Plus the twins were  wannabe kidnappers which put them even more on her shit list, she was  absolutely not fucking around with this fight.

I couldn't  help but laugh at the enthusiasm "Normally I would say you're right, but  given the kind of tricks gods can pull here I'm erring on the side of  caution. We follow the plan and play defense until they spring their  trap. If the last few weeks have taught us anything it's that no one is  invincible. If someone gets hurt because we rushed in without thinking  there would be no taking that back. We can definitely take them if we  stick together and make sure to watch each others backs." I knew  reminding her someone could get hurt would help, Kara was very  considerate like that. She would never let anyone of her loved ones  suffer.

She nodded reluctantly "Fair enough. From what you  guys told me about The Wild Wood they could manage some pretty  terrifying stuff if they're half as strong as Lycaon. Even his general  was able to fight you head on." She wasn't wrong. I was a bit worried  about that myself. Anyone could change reality in the nevernever with a  strong enough will, but I was pretty sure what made gods so scary was  that they could shape the real world like that too. Granted the twins  were only demigods, but even a pale imitation like Chastel had managed  some nasty tricks with what little sliver of that power he had. I was  positive a little time shifting wasn't all they could do.

We  went over the plan a few more times, fine tuning details based on  Gard's suggestions or Cinder's input. Charity weighed in a time or two  as well, and we knew she had skills from backing up Michael on occasion.  Finally at about five PM we had gotten the plan as tight as we could  possibly get it and it was time to go. Sundown was only a short time  away and we needed to be there before whatever was going to happen  happened in case it spilled out into the city so we all moved out. The  trip to soldier field was unusually quiet.

For  groupings we put Yang, Kara, and Barb together. Cinder, Morgan, and  Gard were with me. Harry, Raven, Sam, and River made up the final group.  Of course we all stuck together, but if we needed to split these would  be out battle formations. Charity loaned us her Suburban to make the  trip and we pulled up outside Soldier Field at six PM or so. Managing to  arrive before the sun set. We congregated in the field, looking around  to see if we could spot the twins. The last thing we wanted was for them  to sneak up on us, but we couldn't see them anywhere.

A  voice boomed out over the field. "Greetings, peasants. We see you  accepted our invitation. We expected more of a force, only a ragtag  assortment of minor powers. A few vampires, a forest ape, and your  demonspawn are hardly an awe inspiring army of conquest. But then, we  shouldn't have expected much from commoner garbage. This probably seems  impressive to you trash. We have come to discuss terms. State your  requests, and we shall state our response. But be warned, do not  overstep our generosity, or you'll never leave this place."

I  rolled my eyes "First of all Remus, I know that's you. The whole  pretentious voice of god thing is less intimidating when you're using it  on someone you've actually spoken to before. You have a magic  microphone, congrats. Now, our demands are simple and straightforward.  Leave the kid alone and piss off out of Chicago. If you want either  Connor, or to stay in the city you're going to have to go through us." I  was pretty positive the attitude would piss them off more than actually  just trying to kill them, and if they started the fight it would be  more convenient to explain. And Raven had said I couldn't be diplomatic.

I  could literally hear the sound of grinding teeth humming in the air  through whatever spell had been cast, and it was like music to my ears.  Really annoying music, granted, but still music. "Mongrel! How dare you  speak to us in this fashion, we offer you parlay and you spit in our  faces in such a way? You've signed your own death warrant!" The voice  this time was Romulus, and his tone was so full of rage and shame I  almost believed they had been sincere about the offer of safe conduct.  If I didn't know better I would assume this wasn't even a trap.

Of  course, I did know better, and it was, so I was fine. "Oh please, we  both know this is a trap to get us alone and kill us so you can have an  easier time finding the kid. Pretending either of us came here not  intending to fight is just going to make this process much longer and  more irritating than it needs to be." Ok, so maybe Raven had a point  about my diplomacy skills. I'd never been a bit fan of all the beating  around the bush people did in politics, just telling people what you  thought was usually a much better policy.

The  first voice returned, just as loud and pompous as before, but still not  angry. These fuckers were trying to good cop bad cop me. "You dare  impugn our honor mortal! We call you here under flag of truce only to be  berated and humiliated! You have insulted us for the last time, we will  crush you and your little raiding force and restore our reputation!" I  was pretty much blown away. These canine fucks had been incredibly clear  about their intentions. This was obviously a paper thin excuse for  violence so they could pretend to be in the right and wouldn't have to  deal with...Odin.

Fuck,  I'd just realized what I'd been missing. They hadn't mentioned Gard.  This whole show was for her, and for Odin. If they just killed us all,  including the valkyrie, then Odin could claim insult and butcher them  like pigs. A pair of mangy demigods were no match for the all-father and  they knew it. Whatever, I'd tried, who cared what their reasons were,  if they wanted an excuse they could have it. "Fine, you know what, I  don't have time for this nonsense. Sure, we offer insult, truce over,  get your asses out here and fight us if you're man enough. Or would that  be dog enough?"

A  cold laugh split the air "Arrogance, but you will soon know your folly,  and then you will know nothing ever again." And before our eyes the sun  finally set. The last rays of dusk lanced out and struck the ground and  started to...build. First a foundation, then stands, walls and golden  sand and massive portcullis gates around the interior, until finally we  were standing in a perfect full size reproduction of a fucking roman  coliseum. It was like watching a fucking 3D printed build the damn thing  out of light.

Ok,  that had been unexpected. "Alright, I'll give you idiots this, you  definitely know how to put on a show. But what's the use of all this  pageantry. If we're going to fight, lets just fight, you didn't need to  build an arena, I mean gods how pompous are you idiots. This isn't  ancient rome, get used to it." Despite my bravado I knew there was  something wrong with this place, I could sense a discord with the world  around us but I couldn't put my finger on why.

The  same laugh came again, but slightly different, this one obviously from  Romulus. "Insignificant cur, have you not realized? We ARE Rome!" And  with that the world shifted and warped around us, the nature of the  coliseum finally settling into place and my brain clicked at last as I  recognized this feeling. I'd felt this in The Wild Wood, and again in  the jungle. This was an ethereal aura of surreality that only existed in  one place. They'd dragged us into the nevernever, and we were in their  territory now.