Hera Stries Bac

Aphrodite's Curse

Book 4

Hera Strikes Back

Chapter 6

"I don't like the looks of this. The Gods seem quite agitated," Grid said as she walked over to Orion standing at the far corner of the Acropolis. Her brow furrowed, as she added, "obviously something major has happened."

"Yeah," Orion said as he gazed up at Athena's temple, "something has apparently gone horribly wrong— again! That seems to be the general theme for this wild, fucked up day."

Grid and Orion were alone on the Plaza now, all of the divinities, one by one, having been summoned up to the porch of Athena's temple over the past thirty minutes. Talos' return had created quite a stir, and a heavy discussion was taking place.

"Truer words were never spoken," Grid said.

The loud shout of Hades crying "This is Bullshit!" drew both of their attention, and their heads snapped to the left to glare up at the temple. There, they watched the Gods furiously continue to argue, and the fight appeared to be growing increasingly heated as each second ticked by. Fingers were pointed. Arms flailed, and Grid noticed that they all kept pointing down in their direction.

"I wonder what they are talking about? It seems very conspiratorial, and, I notice, they seem to be very interested in you," Grid said.

"Me? I can't imagine why. I didn't start this war!"

"So," Grid said, "what do you think is going on?"

"Who can know with the Gods? They all have their own agendas, and we mortals are but puppets on their stage. But..., my gut tells me not to be optimistic. I have pretty much come to just expect more disasters at this point. Maybe they know of what's coming and are arguing over just how fucked up things really are."

"Really?" Grid said. "At this point, what else could go wrong?"

Orion laughed as he threw his head back. "Grid, you dated a God, Thor! I would think that would make you an expert on Divine insanity. Surely you can't really be asking that question. The Gods are very hard to predict, so there is no end to the Fuckpacalypse that might be unleased on us. Perhaps a great plague is coming from Egypt, where we all end up covered in festering sores. Or, who knows, maybe Babylon will unleash the Typhon, and he will show up and finish us all off with a big crunch from his razor sharp fangs. Hell, you know the Norse Gods. Is there any end to the whacky shit they might come up with? No, it is a total clusterfuck," Orion sighed. Turning to Grid, he said, "You think you might have joined the wrong team, now? You may have fared better staying with the Gods of the Norse. We Greeks do not seem to have a shit together today."

"Oh, I don't think so," Grid said as she gazed up at the Gods and Goddesses continuing to argue on the porch. "You may have lost hope, but, I still have faith. Hera appears to have things well in hand, and Athena, my Patroness, is very bright. I am sure they will set this ship right."

"That's right," Orion said, "so much has happened, I nearly forgot you are Athena's Priestess now!" He grinned as he added, "And a more beautiful Priestess Athena has never had." He licked his lips, and slowly ran his eyes down her body, lingering over her delicious cleavage peeking out of the top of her diaphanous gown. She was as stunning as he remembered, her gown of silk looking almost as alluring as her former covering of animal skins. Almost... A grin crept over his mouth as his mind flew back in time, and he wallowed in the image of the joyous moments he spent with his face between her thighs.

"I must say, Grid. Although you look super fine in silk, I do miss the fur and leather," he added with a wink. "Although with a body like yours, I am sure you could make even burlap look good."

"You are such a smooth bullshitter," Grid laughed. "Great Gods of Olympus, I can see why you get so many women."

"Who me?" Orion said with a wink.

"Yeah, you!" Grid said as she jabbed his chest with her finger. "But, if I were you, I would be on my best behavior. After all, your new girlfriend, Circe, is a very powerful Goddess. You sure don't want to piss her off."

"No, I don't," Orion said as he looked down at his crotch. "I already have my balls locked up due to some Divine anger by a Goddess. I certainly don't need any more grief heaped on my head."

"Or your balls," Grid said. "Remember what you told me she did to those three Babylonian soldiers? Circe seems to have quite a vindictive side."

"That she does!"

"Vindictive, crazy and a Goddess to boot!" Grid said. "That is a dangerous combination. It would be a shame to not only have your balls sealed up, but also have your dick shrunk down to the size of a flea's hindquarters. That would suck."

He sighed, and said, "No, that would definitely suck, but, as it looks now, she might as well just go ahead and shrink it off. It's not like my dick and balls are doing me any good now anyway. Plus, with Artemis frozen in stone, for who knows how long, I doubt I am ever going to get free."

"Well," Grid said as she winked and lowered her eyes to his crotch, "I still would be sad to see them go. They definitely have a certain..., aesthetic appeal. So, for the sake of womankind, don't piss her off so much that she shrinks your tongue too, Orion. That, boy, is one of your greatest assets."

Orion smiled as he reached out and stroked her cheek. "Damn, girl, you were quite tasty."

"We did have quite a romp back in the den of the Griffin," Grid said as she blushed.

Orion smirked and said, "If, or when, I ever get my balls unlocked, I plan on coming back and seeing you again. We have some unfinished business, you know," he added with a wink.

"Orion, Orion, Orion," Grid laughed as she shook her head. "You were, and still are, such a dog."

"Woof, woof; guilty as charged!"

Grid glanced over at the frozen body of Artemis at the far end of the plaza, Pegasus curled up and sleeping at her feet, and said, "Have you gotten any information about how to unfreeze Artemis? Surely with all of these Gods gathered, someone must know some way to counteract the Blood of Medusa."

"So far, no luck," Orion said. "With the war and all, bigger issues have taken center stage."

"Yes," Grid said. "But, it appears perhaps the worst is over. It is late afternoon now, and, if there was going to be a second wave attack, I think it would have started by now." She pointed back up at the crowd of Gods on the porch of the temple, and said, "And if Talos has brought back Ares, perhaps we can finally start some kind of counter-attack. The best defense is a good offense! We should rip those mother fuckers a new one!"

"Amen to that! That's your Nordic blood talking, girl and it makes me kinda hot when you talk all mean," Orion said. "Frankly, I am getting antsy. All of this standing around, and waiting. It is not my way. I need to do something! I cannot just wait—"

"—Orion! Come here!" Circe shouted from the porch.

"Well, Orion," Grid smirked. "It appears your master has called."

Orion smiled at Grid and winked as he bounded up the stairs to Athena's temple. His stomach roiled a bit once he reached the top. Other than Archimedes standing beside Hera, he was the only human standing in the mass of Gods, and, it was intimidating.

"Orion," Circe said as she smiled. "Hera needs to ask you some important questions."

"Hera?" Orion said as he glanced over at the Goddess. "Questions? I am confused."

"Don't be confused, Orion," Hera said. "You have some very powerful advocates for your case here," she added as she winked over at Circe. "But, before I render my final decision, I need to be satisfied that you are the right man for the job."

"I don't understand, Goddess Hera," Orion said. "What job? Are you sending me out to find a cure for Artemis? I am very anxious to get started, as, well..."

"Yes, I am sure you are quite anxious about that, Orion," Hera bellowed. The Goddess glanced over at Artemis, naked and frozen at the other end of the plaza, and smirked. "She will be dealt with in good time. Frankly, and I hate to say this, as she is my daughter, but, she brought this shit on herself. Artemis always was such a hothead. I think being frozen by the blood of Medusa for a bit, might do her a world of good. Cool her jets so to speak."

Orion felt his stomach drop. This was not what he wanted to hear. "But Goddess, I had hoped that you would send me off to hunt for a cure for her condition. I assumed that you Gods, who know all, already know what is required to restore her and would send me on a quest to retrieve it. Now, if I could get going on that mission, then—"

"—Then you can unfreeze her, and when she is all restored, you hope she will release you from your chaste state, eh?" Hera laughed. "You are such a fool, Orion! A glorious, handsome, and philandering fool! Even if you managed to free Artemis from her curse, there is no guarantee she would help YOU out of your vow of chastity to her! Far from it probably. She can be a real bitch sometimes, especially to cheating pussy-mad fuckers like you."

"But..., I thought," Orion gulped.

"Yeah, I know what you thought," Hera said as her eyes blazed. "Sucks doesn't it? It sucks to be told a lie, doesn't it ORION? Now you know how it feels. I guess all those hundreds of women you lied to over the years, weeping pitiful girls praying to me daily for vengeance on you, are finally getting the last laugh. Great and mighty Orion, pussy hunter extraordinaire will live for the rest of his life as a cumless monk. Oh the sweet irony!"

"Please Goddess," Orion said as he fell to his knees. "I-I just..."

"Goddess Hera," Circe whispered as she pointed at Talos. "Remember..."

"Yes," Hera sighed. Turning back to Orion, she shouted, "Oh get up, boy. I am just fucking with you a bit." Pointing to Circe, she added, "Like I said, you have quite a powerful advocate here in Circe, Orion. You owe her a lot."

"I do, Great Goddess!" Orion said. Still on his knees, he added, "So, you will help me?"

"Yes..., but first you need to prove yourself to me."

"Prove myself? I, I don't understand."

"Well, Orion," Hera said, "you still have many crimes to atone for. Personally, if it were up to me, your balls would stay nice and sealed up for eternity. They have caused much mischief and grief on the maids of Greece. I, as the Patron Goddess of Aggrieved women, have heard much about your devilish pursuits for years. So many pissed off women, Orion. So many."

"Please Goddess, I have seen the errors of my ways, but it cannot be that I am to stay this way forever. That..., that can't be the plan."

"Now, don't get your panties in a bind, Orion," Hera said with a grin. "I am not finished. Against my natural inclination, I have been persuaded by your advocate to help you. And eventually, when Artemis is released from her stony prison, I will command her to release you from your oath. She cannot refuse a direct command from me."

"That is fantastic, Goddess," Orion blurted. "I, I cannot possibly thank you enough!"

"Well, you might want to hold off on the thanks for a bit, Orion," Hera said as she smirked. "There is no free lunch in life. You still need to prove yourself worthy of my blessings, and that trial starts now." She paused, and said, "They say you are the greatest hunter in the world, right?"

"Yes, Goddess," Orion said. "My skills are unsurpassed, and, after all, I won the contest back on Ephesus and that is why—"

"—Yes, I know your qualifications, and I like your confidence," Hera said. "But, tracking down a naked human being, Demetrius, was one thing. In order to win my favor, you will have much larger tests of your abilities. Are you sure you are up for this? Honestly, if I were you, I would just accept your new sexless state and go study Philosophy. You will live longer, probably."

"No!" Orion said. "I must try! I am up for the challenge, whatever it is."

Hera smiled as she glanced over at Circe. "He is feisty. I like that!" Turning back to Orion, she said, "OK, Hunter-boy, here is your first task. You are to use all of your tracking skills to hunt down and find the God Ares."

"But, I thought he was found? I thought Talos—" Orion said.

"—Well," Dionysus interrupted, "like everything else today, things have not gone according to plan."

"What do you mean?" Orion said.

"What he means is, Ares has been kidnapped!" Hephaestus said. "Talos tells me not only is he missing from my palace in Vesuvius, but, all of my fire nymphs are gone too." Balling his red hands into a fist, he growled, "I swear! If they were taken by those Egyptian fuckers, I will personally rip of Ammon Ra's big fat bird head, and shit down his neck!"

"So you see, Orion," Hera said. "This hunt may be a bit more challenging for you. Finding Demetrius was one thing. Finding a God is quite another."

"Yes," Orion said as he sighed, and dropped his head. "But, when I do find him, how will I get him home. I mean, I may need some divine help on this."

"Of course!" Hera said. "I am not a total bitch." She smiled as she bent down and placed a golden flute into his hands. "You can thank the Muse Euterpe for this. She always was so musically talented. I thought it was quite clever."

"What is it, Goddess?"

"It is a flute, silly." She paused after reveling in his discomfort, and added, "but it is not just any old ordinary flute. With this, you can summon one of us Gods to your assistance, wherever you are in the world. Now, our presence will only be temporary, though. The Gods are going to be quite busy preparing for our counter-attack, and I have forbidden any of them to leave the lands of Greece for the duration of the war unless it is absolutely necessary. Once summoned by your flute, one of us will materialize at your location to assist. Our powers outside of Greece will be limited, though, and we will only be able to stay for a few minutes, so use it sparingly."

"Yeah, Orion," Hades said, "don't be ringing us too often. We have our own tasks to complete."

"Tasks?" Orion said.

"Yes, Orion," Hera said. "I have assigned all of the Gods, including myself, jobs to perform during this war. Only through our divine cooperation will the Egyptians, Babylonians and Norse be defeated. So, Hades is right. Don't bother us too often. We divine will take a dim view of too much whining from a mere human."

"I see," Orion said as he glanced back at Pegasus, now pacing back and forth across the plaza. "Well, I will start at Hephaestus' palace on my search. Hopefully, I can pick up Ares scent from there."

"This might help," Aglagea said as she stepped forward. She reached into her purse, pulled out a small tiger printed thong, and placed into Orion's hand. She whispered, "try and get the scent from this. It belonged to Ares, and should still have his scent on it."

"What the hell is that?" Dionysus said as he leaned over to inspect.

Aglagea blushed, as Euphrosyne blurted out, "It's Ares underwear!" Spinning around to look at her sister, she laughed, "Girl, you have been up to some dirty business."

"Hey, I was drunk at the time, and Ares was quite charming, and..., oh fuck it, we all make mistakes," Aglagea said.

"Oh, how I want to hear the backstory on this later!" Hera cackled. Turning to Orion, she winked, and said, "See, Hunter, we Gods are helping you already." She pointed over to Pegasus and said, "Now, if you don't mind, we have important business to attend to; as do you."

"Yes, oh Glorious Goddess of the sky, Radiant divinity and mother of—"

"Just go!" Hera snapped. She winked as she added, "Good luck, Orion. You are going to need it!"

*****

The white zone is for loading and unloading of passengers only... The white zone is for loading and unloading of passengers only... The white zone is for loading and unloading of passengers only...

"What in the fuck is taking Shelia so long," Darla cried as she paced back and forth outside of the baggage claim of Austin-Bergstrom International Airport. "See! I begged her not to check her luggage!"

"Well," Dottie said as she sucked on her cigarette in the small, smoking area outside of the automatic doors. "I don't think she was planning on having to claim her luggage BEFORE the trip began!"

"True," Darla said as she looked back at Ishtar, and frowned. "We are fucking lucky to have gotten out of the airport without being arrested. Jeesh, what a disaster!"

"Still...," Dottie said, "you have to admit, it was pretty fucking funny. Man, did you see the dicks on those two? They have some hard times ahead."

"I'm here!" Shelia said as she burst through the doors with her bags. "Sorry for the delay, but..., well, it is chaos in there right now. All flights have been canceled, and security has gone crazy. It took forever to get my bags."

"I guess I did cause quite the stir," Ishtar laughed as she walked over. "But honestly, those bastards deserve what's coming to them. I hope that cute little clerk works their asses over good."

"So..., Divinity," Darla said. "Not to be sacrilegious, but, now that our flight has been canceled, and those were non-refundable tickets by the way, we are royally fucked. We have no money, so we cannot buy new tickets to New York, and my 1991 Ford Festiva would never make the trip. It can barely get me to work at the mall, much less across the country."

"Hmmmm, that is unfortunate," Ishtar said.

"Maybe you can conjure something up, Goddess," Shelia said. "Your powers are unsurpassed! Perhaps you can put some zing into Darla's Festiva."

"Hey," Ishtar said with a wink, "I may be a Goddess, but somethings are beyond even the most powerful magic!"

"Hey!" Darla cried. "My car is not THAT bad!"

"But, it is a moot point anyway," Ishtar sighed as she sheepishly looked down at the ground. "I totally blew my wad on those two guards back in the security line. My manna is almost entirely tapped out and I need to reserve what is left to use in my replenishment efforts."

"I guess we have to go back home then," Darla said. "I will call Steve and tell him we aren't comi—"

"Oh no!" Ishtar shouted. "We are continuing on. I must get to New York and capture that Greek! He is the key to me getting out of here."

"What?" Darla said. "How? With no money, and you with no manna, and no tickets, and no car, how in the Hell are we going to get to New York? It's 1750 miles away!"

Ishtar pointed up to the sky, and said, "Ah my loyal Priestess, you must have faith. Mother Gaia shall always provide for her dutiful children."

"I don't know, Goddess," Shelia said. "Darla may be right. The other girls are milking Jim Bob back at the trailer park. Perhaps we should just postpone until he provides enough..., sacrifice to replenish your manna and we can be successful on this trip."

"No, I don't think so," Ishtar said. Closing her eyes, she held her arms out and said, "I can feel destiny calling. The melodious melody of the Fearsome Fates is in the wind, and tickles my ears. My powers are not all used up..., yet. I have some left. We must go to New York now! There is no time to wait for Jim Bob to dribble out enough pre-cum to replenish my manna reserves, and, I sense there are other forces on this same mission. We must beat them to the goal! Take your Goddess' word for it, this will all work out."

"But..., how? How is this going to work out?" Darla cried. "Pardon me for saying this, but, you blew through all of the manna Jim Bob generated over the last month in one big burst back in the security line. Teased continuously for an entire month, that was a shitload of pre-cum he oozed out. We aren't going to have access to something like that again. Especially if your manna is low."

Shelia said, "As much as I liked seeing those perves get what's coming to them, maybe it was a bit pricy, Goddess."

Ishtar grinned, and winked over at Shelia, and said, "I agree, it was expensive, but boy was it so fucking worth it. Those fuckers needed some serious attitude adjustment."