middleofsomewhere | The Endless River

The Endless River

On the morning of day twenty one of the month of Kazoo there is a message on the ICP screens around the train. Their SCA's will light up the colour of the Void and show the following information.

World #398050 is a void nexus known locally as Tshering. As a void nexus this world has strong links with the void and the connection through worlds. World #398050 is home to the Endless River. Legends speak of this river being powerful enough to send thoughts from one heart to another across any distance. All that is needed is for you to know who it is you wish to reach.

On-board

The dressing carriage is open, filled with clothing best suited to a pleasant spring day. Light, airy and in a rainbow of joyful colours and florals. One closet is entirely filled with wide-brimmed hats bedecked with ribbons, feathers and ornaments. A stack of picnic baskets and containers filled with an alarming variety of passenger-suitable foodstuffs and flasked drinks sits in one corner, next to rolls of thick, weatherproof blankets in the four team colours.

The large box marked Do Not Use Yet, filled with small, empty jute bags, is hopefully still sat in the Luggage carriage, ready for passengers to grab handfuls of its contents as directed by the announcement.

Upon landing (after an appropriate countdown), the train remains on the surface, its carriages partially curved to form a gathering site for the day. Welcome to Tshering, the eighth void nexus!

A Day for Picnics

Tshering, system #398050, is a strange place, only habitable by grace of the passengers' SCAs. The sky is shot through with colours, a cascade of sunsets, and through it, the void shimmering through it in seams like a child's painting of the milky way. Still, there's a beauty to the chaotic mash of colours that soaks through its landscape, and in the shelter of the forests of towering funghi that dot its surface, the Void can go unseen by its visitors.

The temperature seems mild, suitable for the provided clothing, and if there are weather patterns around the world they've taken the day off. The funghi are sturdy enough that what air flow there is doesn't disturb their stalks, and carved grooves and holds in some of the larger examples indicate that climbing them to sit atop their glowing crowns is eminently possible, and, in fact, encouraged.

the Endless River

The Endless River is a font of pure chaos, flowing from a multitude of small rivulets across the area to a central reservoir, from which it pours directly upwards, away from Tshering's surface and out of sight, beyond the world's atmosphere.

Anything bagged and placed within the Endless River will also flow upwards and soon be out of sight, passing, presumably, into the Void. Scattered across the surface of Tshering are small, glittering pebbles, as described in the announcement.

The stones are pleasantly cool to the touch, and all passengers need to do is feel. Messages can be in any form that the Voidtreckers wish. Perhaps words, perhaps feelings, perhaps an image from their mind into the stone. Perhaps a mixture. Once they begin their message the stone will glow slightly and continue to glow as they secure it in the bag and cast it into the river. They will feel, almost instinctively, that they need to focus as they do so, thinking of the person they wish to reach all the while.

There are plenty of bags and many more stones; passengers will not be limited in their sendings.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

That is the thinnest book Thanatos has ever seen. And it's so colorful and shiny. How is it even staying together? He needs a moment to just get past that bit technological advancement before he looks at the pictures themselves.

He's amazed at how different it all is from a single glance. Thanatos knew their worlds differed greatly. Seeing evidence of it is something else entirely. "That's..." Thanatos has seen words carved into stone, but a neon sign is completely foreign to him. "It looks closer to the world with the four seasons than my Underworld."

"Oh the big sphere thing? A little. It's far more technologically advanced than the mortal realm, which is more what I think you're working with?" She waits for him to look it over and then laughs as she flips through a few more pages to settle on one, "Gods, he does have some dorky pictures."

This page is Hades, a little awkwardly posed on one page, while the facing page has the article, written in painful white text on black background. This seems to be a theme in this magazine.

"Hmn, I wonder where your other you is..." Persephone lifts the edge of the pages to search through the pages, "Ohh I found the furies. Not what I'm looking for."

Technology like her mortal realm. Thanatos nods at Persephone's guess. It's likely. He and Zagreus don't know a lot about the various technologies on the train. Their Underworld does have some technological advancements compared to the mortals, who are just trying to survive rather than invent and now lack the shade Daedalus. However, the gap between the two isn't as large as Persephone's Underworld and theirs.

And then the page lands on a very blue figure who looks just as awkward as Thanatos felt when forced to have his portrait taken for the Feature Houseservant Board and that horrid poster in the Administration Chamber. He starts to sympathize... until he realizes the identity of the blue god. Then he's stunned.

"I... don't know what I expected. I knew he'd be different than Lord Hades, but that's... really different." How different must the Furies be then?!

"I could say he's not nearly as awkward in person, but he is a huge dork. They caught him on a bad day though. There's got to be a better picture of him in here."

It feels weird to look at Hades, to talk about him. She'd managed five months of not talking about him, of flirting with someone else and putting all her home problems behind her. Persephone held the next page with her finger, looking down at him.

"See my confusion at meeting Zagreus? Nothing like his father. Or I guess--I mean, nothing like my version of his father? Regardless--he's nothing like your Hades, from what I heard."

"Yes, the way you speak of him is unlike anything I would hear about Lord Hades." No one in their right mind would call the Hades he knows a "huge dork." He would also intimidate anyone who would dare paint a portrait of him in that manner. "But surely, your Lord Hades could have requested his portrait be painted differently. The sketch must have shown his discomfort."

He doesn't know what a photograph is yet. Somehow he had video games explained to him before the idea of a photograph and camera.

"What--Oh no, this is a photo. You take a picture with a camera and it's just a perfect snapshot of whatever you see through it. Like--tada, picture. Though if you want to have them to hold, you have to print them. That's how I have these." Persephone pulls up the folding frames, pointing out the pictures.

"See, Mom and all the kings and Hestia and Her Majesty, Hera. They're wearing a little old fashioned clothes. I'm pretty sure this was taken before I was born." She squints at it, trying to decide. Nope, don't know enough about fashion. "But that way you can have a keepsake of a moment in time. Or just a cute cat--I definitely took pictures of Retsina."

That's an amazing technology. Not even the shade of Daedalus could create something like that. (Although, Thanatos doesn't know how he feels about himself being in photographs. That would just make it easier for the House to update the Featured Houseservant board... or make more ridiculous motivational posters.)

He looks at the photograph, and he tries to match the name to the god in the photograph. Thanatos knows the one in blue is Hades now, so that is one down. The green one might be Poseidon based on having a similar color scheme. That leaves the other god to be Zeus. Purple? Really?

He has no idea which goddess is which though. There's no telling symbol of their domain. "They're all very different than the gods I'm familiar with."

"Well it would be. But you understand why I was so confused by your appearance. You're much closer to the way mortals look, in shades of brown and peach, than the gods I know. Even the nymphs come in all sort of colors at home." She gestures to the two pink nymphs she's curled beside, with their blue iridescence somehow still reflected in the still image.

"Hera and Athena are both quite striking, with their golden and silver skin. They both reflect light, almost like they're shining metal. Not that I have a picture of Athena here." She shrugs, "We come in all colors. Here--these are the Furies." She flips to the page she still has marked with her finger.

"Dusa?!" Thanatos remarks upon first glance. Could that be what she must have looked like with her full body... No. Not Dusa. The mannerism might be similar, but the color is wrong. These Furies look like gorgons with their snake hair and lack of a bat wing.

Still... how could she be a Fury? , but he then spots some text pointing out which Fury is which. "... That's Megaera?" No, she's more like Dusa. Thanatos shakes his head.

"I cannot picture her as Megaera."

"Well she is."

Persephone doesn't mean to snap, but honestly, she liked Megaera. She's kind and thoughtful, sweet. Pretty and if people didn't seen her worth, that was on them.

"Alecto, Tisiphone, Megaera." She points them each out with a little jab of her finger, "They might not look like your Furies, but they're certainly up for the job or they wouldn't be doing it. Is it that surprising that she might not look or act like yours? You certainly don't act like Thanatos."

Thanatos doesn't flinch, but he does know he's overstepped somewhere. Forgot himself.

He bows his head, casting his face more in shadow from his large Charon hat. "My apologies."

"No--no sorry." Persephone nudges him with her elbow, flopping her head on his shoulder with a little huff of a sigh.

"I argued about this a little when Zagreus and I first met and I was explaining how different he looked to how I'd imagined him. And then explained how they looked." She gestures, "And we argued about it a bit and I guess I'm just... These are the Furies. They're not as cruel as yours, I think. Alecto would never call the son of Hades names, can you even imagine? Hades would throw her out on her ear. But Meg is the one I met and the one who let me borrow an outfit to go to the mortal realm and we talked a little. She was kind."

She sighs, "I get a little tired of everything being so different. I'm sure you do too...I guess let's go for the big dumb reveal."

She flips back and forth through the pages, avoiding Minthe and finally finding him, wings spread, hair pulled up in a ridiculous bun.

"Tada. You."

Should Thanatos mention that this Megaera reminds him more of Dusa? Should he ask if she knows any gorgon heads and if they are imposing and fierce? Perhaps it's just best to drop the subject. It's bothering Persephone, and his curiosity isn't worth upsetting her over. He makes a note to choose his words more carefully.

"We're the same color," he says looking at the silvery grey of his entire body. It's similar to the color of his own hair. There. That's neutral enough and the truth. Except for the wings. Thanatos's wings are like a night's sky.

"Who's the same color?" A voice suddenly comes from behind them, and here comes Zagreus, head popping up from underneath the mushroom cap as he swings one fiery foot over the edge, singing the edge of the cap a little in the process. "Damn it," he mutters as he finally manages to scramble onto the top of the mushroom, far less elegantly than a prince is expected to do anything.

"Sorry I'm late, Sephe, I, well... I had a lot of messages to send." He sheepishly rubs at the back of his neck, not approaching just yet out of concern for burning the mushroom they're on even further with his damnable feet. (There's already a little set of fiery footprints in a line up the stalk of the mushroom, so...)

"Thanatos is." Persephone gestures to the magazine draped over their laps, which he probably cannot see from behind them, and taps the space beside her. She tucks her dress in a little so it won't singe.

"Maybe dangle your feet off the edge? Here, come sit. You missed Hades and the Furies, but we can always backtrack. Cerberus is in here as well, unsure of the his other dogs though." She's suddenly unsure about showing him the picture frames. Is it cruel to show off her as a child with her mother when he never had that? She tucks it beneath the magazine a little. Just in case.

"Come see how much more ridiculous my Thanatos looks compared to yours."

Zagreus is here. Thank gods. He can take over and leave Thanatos to his thoughts which he doesn't have to say aloud.

Like... how he doesn't think this Thanatos looks ridiculous. Like how he wonders if he's met Sisyphus. Persephone didn't know, so maybe it hasn't happened yet. Maybe Thanatos can warn him if he could give him a message. It's worth trying. Thanatos stares harder at the other Thanatos, trying to commit as much of his appearance to memory as possible.

The other Thanatos is going to have no idea what hit him....

Zagreus gets on his knees and crawls over to Persephone's other side, swinging his legs back over the edge and settling in real close to her so he can peer over her shoulder at the magazine.

"Ha! Wow, that's crazy," he says, cocking his head to the side to get a different angle. This Thanatos looks... well, handsome, but definitely not as handsome as his Thanatos. "I dunno, I think the black doesn't suit him as well as it does my Than. Maybe he should lean into the blue a little more?"

Zagreus, being the gremlin he is, spots the little bit of a photo tucked under the magazine, and slowly reaches behind Persephone to try and grab at it from the other side. Hopefully he's stealthy enough to see what it is Persephone's hiding from him!

If he manages it successfully, he'll let out a little gasp of delight upon seeing a tiny, tiny Persephone. "Oh. My. Gods!"

"I am not one to give him fashion advice. But it's a chthonic thing, I think, all that black. You all seem to adore it. And I know some look very good in it."

Persephone glances at Thanatos, who just seems to be staring at his counterpart with a...weird look. She frowns and nudges him with her shoulder, linking an arm through his to tug him back into the conversation--when Zagreus snatches up the photo she had so cleverly hidden.

Okay, it was barely covered but still! She snatches for it, missing it by a few inches and then huffs.

"Fine fine, go ahead and look. See how very small I was. Thanatos saw the one with Mom and Hera and Hestia and all the kings already."

Can't he mope and thwart a hypothetical Sisyphus's plans in peace? No? Fine....

Thanatos will not admit his slow pulse did a funny thing when Zagreus called him "my Than" again. The fluttery feeling is bad enough without admitting more. Still, he'll let himself get pulled closer by Persephone. Wait, is that? It is.

"You have proof that gods grow. So many people think all of us sprung up fully-grown like Lady Athena." It's so strange that he's heard the surprise so many times on this train.

"Oh, Sephe, you were just precious!" Zagreus is beaming, fawning over his not-mother's picture, only after a moment registering the other person present. "Is this Lady Demeter? Wow, she's lovely. Not that ours isn't, of course, but... you know what I mean. But Gods, you were so small, maybe even smaller than me when I was growing up... and yet you managed to keep your cuteness even as you grew, huh?" He'll even reach up to ruffle her hair a bit, in a teasing gesture.

The easily-distracted prince suddenly remembers something, and he pulls off the backpack he'd been carrying his jute bags in, to dig out something else - a spare notebook and a package of multicolored crayons taken from the Crafts Car. "I was going to show you, actually, but I'm not a very good artist, so... bear with me, I guess. I'll start drawing people and we can compare as we go."

He is, of course, going to start with Meg and Dusa.

Edited 2021-05-16 17:12 (UTC)

"Well, like Than said, I wasn't born fully formed, like Athena or Aphrodite."

Persephone doesn't exactly hiss but there is some hand batting at the hair ruffling. She smooths her hair back down with exaggerated dignity, like a bird whose feathers have been ruffled, and then flips back through the book to Hades. She finds a slightly better picture of him for Zagreus, more dignified at least.

She does not get the picture she had prepared for. She tilts her head and doesn't bother to hide her amused smile.

"That's adorable. Okay, I understand the confusion. At least they're both cool colors? The Megaeras, I mean. Hold on, let me find their page again..." She holds a finger to keep her place, paging through the rest.

Zagreus ruffles hair like everyone is Cerberus. While Thanatos still doesn't know how he feels about it, he knows that it's just Zagreus being Zagreus.

"When... I was surprised about Megaera, it was because she reminded me of Dusa," Thanatos admits quietly, not wanting to step on what set her off earlier. He glances a Persephone for a moment before returning his attention to Zagreus's drawing. "They're friends, from what I've seen in passing."

He still wouldn't call Megaera a sweetheart, but she's a good, respected colleague of his. (... Are they actually friends...?) Thanatos doesn't think badly about her and knows her job isn't easy, especially with the added responsibility of trying to stop Zagreus. Dusa... well, he doesn't really interact with her and only occasionally sees her. Most of his opinion of the gorgon head comes secondhand from his mother and then Megaera.

Look, Persephone deserves a hair ruffle in Zagreus' estimation! It is one of the primary ways he displays his affection!

Zagreus' eyes widen upon seeing Persephone's version of Megaera, and he forgets about the baby picture for now, though he still is holding onto it in his lap. "Oh woah! She's not at all like our Meg!" Zag motions at Thanatos in a sort of 'are you even seeing this' gesture, before leaning back in over the magazine to get a better look. "She's kinda cute, actually! Cute like the way Dusa is." He holds up the picture he'd drawn of Dusa. "You know I confessed to her at one point? But Dusa rejected me, kindly, and we promised to remain the best of friends while she works on her career as the main servant of the House. And yeah, Megaera and Dusa are great friends. I can hear them gossiping in the lounge sometimes, though I can never hear exactly about what."

He looks back at Thanatos, then, explaining to him, "Meg was just as upset as I was when your mother temporarily fired Dusa from her job at the House. And I think she was just as happy too when Dusa returned."

The prince glances down at his pictures of Meg and Dusa again, looking back over at Persephone's Megaera. "I can definitely see where the confusion would lie. Hmm, all right, who should I draw now? Do you have an idea of who you want to see next, Sephe?"

"I told you she's adorable." Persephone is firm on this, looking between the two men beside her and rolling her eyes.

"Meg looks like your Meg and Dusa squished together, I get it, I do--but we have actual gorgons! They're...somewhere in here. I know I saw a few when I was down there." She frowns at the magazine, then pauses, about to say something. And then Zag casually drops a whole story in their lap, like you do, just here you go, confessed to that cute gorgon. No big? Persephone hesitates. Okay maybe Zag really isn't into Thanatos? Or maybe he is now? Or--or something. She bites her thumbnail, glancing at Thanatos.

"Um--what? Oh--Oh! Uhhh--I have Hades in here--Zeus and and the kings in the pictures. And Mom." And then she gets into the idea of seeing more, "Oh--what do I look like?"

Thanatos looks at Zagreus like snakes have grown from his hair. Zagreus had been in love with Dusa and confessed to her? Then... has Thanatos been trying to analyze for something that isn't there? If he was supposed to see something more in Zagreus's gestures and words, wouldn't he know because Zagreus would be obvious and say something?

That's the answer, isn't it? Thanatos may not have been able to figure out his own feelings, but learning of Zagreus's lack of them brings the same results. He doesn't have to worry about this anymore.

But Thanatos steels his expression again as Zagreus turns to look at him and drops another new bit of information. Mother Nyx had fired Dusa? There must have been a good reason for it, but... just how much more has happened? First, Zagreus defeated his father multiple times (though Thanatos still doesn't know how many). He has Mort, reunited Achilles and Patroclus, changed Sisyphus's sentence... Has he fulfilled that Minor List of Prophecies? Somehow managed to get the Minotaur's autograph for Hypnos? Completed his mentor's codex? Made right by Megaera? Met the famed Resource Director? Taught Tisiphone to talk? Managed to make Charon give a discount he won't even do for family?

"... No, I don't know anything about that," Thanatos says trying to mask the surge of hurt and being unintentionally left behind again. He looks out at all the other mushrooms and the river. "I'm from the past, remember?"

Thanatos hasn't been a part of that life yet. Maybe he won't ever.

The Endless River

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