Daylight
The two had been looking at each other for an amount of time that some would call concerning, Enid would call them the best 2 minutes of her life.
The moment was straight out of a romance novel, The sun was setting covering the world in a pastel orange hue.
The birds were singing a song that felt like it was meant for them.
(What the birds were actually saying)
“HEY! HEY YOU, RED BIRD!”
“WHAT DO YOU WANT YELLOW BIRD?”
“YOU SEE THIS TREE?”
“YEAH!”
“IT’S MY TREE!”
“YOU CAN’T JUST SAY THAT’S YOUR TREE!”
“WELL, I JUST DID!”
“ WELL GUESS WHAT”
“WHAT?”
“YOU KNOW YOUR GIRLFRIEND?”
“YEAH?”
“WELL HER ASS WAS MINE LAST NIGHT!”
“WHA-”
“YEAH!”
“HOW COULD YOU DO THIS TO ME?”
“HAHA SUCK IT!”
(back to romance)
Suddenly the bird song started to sound more violent than romantic which caused the two to snap out of their trance.
The two just looked down and laughed sheepishly.
Luckily, once Enid saw the setting sun she remembered that they both had somewhere to be, “Oh shit, we need to go right now.”
“Wha-”
“We need to go meet the others and we’re running late so hold on tight.”
Before Wednesday could get another word out the goddess had wrapped her arms around the brunette and teleported them.
The experience was just as awful as the last two times Enid had contorted their bodies through time and space.
But it was better than walking so who was Wednesday to judge?
When she opened her eyes, she quickly realized she was in another void. This one wasn’t much like Enid’s, it was completely golden and had large stone pillars in every corner the ceiling looked like the sky but it looked too perfect to be real. Finally, at the far end of the room, she saw them.
The ones who had forsaken her people and left them to rot in a hole, while they lived in luxury.
The gods, at least a few of them. She recognized most of them from their statues and their descriptions in books.
There was Yoko the goddess of health, and her wife Divina the goddess of knowledge, standing next to each other hand-in-hand.
Next to them was Ajax, the god of loyalty, to his right was Xavier the god of poetry and finally there was….
Well, honestly Wednesday forgot his name.
The other one is the god of the sun.
Of course, each god has more than one domain that the lord over. She’s also seen Ajax be called the god of friendship and the other one is also the god of prophecies.
In the back of her mind, Wednesday always wondered what her domains would be if she were a god. It was always a silly little fantasy of hers.
She was ripped from her thoughts once she felt Enid's hand on her shoulder, “It’ll be alright, they just want to meet you.”
They slowly started walking toward the group, their footsteps echoing off the golden walls. With each step, Wednesday could feel her heart trying to crawl its way up her throat.
It wanted her to scream at them, to ask them why they had let her family suffer for so long. It wanted her to claw at them and strip away their skin, to see what was underneath their physically flawless exteriors.
She wanted to see if there was a heart under all of their facades.
When they were about halfway to the group Ajax lifted his head and saw them coming. The others followed his gaze and saw the two of them approaching.
Then Ajax started running at them, and the brunette froze,
then she was in the air.
“A little Addams! We haven’t seen one of you in so long!”
The maniac was throwing her in the air like a rag doll.
“AJAX, PUT HER DOWN SHE'S FRAGILE!”
She heard someone scream.
When she was caught again she was being held up to be at eye level with Yoko, “Hello little Addams, it’s very nice to meet you.”
“Babe I want to hold her!”
“She’s not a doll Di.”
“But everyone else got to do it.”
That was her last word of warning before she was yanked into a different pair of arms, “Oh she looks just like Aggy!”Divina yelled,
And then another pair “No she looks like Chris! She has his chin!”
“Xavier you’re crazy, she looks like Jackson she has his eyebrows.”
“I don’t think eyebrows are completely genetic Ajax.”
“Shut up Xavier you don’t know shit.”
“CAN YOU ALL PLEASE STOP HOLDING MY WIFE LIKE SHE’S A CAT IN AIR JAIL?”
Finally, she was done being passed around.
Ajax set her down on the floor and Enid quickly came to check up on her, “Are you alright honey? They didn’t give you any bruises, right?”
She cupped Enid’s face gently “I’m fine cara mia, do not worry.”
The blond blushed slightly before nodding.
Wednesday finally got a good look at the gods, they were just like her books described, flawless. In everything but soul.
“Who were those people you were comparing me to?”
She asked,
They all looked at each other before Yoko decided to answer, “Your ancestors, our old blessed.”
She should be angry, she should be furious about being compared to these people. The people these gods supposedly cared enough about to remember years later, but couldn’t care enough to help their families when everything happened. But all that could come out of her mouth was, “Do I really look like them?”
All of them started smiling and nodding, one by one they told her stories of her ancestors “Aggy was so smart,” Divina bragged “She knew every plant’s scientific name off the top of her head.”
“Chris was an amazing author, his horror stories were band from several different villages. Did you want to read them?” Xavier asked,
“Jackson was a very loyal man, he stood his ground against an entire army to protect his town. Did you want to see the picture? I commissioned an artist to paint it.”
Before she could answer Ajax had already teleported to get the picture.
“You look like one of mine too,” mentioned Yoko “She was one hell of a doctor, stubborn as hell though.”
It was overwhelming to be compared to all of these people.
And confusing, the gods clearly cared about her family, so why did they leave them?
She felt her heart crawling up her throat again.
She felt like she wasn’t in her own body anymore like she was just a restless spirit watching everyone interacting with each other. She watched them all fight over which one of her ancestors was the best and why, they were speaking so casually and fondly of them that they sounded more like storybook characters than people.
They described them with such detail that she could almost see their faces out of the corner of her eye. But behind them, she could also see all the faces that remained nameless. All of the forgotten Addams that did receive a blessing, the ones that died sick, cold, afraid, tired.
She could hear their screams, the noise was overwhelming.
They begged her to ask why. Why they were left for dead, left to be treated like animals, left to be slaughtered?
She knows there’s only one way to make it stop.
“Why did you leave us?”
The conversation the others were having dies out abruptly.
She didn’t have to clarify, they all clearly knew what she was talking about.
They all kept looking at each other expecting someone else to say something, but nobody did.
“Honey,” Enid whispered softly “Do you want us to step out for a minute?”
She shook her head violently “NO, I don’t want to ‘step out’ I want answers. Why did you leave us?”
Once again her question was met with silence.
“One of you please,” she pleaded with them, her voice cracking with years of pent-up emotions, “Please answer me.”
She was met with silence for a third time.
Wednesday turned to tell Enid to take them home but one of the Gods reached out and teleported them suddenly.
The lack of mental preparation made the nausea worse than usual and she fell to her knees when they got to their destination.
The floor was cold and moist stone, they were in a cave.
“I’m so sorry, but I had to find a way to get you here.”
Wednesday looked up to see the sun god standing over her, with a distressed look on his face.
“We can’t say anything, but you need to know the truth. You deserve it after all.”
She stands up, her legs still shaking from the sudden teleportation.
“Where are we? Why are we here?”
The sun god holds his hand out creating a small light that illuminates the cave, the walls are covered in old drawings and writing in a language long forgotten.
“We’re here to see my oracle.”
At that moment she finally remembers the god’s name, Tyler.
Can you truly blame her for forgetting it though? In a group with names like Yoko and Ajax a name like Tyler doesn’t exactly stick to her memory.
All she can really think to do is keep asking questions, “Why do you want me to speak to your oracle?”
Instead of answering he points to a long staircase leading up to a ledge in the cave, “I can’t say anything else, trust me I would if I could. Ask her your question, ask as many as you want. It’s the least I could do.”
With one more sad look he hands her the small ball of light and teleports away.
In any other situation, she would probably hesitate at least slightly before making her way up those stairs, but he had just promised her an answer even her own ‘wife’ couldn’t give her.
She started her way up the stairs slowly, they were covered in mildew and water that had dripped from the ceiling of the cave. With each step, she could feel her feet slipping slightly.
When she reached the top she saw the ruins of a temple. Her books spoke of the oracle many times but only in passing. She didn’t know what to expect from this encounter.
“Hey girly, what ya doing?”
“I’m waiting for the oracle to show up.”
Wait, shit
Wednesday turned around and came face to face with the oracle. She was taller than Wednesday, by a lot, if Wednesday had to guess she would say the oracle was about 6’2 (that’s 1.88 meters for my readers who use the metric system) and had long black hair. But her eyes were the most interesting thing about her, they were a pale green-gray color.
“Could you please stop looking at my eyes like that girly?”
“I-i’m so sorry.”
“It’s alright, now what can I, the great and powerful all-knowing Oracle, answer for you.”
“I want to know why the gods abandoned my family.”
The oracle looked at her sadly, “I knew that’s what you were going to ask but I was really hoping you wouldn’t.”
The oracle closed her eyes for a moment and then they burst open again with a flash of sea-green light.
The light that came from her eyes started projecting different images onto the stone wall of the cave.
A ruin, a pit, a family running, a village on fire, and finally her wife,
Enid.
The projection showed a younger-looking Enid playing with some other kids in front of a dirt hut.
“Long ago Enid was a human much like yourself.” The oracle spoke.
“She was the youngest and the only girl out of her siblings, her father loved her very much.”
Suddenly the projection changed and showed Enid fighting with an older woman, shielding one of the other children from her.
“But her mother, she was a terrible woman. Her anger consumed her from the inside out, like mold and she took out that anger on her children. Enid would try to keep her siblings from this but that only angered her mother further.”
Wednesday watched the projection in amazement, wondering what it had to do with her family but not daring to interrupt the oracle.
“Enid’s father, while a loving and caring father, was a coward who never stood up for his children.
One night raiders invaded the village and destroyed everything.”
The projection changed again showing a burning village and people running and screaming.
“While trying to escape, Enid tripped on a root and fell, twisting her foot. Her father stopped to help her but her mother forced him to leave her there. Without the torches her family was carrying she was left in the woods in darkness.”
The image changed, showing Enid in the forest struggling to stand up.
“The poor girl made so much noise trying to stand that she attracted the attention of a pack of wolves, she fought them off with sticks, rocks, mud, and anything she could get her hands on. But it proved futile.”
The image changed and it showed Enid's corpse getting eaten by wolves, Wednesday put her hand over her mouth trying to hold in her vomit.
“But she was given another chance, you see gods were all once human. But when a different god took interest in them, they handed over their powers and their titles.”
The projection showed a flash of light, then a woman appeared scaring off the wolves. She picked up Enid’s body and put her hand on Enid’s head. A stream of light started to make its way from the woman’s body to Enid’s.
The wounds on Enid’s body started to heal and she slowly opened her eyes.
“The gods will transfer small portions of their power to their successors at a time, this lets the god train the new god and lets the new god get used to their abilities.”
Now the projection showed flashes of different images of Enid training with her new abilities and then showed the other woman fading away and Enid crying.
“B-but what does that have to do with-”
“I’m getting there, please no interruptions.”
The next projection was of Enid and Ajax with Yoko and Divina on what seemed like a date. Then it was Yoko and Divina at a wedding and then it flashed to Enid and Ajax fighting.
“Enid developed a fear of death, having already died once you can probably imagine why. But her friends and her boyfriend helped her deal with the idea that she would have to give up her position one day. But then she learned,”
The oracle’s voice started cracking,
“She learned that if two gods fell in love and got married in a ceremony that bound their souls when they gave up their powers they wouldn’t die and they would retain their immortality.”
“How does that work?”
Suddenly the lights in the oracle’s eyes turned off and her voice went back to normal.
“The king god is a bit of a softy, he doesn’t like separating couples. He didn’t like the idea of one god fading earlier than their partner the added immortality is just like a bonus for finding true love or whatever. It’s like dollar store immortality, you live until you get murdered or a rock falls on you or something.”
“Dollar store?”
“Oh those aren’t around yet but you’ll love em. Anyways back to the important stuff.”
Her eyes lit back up and her voice dropped again, “After she found out about the immortality perk she came to me, she asked me if her relationship with Ajax was enough. And I told her the truth.”
The projection showed a clearly distressed Enid crying in front of the oracle.
“I told her that the only way to get what she wanted was to be with you.”
“But I’m not a god,” Wednesday said confused.
“You have to promise to forgive me for what happened next tiny Addams, please?”
The oracle looked like she was going to burst into tears.
“What did you do?”
“I am the oracle, I must tell people the answers to all their questions. Especially the gods.”
“I understand that, please tell me what you did.”
At this point, the oracle was in tears, “The only reality I saw where you became a god, was this one.”
"So what you're saying is-"
"Enid blackmailed the other gods to stop blessing your family, that was the only way to get this outcome."