Hades (17 page)

Doc sighed. “It can make him hard to
understand, too, though. That’s not always good. You can go now and
I’ll see you in the surveillance room later.”

Cher nodded as she headed out the room. Doc
wondered how long before Darius’s mate came to her. Cher and Sierra
had both gotten with child the first time or two they had had sex
with their mate. It was that aggressive sperm combining with a
compatible egg. It made her wonder if she might be pregnant
already. She would wait until she saw signs before she checked. Why
worry about it when there was so much to worry about already? She
looked around her lab at all the equipment available to her that
the average person didn’t have. She had some things the average
doctor and even researcher didn’t have either. She hoped it would
help her to get some answers soon.

She cleaned up the room then went in the lab
to check on tests she had running on some samples. She wanted to do
some research but there just wasn’t enough time before the
interview Zeus had scheduled. She decided to put everything away
which took less than five minutes before heading to the meeting
early. She finished and closed the door behind her as she stepped
out into the hall. She’d bet Cher was already there waiting for the
rest of them.

Hermes and Cher sat in front of the security
screens. He was sitting in the middle chair with her in his lap. It
made Doc feel like she was interrupting something even if they both
acted glad to see her. They looked at the screen, the reporter had
been late the first time she interviewed Zeus but now she was
early. She was kind of pretty, with reddish blonde hair and brown
eyes.

“She represents World Matters Magazine and
she’s their ace reporter. She can be a vicious bitch when she
senses a secret. I’m not sure Sierra should watch this, I heard she
was quite taken with Zeus last time she was here,” Cher said.

“I didn’t hear anything about it,” Doc
replied.

“That’s cause you’re always in medical,”
Hermes observed. He didn’t make it an accusation, to him it was
just a fact.

Doc noticed the reporter was attempting to
flirt but Zeus was being cool. It still didn’t seem to prevent the
girl, who had identified herself to Hades, who guarded the door, as
Janice, from fluttering her eyelashes at Zeus. Doc had to admit
that if she did that to Hades she might knock her teeth out. It was
good that Sierra wasn’t there yet or bad things would probably
happen. Uh, oh. Sierra walked in getting herself a cup of coffee
and a donut.

“I miss anything?”

“Not really, the interview hasn’t started
yet,” Doc said. It started right then and the girl changed into a
consummate professional right in front of her eyes.

“
Hello, Zeus. I hope you remember me from
our interview in October? I’m sure everyone remembers you.”

“
Yes, Janice, I remember you,” Zeus said
with a friendly smile.

“
I hear congratulations are in
order.”

“
Yes, I am the luckiest man in the world.
I now have a wife named Sierra.”

“
You’re not the only god to tie the knot,
are you?”

“
No, Hermes’s wife is named Cherish. We
also have a few couples that haven’t taken the plunge yet.”

“
Must be something in the water,” Janice
said snidely.

“
I prefer to think love is in the air,”
Zeus countered.

“
I guess this would be the perfect time to
mention your New Year’s Eve Ball. I was at the Halloween Ball and
it was very exciting. Did anything permanent come of it?”

“
Yes, Darius met his fiancée, Gypsy. They
are very happy together.”

“
Is it true she’s a kindergarten teacher?
Any little gods on the way?”

“
As far as I know, they don’t have any
children on the way. I’m not even sure they are planning to have
any right away.”

“
I’ve heard you have Gemma Dennis assigned
here. She’s an expert geneticist. Any particular reason she’s
here?”

“
When the military freed us, she was with
the unit they sent in and she is still assigned here simply as a
medical doctor. While I have also heard she is a geneticist, we
have only used her as a general medical practitioner.”

“
I would love to interview her
sometime.”

“
You’ll have to ask her, she doesn’t work
for me.”

“
Looks like our time is almost up. Once
again we made a sizable donation to charity for this interview. I’m
Janice and this is Zeus saying goodbye from Olympus.”

“Damn it, Janice! You got off topic and ran
out of time. These are just mini interviews, you have to watch the
clock,” a short female who was clearly upset, said. Janice just
ignored her.

“Where is Gemma hiding?” Janice asked
Zeus.

“If you’ve met Gemma, you would know she
never hides.”

“Maybe next time, I can interview her? People
are concerned for you and your men. Gemma can set their minds at
ease.”

“Again, all I can tell you is she doesn’t
work for me. I have no control over her.”

“Alright, I can see you’re sticking to that
story. Let us know how the ticket sales go. We like to keep our
viewers current since some of them came to the Halloween Ball. I
hope I’ll get a ticket next time, too.” She looked at Zeus
hopefully.

Zeus didn’t answer. The female was starting
to get on his nerves and he might ask for another reporter or go to
another magazine next time. It was something to think about. He was
happy it was time for her to leave. He suspected she had been
searching for more of a story than a big party hosted by gods would
be. He had no intention of giving it to her. Relieved to be done
with the interview and the reporter, he was ready to search for his
mate and carry her to their room.

Doc, Cher, Hermes, and Sierra watched the
monitor all picking up to various extents on Zeus disgust with the
reporter. She had tried to hint that something unseemly was going
on with no proof whatsoever. It was unprofessional, but not really
a surprise. Hopefully she wouldn’t return.

Doc wasn’t surprised that reporters wanted to
talk to her. She received calls and emails from them all the time.
She had even gotten them before she was at Olympus because she
worked on military projects that were classified. Tell someone it’s
a secret and everyone wants to know what it is. How they managed to
get her number or even more surprisingly her email address, had
stunned her when it first started to happen. Now she knew that
little could stop a dedicated and ruthless reporter once they
scented a story. It was lucky for all of them that the inhospitable
conditions around Olympus were one of those few things that could
and to some extent had, stopped the media circus from coming to
town.

“Ares and his males just arrived. He has
asked for medical help, he has two wounded,” Hermes said.

Must not be too bad, he had said it like one
might say
pass the salt
. Doc headed toward medical where
Nioma was waiting to help. They would each take a patient to get
them dealt with quicker and hopefully on their way to their own
quarters. When patients stayed overnight, someone had to stay with
them. She wanted to be with her mate but it wouldn’t be fair to
stick Nioma with all the overnight care.

Ares escorted two of his males in and he
looked disgusted. “Fix them up, Doc, so I can get to their
punishment.”

“What happened to them?”

“This one,” Ares said pointing to the one
with black hair and blue eyes, “decided it was a good idea to fill
this one’s bed with fish while he was in it,” he added pointing to
the blond Adonis next to him.

“How did that cause them injuries?” Doc
asked.

“It didn’t, it was the fight that ensued
between them over one’s lack of a sense of humor and the other’s
ill advised choice of a joke.”

“Alright, so what do we have here?”

“I’m Aaron. Zotikos’s hard head messed up the
knuckles on my fist,” he flirted outrageously with her and Nioma
making it obvious he just wanted attention and didn’t care which
female he got it from. Nioma took him over to one of the chairs so
she could examine his hand.

“I’m Zotikos but you can call me Zot. I have
a bump on my head but it doesn’t bother me. I also have a messed up
finger. A fish’s fin was rammed up under the nail. It looks worse
than it is.”

“Okay, Zot, let’s get you over here where you
can sit down so I can examine your head and your hand.”

“Overgrown boys, that’s what I’m saddled
with. I’ll leave them to you, Doc. You two better behave or I’ll
knock your heads together this time,” Ares growled as he headed out
the door.

“When did this happen?” Doc asked.

“Two days ago, our last day on that shitty
boat,” Zot replied.

“Why did you bother with a practical joke
when you were almost home?” Nioma asked.

“He’s been pranking us all the way home. He’s
lucky Ares didn’t kill him, I’m sure he wanted to,” Zot shared.

“It took me some time to get enough fish
together. We only had small nets, they only held one or two fish at
a time.”

“Did it ever occur to you that you could have
found a better use of your time than torturing your fellow gods?”
Doc asked.

“There couldn’t possibly be a better use.”
Aaron smirked and winked. “Unless it required spending time with
lovely ladies like the two of you.”

“You two may go to your rooms now. None of
your injuries are serious if you just take it easy until they have
time to heal.” She gave them each a serious look. “It’s time for
lunch now so we’ll follow you out.”

Once they were all out, Doc closed the door.
She and Nioma watched the two gods walk away. “What did you think
of them?” Doc asked.

“I like Aaron a lot, but I wish I didn’t.
That god is trouble with a capital T.” Doc nodded in agreement, but
all the gods had trouble as their middle name.

“That wasn’t really what I meant. With their
healing at twice the speed of us regular humans or better in some
gods, I’m surprised they weren’t healed by now or at least enough
not to be concerned about the injuries.”

“Okay, I think you’re getting spoiled by not
having many patients because you would rather do research. The
injuries were probably much worse two days ago and are well on
their way to healing now. Why don’t we get out of here so you can
hunt down that sexy mate of yours?”

“You don’t have to tell me twice.” Doc headed
out with Nioma on her heels.

Hades sat at the table watching her approach.
She saw that he had already gotten her plate for her so she and
Nioma went in opposite directions. Doc went to sit by her mate as
Nioma went to stand in line behind Aaron.

“What’s up with those two?” Hades asked.
Their chemistry was obvious even to the most oblivious of the gods.
Maybe they were just learning to pick up on it now that mating was
becoming common.

“What you see, is what you get. I would guess
that they are mates, but it could just be lust. When they know,
we’ll know.” Hades nodded, he had enough problems of his own since
he struggled not to anger his mate with his comments or actions.
Gods in general didn’t understand females and she suspected he in
particular was one of the most clueless. It didn’t matter, though
because she loved him.

“Zeus still having that meeting after lunch?”
Doc asked.

“Yes, I have a bad feeling that you and I
won’t like what he has to say.”

“Why would you think that?”

“He’s already as much as admitted it to me
and apologized for what he’s going to ask of us.”

“Another mission?”

“I fear that will be the case.”

“Maybe we could run and hide?”

“If we were any place but here, maybe,” Hades
said with a smile. “At least we’ll be together and loving that part
of it.”

“The together part, but so far none of those
missions has been a load of laughs.”

They started eating, there was nothing left
to say until the meeting where they would find out for sure what
Zeus wanted from them. She picked at her food, her mind back in the
past. She thought back to when she had first seen Hades. He had
growled at her through the bars of his cage. He had looked as
abused as anyone she had ever seen without body parts missing or
fatal injuries. Starved, covered with small wounds, and one step
away from death, she had feared she would fail him, fail all the
gods in his cage that were so monstrously abused. She had
incorrectly thought he felt threatened by her, but he had been
attractive to her even in his horrible condition.
Clean him up
so I can kiss him!
What a thought for a doctor to have, yet she
had thought exactly that.

It hadn’t taken her long to realize hurting
her wasn’t what he had in mind. She felt connected to him in a way
that scared her but she also sensed he was meant for her, would
never mistreat her or cheat on her. He would never be like her dad,
once he mated, there would be no other for him. They had connected
on the most basic possible level, but the bitterness her mother
even now felt for her dad had rooted itself so deep inside her it
tainted her nearly as much as it tainted her mom.

The view her mother had imparted to her about
males, all males, had almost cost her Hades, her soul mate. He had
wooed her slowly, sensing her confusion about how she felt about
him. That hateful bitch Dee had been jealous, wanting a god in
general and Hades in particular for herself. She hadn’t gotten him,
but she had almost ruined the relationship that Doc and Hades had
started to build, forever. Her fear and her distrust of men had
made it so easy to do.

Maybe her dad hadn’t been what she had
thought, maybe he had just never found his soul mate because he had
never known one was out there. Most humans believed soul mates a
romantic myth. Maybe gods weren’t the only ones who had one of the
opposite sex that was meant for them and them alone. The mating
call that the gods felt was overwhelming to them once they met
their match, it was something she was sure could be predicted if
she researched it more.