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CHAPTER 8
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𝐉𝐀𝐍𝐔𝐀𝐑𝐘 𝟐𝟓𝐓𝐇 𝟐𝟎𝐗𝐗:
It's a new day... yay.
I internally sigh, the memories of yesterday's argument flowing through my mind.
I can't believe Capricorn actually blames Aquarius for Hell blowing up. And I can't believe Aquarius sent Capricorn to the breaking point... I guess people aren't always as they seem.
"You okay?" Scorpio asks, hand resting on my shoulder.
"Yeah, fine," I answer, a bit too quick.
"Is it yesterday that's bothering you?" He guesses.
"Yep. And the day before that, and the day before that... for a couple of days," I admit.
Scorpio raises his hand to rest on top of my head, "Cheer up. Training's today. Hopefully, it'll take your mind off it," He ruffles my hair, before walking past me.
He catches Aquarius leaving Leo's room and joins her.
Gods, aren't they awfully close? I remember two weeks ago when they were at each other's necks.
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FLASHBACK:
"Stop touching her leg!" He yells.
"I need to put on the damn ointment!" She yells back.
"You're hurting her!"
"Oh, did I hurt her as much as you did when you stomped on her feet with your torture shoes? Yeah, exactly,"
"I didn't even answer!"
"Your face says it all!"
"Um... guys-"
"SHUT UP!"
"SHUT UP!"
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"Okay now, why the fuck would you have porridge with water?" Aquarius asks in utter disbelief.
"Because it's good?" Scorpio answers, more like a question.
"You're already a water sign! Do you need to have porridge with everything?"
"Your name literally means 'water', does it not? Yeah, exactly,"
"Don't steal my thing!"
"People don't own 'things', you masochist,"
"What do I being a masochist have to do with anything? You sadist,"
"So you admit you're a masochist,"
"What is even the difference between masochism and sadism?" I ask, clearly confused.
Aquarius answers, "Masochism is defined as sexual enjoyment derived from suffering, while sadism is the inflicting of physical or psychological pain upon another person for the purpose of achieving sexual excitement,"
"Okay, Miss Google," Scorpio rolls his eyes.
"Okay, Miss Sadist. What do you want me to do, make you moan by stabbing you multiple times?"
"Nah, put some effort and seduce me into it,"
"Okay," Aquarius grabs the small knife from her arsenal and pins Scorpio on the bed with one hand, aiming the knife close to his neck.
"Gods, get a room!" I grab a pillow, hitting them with it mercilessly.
END OF FLASHBACK:
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Those were some unforgettable times. I wonder what happened to them that made them so close? And it's not just them, either. It's those two, and Gemini and Libra, even Sag and Aries! Why can't I have one?
I shrug it off, leaning more against the sofa as I feel a weight next to me.
I turn my head and see Virgo, who places her head on my lap, "I don't want to train,"
"Come on, it'll be fun!" I try to cheer her up, which is clearly failing, "I'm sure it'll only be for today,"
"Yeah, today, and every month for the next few hundred years," She moans, "What do we even need it for?"
"No clue, but on a completely unrelated subject, your gear looks cool," I compliment, trying to stray away from the current topic.
Virgo pulls the strap on her shoulder, completely bothered, "Yeah, I guess... though yours is also cool,"
"Thanks!"
Aries walks into the living room, Sag following. They sit down on the single sofa, the sofa somehow managing to fit two grown-ass men on it, "Hey,"
"Hey, did you solve your issues with Leo?" Virgo asks, still not getting up from my lap. Not that I mind, though.
"Maybe..." Sagittarius answers, dragging out the 'e'.
As if in queue, Leo and Aquarius enter, lifting Virgo's legs so that they can sit next to me.
"Aquarius, can you please ask Aries if he can pass the tissues," Leo requests.
"You're still doing this?" Aqua asks, earning a nod from Leo, "Fine... Aries, pass the tissues,"
Aries rolls his eyes, "Aquarius, can you call Leo so that she can get her own tissues? I'm not her slave,"
"Leo, get your own tissues,"
"Oh, I have some!" I put my hand in my pocket, grabbed a tissue packet, and handed it over to Leo.
She gratefully accepts the tissues, "Thank you Cancer. At least someone is being helpful," She gives a mean side-glance to the two men.
"I'm glad someone found another slave to give them tissues," Aries once again rolls his eyes.
"Ladies, ladies. You're both beautiful," Virgo finally gets up, finding herself sitting on Aquarius's lap. "Guys, just say you're sorry and we can just end this,"
I rest my head on Leo's shoulder, "Yeah. All this fighting for nothing,"
"Guys, you don't understand," Leo argues, "What they said was sexist,"
"It seems to affect you more than it affects me," Aquarius admits, "And they said it about me,"
"Well, yeah, that's because you haven't been oppressed as a woman before," She claims.
"And you have?" I ask her.
"Well- yeah. But that's not the point! The point is that what they said was wrong, and they haven't apologised,"
"Maybe because someone won't explain to them what they did wrong. Maybe if they knew, they'd understand and apologise," Virgo suggests.
I get up from my seat, not wanting to be an intruder, "I'll leave you to it. Come on, Virgo,"
She follows suit, walking beside me as we leave the living room, and letting the four Zodiacs talk it out.
We head off to the gardens. It's a beautiful place. Green grass that will never go stale, beautiful flowers that will never wither and die, a clear, blue sky, and a white swing, a personal favourite of mine.
This time, however, we see someone laying down on the swing, knee up and arm covering his face.
He lifts his arm, a warm smile on his face when he sees us, "Hey, guys," He greets, as he gets up and sits on one side.
"Hi Pisces," I greet back, sitting down next to him.
Virgo sits down next to me, and she kicks her feet, moving the swing slowly and steadily. Once we make it back down, we all kick out feet on the ground, sending us up again.
"It's a nice day today," Pisces says, looking up at the sky.
"It's always a nice day. Cold, warm, raining. I don't know how they do it," Virgo agrees.
"I guess it's a way to leave our suffering behind and enjoy our lives here. I'm sure the Gods wouldn't have picked us to be the new Zodiacs if we weren't willing and good people," I add on.
"Yeah, I agree. But these past few days were rough. I'm glad there's some peace in me," Pisces relaxes into the swing more, "You don't get to be this old and not find inner peace,"
"Tell that to the two flaming hot Cheetos in the living room," I roll my eyes playfully.
"Long ago, the Zodiac signs lived together in harmony. Then, everything changed when the fire signs attacked," Virgo blabbers on, rebranding the Avatar introduction.
"Haha, yeah. Not just the fire signs, though. Aqua and Cap had an argument yesterday. It got really heated," Pisces reminds.
"Oh, I wasn't present at the time. What did they say?" Virgo asks.
"They said-" A loud sound of a horn interrupts me, a sign telling us to go to the portal outside.
We three get up from the swing, heading back inside the manor. We jog upstairs, walk across the long corridor and jog downstairs. Pisces sits on the rail sideways and slides down, earning a chuckle from Virgo and me.
We could have not gone upstairs, but this way was somehow quicker, based on the experiences from the past few weeks where I came from the gardens to outside.
Pisces takes the lead, opening the large double doors and we walk past it, meeting up with a few of the Zodiacs. We walk down the steps, instantly noticing the large white portal in front of us.
The doors open again, and we see Capricorn and Taurus walk out. I see Capricorn send glares past me, I turn around to see Aquarius with her hand on her hip, rolling her eyes and muttering something to Leo.
"Ugh, this is still going on?" Taurus asks, clearly bothered, "No point fighting about the past. Just move on with your lives, man,"
"It's not about you, don't get involved," Capricorn snaps.
"It is. It's about all of us. You need to face the facts, Cap," She retorts.
"Don't call me 'Cap'. We're not friends,"
"I never asked if I wanted to be your friend, now did I? So just shut your mouth," Taurus glares back.
"Guys," I interrupt, breaking off this argument, "Please, not another one,"
"I didn't start it," Taurus raises her hands in defence.
"You did. You need to know when to speak and when to shut the fuck up," Capricorn argues.
"Holy fuck, how did we get here?" Sagittarius asks, "Wasn't yesterday enough for you guys?"
"Clearly not by the looks of someone," Aquarius mutters to herself, purposely trying to make it loud so that people could hear.
Capricorn turns his head and glares at Aquarius, "What did you say? Don't think I didn't hear you,"
"If you did hear, then why did you ask what she said?" Leo asks in defence of her friend.
"YO MAGGOTS!" We all turn our heads to the front, seeing Uranus and Neptune standing right in front of the portal, "Stop arguing like little brats and get inside the damn thing," Uranus orders.
We all get in one by one, Aquarius and Pisces both earning a smack at the back of their heads by their brothers. Capricorn laughs and points rudely at Aquarius, before earning his own smack from Uranus.
"How's the gay life, brother?" Aquarius asks, hands behind her back as she smirks uncontrollably.
"Not bad," He answers.
Pisces turns to Neptune, "How's the bi life, brother?"
"Shut up," He rolls his eyes, "How's your wife?"
"Ooooooh my Gods he went there," Uranus closes his mouth and chuckles.
What are they talking about? Does Pisces have a wife? How come we haven't heard of it?
I was so focused on that that I didn't even realise that we'd finally gone past the portal, the unfamiliar setting intriguing me.
"Oi, huddle up," We circle the two Guardians, "Usually, Ares would be training you guys for the first a hundred years or so. But because of the recent events, you little shits are getting the easy way out for now," Uranus looks over to Neptune, who gives a nod, "The first test is speed. As you can see, this arena has been altered while I've been talking, so-"
All of us immediately turn around, seeing that the arena has, in fact, changed while Uranus was talking.
"Oi, I'm over here! Ah- yes, there are twelve lanes, one for each of you. You have to run seven thousand miles that way and run back. You have to do that a thousand times. So, by the end of this week, you all would have ran... fourteen million miles. Not that much,"
Not that much? Not that much!? That's so much! I get eight hundred thousand, or even a million miles, but fourteen million?! Who do they think we are? Aries?!
"Air signs, no flying or levitation, Aries, you're not allowed to go past the square root of the speed of sound," Neptune warns.
"So the speed of sound is three hundred and forty-three metres per second," Aries thinks out loud, "So the square root of that would be... eighteen point five, two, zero, two, five, nine, one, seven, seven, five. Wait, only eighteen miles per second!? But it'll take so long! Seven hundred and fifty-five thousand nine hundred and twenty-eight point nine, four, six, zero, one, eight seconds in minutes is twelve thousand five hundred and ninety-eight point eight, one, five, seven, six, six, nine, six, six, seven! I'll lose instantly!" Aries calculates.
"It's not about winning or losing," Neptune sums it up, "It's about beating your own personal best. You'll do this again a few hundred years later. And someday, you might find yourself with your super speed drastically turned down, and you can't cope with it, what are you going to do then? Do simple math?"
Simple? Simple!? What was so simple about that?
"Simple. Just not get to that situation," He shrugs.
"Bro- I- you know what, never mind," Neptune dismisses it in a hurry, "Maggots, math geek, get in your lanes,"
In a hurry, we go over to our lanes. I'm the fourth Zodiac, so I'm on the fourth line. On my left, is Gemini, and on my right, is Leo.
"Remember, do not throw anything in the way of other Zodiacs. And I'm looking at you, Taurus. The Gods only know of the full potential of your vines," Uranus reminds.
"Yeah yeah, whatever," She rolls her eyes, taking her stance.
"In three..." Neptune counts down, "Two... one... GO!"
We dash. As I run, I try to think about what I can do to make it to first place. Already, I can see Aries, Scorpio and Leo ahead of me, Taurus is catching up as well as Libra.
I look over to Scorpio. He frees one hand and sprays water all along the lane in front of him.
Ooohhhhh, he's using the water to make him go faster. He's pulling the water and wrapping it around his feet, pushing him. If he didn't have that ability, he would almost be dead last.
But, I decided to take a page from his book, and simply rebrand it.
I copy his movement, using my dominant hand to wet the floor with water, and using my other hand to solidify it into ice.
I also warp the water around my entire feet, solidifying it to make ice skates. I then lower my hands, using them to push me further up the line.
What did Aries say...? That it would take twelve thousand five hundred and ninety-eight point eight, one, five, seven, six, six, nine, six, six, seven minutes for him to finish? And that's... two hundred and nine point nine, eight hours. And in days... eight point seven nine four days. So around eight to nine days of running!?
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𝐅𝐄𝐁𝐑𝐔𝐀𝐑𝐘 𝟒𝐓𝐇 𝟐𝟎𝐗𝐗:
It has not been eight to nine days.
I lunge over as I take a deep breath, almost dying from the tiredness. My powers stopped working after day three, I wanted to save that energy into actually running.
I pant heavily, as I take my last step until I pass the red line, the same line I remember passing over a week ago.
I collapse. I close my eyes, waiting for the impact of the concrete floor, but instead, I felt strong arms wrap around my body.
I sit down on their lap, their legs crossed as I rest my head on their shoulder. I open my eyes, to see someone I wasn't expecting.
"You did great, Cancer," Aries praises, with a lopsided smile. Damn, I guess he's also burned out as well. "You're fourth. Leo, Scorpio and I are also here,"
"Well done, Cancer," Leo hands me a water bottle, and I gratefully take it, chugging the whole thing.
Uranus walks up to us, "Hmmm, I wonder what's taking Neptune so long? He was supposed to do thr daily check. It's almost been fifteen minutes,"
"He can't be back in fifteen minutes," Leo says in disbelief.
"Why not? It's easy,"
"I bet money that someone fainted," Aries chuckles.
"Who?" Scorpio asks.
"Hmmm... Gemini,"
"Oh, someone did actually faint. And it wasn't Gemini," Uranus says looking at his phone, genuinely surprised. "...shit,"
"Aquarius," Aries and Leo say simultaneously, while Scorpio starts running.
I can hear his footsteps receding as he runs further and further away. I lift my head from Aries's shoulder, my hands planted on the floor as I try to lift myself up, but land back down on my bottom on his lap.
"I think my legs stopped working," I say.
"Finally!" Sagittarius yells, passing his red line, "I thought that would never finish!"
He stumbles over to us and falls on his knees. He flops onto me, head resting on my chest as he pants heavily, just as I was a few minutes ago,
"I saw Scorpio running my way. I thought he finished...?" He breathes out.
"Apparently Aquarius fainted," Aries mentions.
"Oh... I hope she's alright. I think she has... a hundred and three more rounds to go?"
"She won't be doing anymore," Uranus claims, arms crossed since he placed his clipboard on the ground. "It's against the rules. I remember when we did it with Ares, he made us run around ten million miles a good two thousand times. Moon, Venus and Mercury all fainted. I almost felt like I was gonna faint but I made it past the red line,"
"And you didn't have to make up for it?" I ask.
"No, we didn't. Overworking isn't good for you. It doesn't benefit any- oh, Taurus's here," He interrupts himself, picking up his clipboard and scribbling something on it.
Leo rushes over before Taurus can hit the floor, helping her up and pulling her away from the front.
"I did it...!" She shouts in triumph.
"Yes, you did," Leo agrees.
"Okay, so Aries, Leo, Scorpio, Cancer, Sagittarius, Taurus. Half done, half left," Uranus informs.
"How many laps do each have to do?"
"Gemini has three, Virgo has seven, Libra is on his last lap, along with Pisces, Aqua is out and Capricorn has five more," Uranus explains.
"Teri meri meri teri prem kahani hé mushkil~" A ringtone was heard, and it seemed to be emitting from Uranus's phone.
He gets out his phone, and answers it, "Hey, love.... yeah, Maggot #9 and #2. There's six left. How's Aqua? ...hmm, I know. Keep on doing it, Scorpio's getting her...okay, yeah, love you too," He smiles, before hanging up.
"That's so cute!" Leo squeals, seemingly forgetting her tiredness.
"Shut it. When the rest get back, we'll rest for a week or two and get back on it again. Trust me, these next ones won't be as long,"
"How long has it been?" Sagittarius asks.
"Oh about ten days and a few hours," He answers, "There is no nightfall here, so I guess it would be hard to assume,"
"Please, just let this be over..." I mutter to myself, as the drowsiness of sleep takes over me.
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[WRITTEN | 17-18/10/2022]
[EDITED | 22/10/2022]
[POSTED | 22/10/2022]