<DESTRUCTION'S POV>
Chaos and I woke up again at 04:00, extremely exhausted but energized at the same time.
"I hate Hypnos for this," I groaned.
"Hypnos doesn't control our bedtimes, Struct," Chaos retorted tiredly.
"Ugh," I scoffed.
We were sitting in the kitchen, currently holding our sixth cups of coffee as I prepared more coffee in the background.
"I want to put my head through a wall," Chaos groaned, blinking rapidly.
"Same," I yawned, pouring my girlfriend and I another cup of coffee.
I passed her the cup, which she took silently. I took a sip of my coffee and began thinking about random stuff, my thoughts jumping from one random thing to another.
Eventually, I landed on one certain subject.
Now, some background.
When I started dating Chaos, I researched all of the LGBTQ+ stuff I could so that I wouldn't accidently offend her or anything. I also asked her some stuff like her preferred pronouns, and similar stuff.
Now, thinking about it, and myself, I was beginning to think that the boy/girl binary didn't really feel like... me.
I didn't know how to explain it. The 'boy' binary, title, or category, however you want to think about it, felt off to me to be addressed and to think of myself as such.
I didn't really feel like one, either.
So, I started to think back on my research on gender and began thinking about any possible them. I wondered if one of them could fit me.
I started off with the nonbinary category, pretty self-explanatory, and the one category that I felt would hold my answers.
Pangender... it didn't fit me. As I recalled, it was "people who identified as more than one gender," and that wasn't how I felt. Polygender and omnigender had the same base line, just other rules and statements and stuff, which rules out all three of them.
More nonbinary genders... bigender. It was also similar to genderfluid, which, again, didn't fit me. I didn't feel feminine or anything, I just didn't feel like a boy.
I sighed, wracking my brain for more ideas of gender identity.
Finally, something stuck out to me.
Agender.
If I remembered correctly, it was basically nonbinary, people who identified as none of the genders, also called "genderless".
The title felt weirdly natural. I thought about labeling myself as agender. It felt natural, normal, more... me.
This title fit me like a perfect puzzle piece. I smiled a bit with my conclusion. A small piece of irrational anxiety crawled up my throat.
Now, a little piece of information about my stepfather was that he was homophobic and transphobic. He was basically every bad thing you could think of. It took me a load of time to admit that I was bi to myself, even though he has been gone for centuries now.
I still felt disgusted with myself. I didn't feel that way toward others. I mean, most examples come from my mortal life, but still, I've never been disgusted of Nico, or Will, or Piper. And obviously not of Chaos.
I loved her, and even if we weren't dating, I still wouldn't be disgusted.
It was completely natural, it's not like they're not human! It's as natural for them to be who they are as it is for cis, straight couples.
But, myself?
That's a whole different deal.
It was disgusting and horrible for me to be LGBTQ. I'm inhumane (inentity?) to identify as such. I felt like a vile disease. I was worthless.
"Struct?" Chaos' voice broke me from my spiral of feelings.
"H-huh?" I asked, going back into reality.
Chaos gently reached out and wiped a tear that fell from my eye. I had only then realized that I was on the verge of a meltdown, and was barely keeping my tears in.
"S-sorry- I-I'm sorry," I stuttered, taking a step back and wiping my eyes furiously.
"Don't- Struct- don't," Chaos reprimanded softly.
I did my best to hold my tears in. I had cried enough for the last five hundred years. Why couldn't I just keep my façade with Chaos?
I took a few shaky, deep breaths until my tears clearer. Inside, I was screaming and crying, but outside, I had a small smile on my face.
"I'm alright," I lied in mu most genuine voice.
Chaos looked at me before hugging me tightly. For a second, I was scared that she didn't buy it. When we pulled apart, she smiled sadly and sighed.
"You know you can cry whenever you want or need to, right?" She asked quietly.
"I know," I murmured, wrapping my arm around her waist.
Internally, my thoughts were shaming me and making me feel so disgusted and bad about myself that I wanted to escape my own body, my own thoughts. I thought that no amount of therapy or talking could fix me now.
I was so scared.
I had never been this scared in my life. I'd never felt so mortal.
I could commit suicide any second. Now thar I had figured out how to, who was stopping me? And don't say Chaos, because you know as well as me that if I flashed out to a random place, she wouldn't be able to find me, and by the time she did, she'd be too late.
Of course, I'd hate to die and leave Eta, Forger, Dove, Star, and most importantly Chaos alone, but would I ever get better?
My trauma went deeper than the fall to Tartarus.
I'm so fucking scared.
And who could I even talk to?
Hermes was an obvious no. Apollo was another no. Hades? Maybe... Hestia, no. She's too kind for me to ruin her happiness. I wanted to make her believe my façade.
I couldn't talk to my father. Triton? Well, I did make quite an entrance. I didn't want to seem weak.
Hades it was, then.
"Struct?" Chaos broke me away from my horrible thoughts.
I focused on her and nodded.
"Are you okay?" She asked.
Now, that one last question broke me. I held my sobs and nodded.
"Of course. I'm just sleep deprived," I told her with a chuckle.
Chaos smiled at me. She pulled me into a soft kiss. After we broke apart, I began planning my day to sneak around and talk to Hades for advice, a sentence I never thought I'd say.
"What time is it?" I asked my girlfriend.
She turned and looked at the clock.
"Nearing four," she replied.
I was hoping it was already morning so I wouldn't disturb Hades. On second thought, I was the most powerful entity to ever exist eho could kill him in a heartbeat, so, who do you think has an upper hand on the situation?
Now, all that was left to do was leaving without making Chaos suspicious or upset.
"I'm gonna go on a walk to clear my head," I said softly.
Chaos frowned in worry and nodded.
"Be careful, okay?" She asked pleadingly.
"Of course," I told her with a small kiss.
She gave me a small smile as I flashed out. I was standing outside Hades' house (which, in itself, sounded ridiculous) and I decided to knock. Loudly. Perhaps too loud.
I heard loud footsteps and incoherent swear words coming from Hades. He opened the door with a loud crack.
"WHO-"
He froze once he saw me. Now, I'm gonna be honest, I looked bad as tartarus. I had eye bags and dark circles under my eyes from lack of sleep and bad sleep schedule, I had lost a lot of weight since coming to Earth and I was wearing an oversized hoodie that made me look even smaller. My hair was also messy and all over the place, but I couldn't care less.
"Destruction?" Hades asked with shock.
"Hades, I know this is sudden and you probably had a lot to do and stuff, but please, can I just talk to you?" I spoke quickly in one breath, trying to be as kind as possible, which wasn't hard to do. The god was my favorite uncle.
Hades looked shocked for a few moments before snapping out of it and looking at me with concern.
"Oh, of course, come in," Hades responded, opening the door and motioning him to come in.
I nodded and rushed in, shaking from I don't know what. Perhaps it was anxiety, perhaps it was fear, overriding all of my senses and feelings.
Hades led me into a room that actually resembled a cozy living room, which surprised me.
"What, I can have a nice house. I'm not always depressed and not everything I own is black, that's Thanatos," he snorted.
I rolled my eyes and sat down. Hades sat down on the couch in front of me. Half of me wondered whether he was acting nice because I could kill him, or because he seriously cared.
He would rather have nobody than a bunch of people who were faking it.
"So," Hades began, looking at me with concern.
"I'm sure you'd rather do anything else, but I really need to rant and talk to somebody, but Chaos can't hear about it and I can't talk to anybody else and I'm desperate and I need to talk to somebody and so I came here," I said as fast as I could in one breath.
"Its okay," Hades reassured.
I nodded, anxiety crawling up my spine.
"I, uhm, I want to kill myself," I blurted out.
Hades' eyes widened in shock.
"Wha-what?" He asked.
"I'm not perfect. I have so much power that gives me more responsibility than I can handle, which isn't a problem, I've been doing thar since I was 12, but my PTSD and anxiety and depression is making it impossible to live anymore," I explained.
Hades nodded slowly.
"But how would that even work?" He asked quietly.
"My power," I said bluntly. "I killed End and Void with it. I can kill myself."
Hades nodded thoughtfully. I was glad he wasn't showing any emotion, because everybody I talked to did, and it freaked me out more. Hades was calmly accepting it.
"There are a lot of reasons for you to not, though," he mused.
I nodded.
"I don't care," I replied honestly.
Hades sighed.
"What're your main problems? Don't hold back, tell me. It's not like I'll tell anybody or anything," he told me.
I nodded.
"For a bit of backstory, do you know who Gabriel Ugliano is?" I asked.
He thought for a second before his eyes clouded over.
"Yes," he replied, a bit confused.
"He was my stepfather," I murmured.
Hades' eyes widened in shock.
"That- that thing did that to you?!" He yelled in outrage.
I managed to hold back a flinch and nodded.
"I'm getting a lot of PTSD from it. My anxiety and depression multiply it to the point where it's unbearable. My demigod life also gives me PTSD, but my stepfather really made sure for me to view stuff a certain way," I said with a flinch as a small memory crossed my mind.
I took a deep breath and focused on things in the room. Hades looked like he knew I was on the verge of a PTSD attack, but didn't do anything.
"Okay," I whispered, feeling very self conscious as I wrapped my arms around myself.
"If I were to talk about my trauma in its fullest, it'd take an entire week of nonstop talking, so I'll cut to the chase and my current problem," I told Hades.
"My stepfather was very homophobic and transphobic. I got horrible beatings whenever I didn't act very 'masculine' or said something about boys," I said with a shudder.
Hades listened silently and nodded.
"And I developed internalized transphobia and homophobia toward myself," I concluded in a murmur.
Hades gave a small 'oh'.
"And what is your current issue?" He asked in a soft tone that sounded nothing like him.
"Well... I was thinking about gender and stuff, and I think that I'm agender. It took me an entire one hundred years to accept that I was bi, and now I'm just having anxiety and PTSD attacks," I explained panickedly.
"It's completely normal to be LGBTQ, you know," he said.
I sighed.
"I know that, but I can't believe or think that it applies to me."
Hades hummed in thought.
"Have you talked to Chaos about this?" He asked me suddenly.
"I don't want her to worry," I murmured quietly, looking down.
"Anybody who heard this would worry. Talk to her," Hades told me.
I bit my lip in thought. Chaos would have some advice...
"Okay," I said finally, "I'm going to talk to Chaos."
Hades gave me a rare smile.
"I hope I helped," he told me, getting up from his seat.
I got up as well, flashing out with a smile.
I found Chaos in the kitchen, pacing in worry. She stopped and gave me a big hug once she saw me.
"It's nearly seven," she hissed with worry.
My eyes widened in shock.
"Oh."
Chaos rolled her eyes.
"What happened?" She asked, gazing into my eyes.
"Can- can we talk?" I asked nervously.
She nodded, watching me carefully as we walked into the living room. We sat down and I reminded myself that this wasn't important.
"I'm agender," I just blurted out just like ripping the bandaid off quickly.
Chaos smiled widely and gave me a big hug.
"Amazing! What're your pronouns?" She asked, her eyes sparkling.
"They/he?" I answered like a question.
Chaos squealed (which was very unlike her) and began jumping up and down.
"Okay, okay, I'm sorry," she laughed, giving me another big hug.
"Will you use them interchangeably, or are you unbothered by both of them being used?" She asked.
"The second one, it doesn't really matter as long as you use one of them," I shrugged.
I smiled at her joy.
"I thought it'd be bad news," she sighed happily.
I bit my lip, nodding.
"I guess I could see why," I replied, making a small agreement with myself not to say anything about my stepfather to Chaos.
"Yeah."