A whole day of trying to catch up by breaking every traffic rule in the book later, they arrived at an out of place hotel in a rural part of Canada. Castor got out as soon as he could, slamming the door behind him so hard that the entire car shook.
Melissa sat there and simply sighed. “You know, Pollux, it would help if you would actually do something,”
Pollux frowned. “What are you talking about? I do plenty,”
“Like?” Melissa said, arching an eyebrow.
Pollux considered. “I bought our breakfast. Remember?”
Melissa sighed again. “Pollux, seriously. We're doing all the work here,”
“I've been fighting monsters too!” Pollux objected.
“I mean everything else,”
Pollux shrugged half-heartedly. “I don't know how to do anything else,”
“You could at least show some effort!” Melissa snapped. “You know what? You're hopeless. I honestly don't know what Castor would be doing on this road trip if I hadn't volunteered,” with that, she got out of the car, slamming the door behind her just as Castor had.
Pollux was left there by himself. Great. Now he had managed to piss off both of them.
It wasn't that he wasn't trying to do something, it was just that he really wasn't of much use. And he didn't really need to make it worse by messing everything up for them. Unfortunately, Castor and Melissa didn't seem to be thinking that he was trying to be considerate, which was understandable. Even so, everything he did try to do (such as buying the munchkins) seemed to just piss them off.
Pollux shrugged, getting out of the car. It wasn't as if he owed anything to Melissa. And Castor wouldn't even be alive if it weren't for him, so he was pretty sure he had all his bases covered.
Pollux arrived in the lobby of the hotel, only to find Castor and Melissa at the front desk, checking in. He strolled over, and noticed that the other secretary was talking with a girl wearing a shirt with a large face printed on it. On the back, the words “I <3 Justin Bieber!” could be seen from quite a distance.
Pollux smirked. Isn't that who he'd accidentally turned himself into at Dunkin' Donuts? Well, if he could do it once, why not again?
He willed the mist to shape his face, hair, and clothing to be like the boy on the front of the girl's shirt. Then he walked over and tapped her on the shoulder.
The girl whirled around. The first thing Pollux noticed was her braces, then her unruly hair, and then the fact that she couldn't be older than twelve. Pollux put on what he hoped was an attractive smirk. “Hey,” he said.
The reaction was instantaneous. The girl fainted dead on her feet.
Pollux's eyes widened. “Oh my god!” he said, dropping down to her side. “Are you okay?”
The girl's eyes fluttered open. “Justin...” she said, eyes wide. “I... you're here...”
She grabbed his face and his lips crashed against hers.
The smirk immediately fell from his face only to be replaced with a panicked expression. Her lips were chapped and disgusting. Pollux struggled to get away, but the girl wouldn't let go. He twisted from side to side and eventually broke free, stumbling backwards. “That was disgusting!” he said. “Please don't do that again. Ever.”
The girl's face crumpled. “You didn't like it?”
Pollux hesitated. “Well, I mean, your kissing isn't that bad, I just... don't know you.”
The girl didn't seem to hear him at all, and stormed off in tears. “Justin Bieber hates me!” she wailed.
Pollux realized that the secretary was staring at him with wide eyes. She quickly looked away, blushing. “Can I help you sir?”
That was when someone grabbed his arm rather forcefully. Pollux looked to the side, only to see a very murderous looking Castor. “What the hell are you doing? I know it's you, Pollux. I mean, sure the girl's pretty, but now is not the time!” he hissed.
He smiled. “Just having a bit of fun,” he replied. Then he paused. “Wait, what? Very pretty? She's hideous!”
Castor opened his mouth to retort, and was knocked very roughly aside by a horde of pre-pubescent teenage girls. “Don't touch my Justin!” one of them yelled.
“What do you mean your Justin?” another screamed. “He's mine!”
Soon there was a rather large cat fight forming in the lobby, and Pollux was stuck in the middle of it. Seeing a gap in the girls, he seized the opportunity and ran out as fast as he could, grabbing Castor's hand and racing into the stairwell.
There was a faint yell of, “Follow him!” and the girls raced after him.
Pollux finally let the mist drop, and just kept running up. “What are you doing?” Castor yelled from behind him. “You completely missed our floor! And you left Melissa down there!”
Pollux really had no idea what he was doing, so he opted not to answer him.
They finally reached the top landing, and Pollux wrenched the door open and hopped out, only to find himself on the roof.
“Pollux!” Castor said, panting. “What did you do to those girls?”
“I turned myself into a celebrity for laughs,” Pollux said. “They got a bit, er, over-excited,”
As if on cue, the girls from the lobby burst through the door. Their eyes looked wild. Pollux backed up nervously. Something about them made him uneasy.
“Where'd you put Justin Bieber?” a short one in the back yelled.
“Shut up, Maggie,” another one said. She seemed to be the leader, because she stepped forward. “Okay, so this is how it works. You can either tell us where you put Justin, or we can force it out of you,”
Castor shrugged. “We haven't put any Justin anywhere.”
“Don't lie!” the girl snapped. “We saw him with you. What are you two? Kidnappers? Are you going to ransom him?”
“No,” Pollux said, holding his arms up. “We have no idea who he is, actually,”
“Liars,” The girl who was called Maggie piped up.
“Shut up, Maggie!” said the leader. “That's my line!” she cleared her throat, turning back to the two of them, “Liars!”
Pollux blinked. This was getting stranger by the minute.
“Well, if you two aren't going to tell us anything, then I guess we'll just have to get the information ourselves,” the leader said, withdrawing a sword from thin air.
“Woah woah woah, what? Where'd that come from?” Pollux said.
The rest of them also had swords in their hands. “Prepare for death, demigods.”
“Wait what?” Castor said. “What are you guys?”
“The Empousai,” the leader said. “Although you obviously couldn't see it past our beautiful exteriors,”
Pollux snorted. “What, beautiful as in disgusting prepubescent girls? That's a laugh.”
The Empousai growled. Castor, surprisingly, frowned. “What are you talking about, Pollux? They've got to be at least twenty,”
Pollux blinked. “What are you talking about?”
Castor swallowed. “They can't be prepubescent at that age. Also, they're... kinda beautiful.”
Pollux just stared. “You're kidding, right?”
Castor seemed mesmerized by the girls. “No... I'm not. Jeez, Melissa's got nothing on them.”
“Alright then...” said Pollux, trying really hard not to judge his brother's taste in women.
The Empousai laughed. “That's our strategy. We lure men to their deaths with our beautiful images, and then kill and eat them. How would you like it if we ate your brother right in front of you?”
Pollux suddenly remembered. Empousai were known for looking beautiful, but their real selves were horrid and hideous. Apparently the twenty-first century's idea of hideous was twelve-year-old girls with braces, massive acne problems, and having unhealthy crushes on Justin Bieber.
“Why doesn't it work on me?” Pollux asked.
The Empousa tilted its head. “You are a god. Apparently gods are unaffected.”
“Less talk,” Castor muttered. “More... more...”
“Castor snap out of it,” Pollux said, pulling him backwards. “God, you're like an alcoholic with beer. Are you really that desperate?”
“Let me go,” he said, struggling against Pollux.
Pollux considered his situation. It was him and a love-drunk Castor, both of whom were unarmed, against twenty or so Empousai, all with swords. The odds were not looking great. There was only distraction left.
“So, why exactly do you all love Justin Bieber?” he asked, inching backwards.
“Oh, my, god! Justin Bieber is my favorite for soooo many reasons. Like, for one, he's so completely gorge-”
“Jesus fucking christ, Maggie,” the leader snapped. “Can't you see that he's just trying to distract us? You're such an idiot!”
“As if you aren't, Jessica?” Maggie retorted. “You were the one that said that Justin's eyes were sooo dreamy just last week!”
Jessica snarled. “You weren't supposed to tell anyone that!” she said, lunging at Maggie. With one swipe of her claws, Maggie had ceased to exist.
Pollux gulped. He didn't want to know how it would feel to be killed like that. He kept shuffling backwards, until suddenly his heel hit the edge of the roof. He was trapped.
“Ah, fuck,” he muttered.
There was a beat, and then the empousai were upon him.
Pollux closed his eyes and was prepared to be shredded when suddenly he heard one of them scream. He opened one eye, only to see Melissa on the roof, slashing and stabbing the empousai.
“Catch!” she yelled at him, throwing him his sword.
Pollux let go of Castor to catch the sword which turned out to be a deadly mistake. Castor, still love-struck, swayed, and fell backwards, losing his balance and falling off the roof.
Time seemed to slow down as he fell, Pollux's eyes wide. He scrambled toward the edge, dropped onto the edge of the building, and caught Castor right before his hand slipped out of reach.
Castor slammed into the side of the building, but managed to keep hanging on to Pollux's hand. Pollux winced. That had to hurt. Luckily, though, it seem to knock Castor back to his sense. He shook his head, then looked up at Pollux. “What the hell is going on?” he asked.
“You were kinda mesmerized by love for a few twelve-year-old Justin Bieber fans, and then you fell off a building,” Pollux said. “Right, now save the questions for after you're not falling to your death, 'kay?”
Behind them, the last of the empousai fell to the ground, dead. Pollux pulled Castor up with a single fluid motion.
Melissa immediately stormed over. “You guys okay? No one's dead?”
“Fine,” Castor said. Then he looked around. “Oh no. You're kidding. I wasn't in love with them. I swear they looked a lot better before,”
Melissa rolled her eyes. And then she stepped forward and slapped Pollux so hard that his teeth clattered, and he stumbled backwards a few steps.
“What was that for?” Pollux complained, holding his now red cheek.
“For almost killing your brother! You realize that none of this would've happened if you hadn't pretended to be Justin Bieber, right?”
“Well, no it probably would have anyway,” Pollux answered.
Melissa groaned. “You're hopeless,”
“Excuse me,” Castor said, interrupting them. “But I'm not in the mood to stand out here for very much longer, so, I'll be in our room. Bye,” he brushed past the two of them and walked back into the hotel.
Melissa turned and started to follow him wen she suddenly stopped and turned back around. “Hey, Pollux, give me your sword,”
“Why?” he asked.
“Because I'm going to put all of our swords in the safe that this hotel has. I'll disguise them as jewels. I just really don't want a repeat of yesterday.”
Pollux considered this. “Sure, I guess. Here,”
A/N: awkward ending, i know.
a) i hope this doesn't offend anyone. i don't mean to hate on justin bieber fans, just... society doesn't seem to like twelve-year-old justin bieber obsessed girls very much, do they? (and that was the point, it was society's definition of ugly)
b) if it does offend anyone i will edit it out
c) happy new year!!!