Celesta
Alexios knew that going to war meant casualties on all sides. It meant blood in the streets, hundreds if not thousands of innocent lives lost in the fight to build a better world. No one was safe; men fell on the battlefield while women and children suffered on the sidelines. Places that were supposed to be sanctuaries for the displaced became targets of vengeance. A place like the one he currently stood inside, frozen in shock by its destruction. 

Entering the Sanctum had been a shock to his system. What was once a safe haven for refugees of the war had become a tomb desecrated by fire, smothered by ash. 

Bodies were sprawled out on the floor, charred and still smoking. One in particular caught his attention because the arms were wrapped tightly around what looked like a baby. 

Alexios felt each breath leave his body as if it were his last. Just days ago, he had been inside that very building, checking in on supplies, discussing strategy with the people who were running and maintaining the sanctuary. It had been overloaded with refugees to the point that they decided to move some to one of the other sanctums. The Champions had set up a lot of locations for mortals torn apart by the war. 

They were never able to make the move before its destruction.

Hundreds of innocent civilians dead before Alexios could even get back. Hundreds of men, women, and children gone in a heartbeat because of his own careless mistake. He should have known the Sanctum wasn't completely safe. Many of the locations were common knowledge because no one usually targeted safe havens for innocent civilians. No one - well, no *Mortal* Casually committed a war crime that could have military leaders or even presidents impeached. 

But the gods didn't care about the laws of mortals. 

Approaching the charred woman holding her baby, Alexios knelt down by the body and reached for something he saw half-tucked underneath the remains. When he pulled it out, it squeaked in his hand, and he turned it over, realizing it was a small dragon plushie. It was partially burnt and stained with ashes, but it was still intact unlike everything else in the Sanctum. A children's toy. One that he remembered handing to a little girl as she came to pick up a fresh meal.

His head dropped and he gritted his teeth to bite back his anger. Hand clenching around the toy, Alexios felt the familiar pang of sorrow seep into his bones, settling next to the same pain he held for losing Jessie, losing his father, his mother. 

Many more would suffer before the war's end. Was he doing the right thing?
Cynthia
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「 𝐏 𝐎 𝐒 𝐄 𝐈 𝐃 𝐎 𝐍. 」
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**⊱ ・┆ 𝐁𝐋𝐎𝐎𝐃 𝐋𝐈𝐊𝐄 𝐑𝐀𝐈𝐍 𝐂𝐎𝐌𝐄 𝐃𝐎𝐖𝐍, 𝐃𝐑𝐔𝐌 𝐎𝐍 𝐆𝐑𝐀𝐕𝐄 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐆𝐑𝐎𝐔𝐍𝐃.**
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`SETTING .` A Ransacked Sanctum.
`CHARACTERS .` Poseidon & Alexios.
`SYMPHONY .` Vicarious by Tool.
`PINGS .` 
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࿐ ࿔*:･ﾟ♆
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The ruler of Atlantis was inclined to the scent of sea foam, a testament to his prowess. In solitude, he found familiarity in the clearness of the air upon coastal dunes of sand, salty and wistful. To stand amid the residuum of embers provided no gratification of the senses, but a contentment to his pitiless agenda. Never could he find pleasure in the profuse invasion of soot, the only remaining evidence of subdued flames. With distaste, Poseidon's nostrils flared, as if he had not become acquainted with its scent eons ago. Here, beyond sheets of ash that shrouded the earth like a duvet, was a greater and inconceivable thing.
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Death.
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It was his doing, his calculated and confident proposition. Bodies that persisted in unlikely existence became skeletal remains, swallowed in the char of gloom. Poseidon reveled in the resplendence of his kingdom as it occurred, inflicted by the ferocious physicality of Ares. It would be a statement, and the variations of it would not deter from the immorality of its message— Poseidon only made demands of death. To the God of Seas, a passive aversion to the divine discord was not a means to be spared. Mortals of frailty, that hid in the refuge of valorous demigods, were insignificant. His apathy, a parasitic thing that glommed on him from birth, had become gargantuan in strife. The war was the result of time ahead, of his climb to rightful eminence. There would be no skirmish without casualties; where there was a bloodletting, Poseidon would follow.
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However, in the prominent past where his havoc was proclaimed, he would not divulge this atrocity. The blame would be cast on another, and it would be a stepping stone to his triumph— a stone thrown in the courage of the insoluble Alexios.
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To make one's opposition known in such circumstances was uncanny, but to be enveloped in a preserved anonymity confounded Poseidon. The lineage of Alexios was not yet understood, but his lion–hearted resistance was transparent. The swaying beacon of hope that Alexios seemingly upkept amused him, for he questioned if it began to falter by Poseidon's vicious deliverance. Would the demigod weep, with a face that Poseidon did not know, with tears as salted as his own oceans? Would he beg, shaken by contrition? There was a churning belief that the concealed Alexios would not bend so briskly.
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Some moments after Alexios had Poseidon approached the sanctum, clad in sardonic black. It was as though he had readied himself for a funeral, only a proper entombment brought more solace than this. There was little closure to be found here. Only a few steps had been taken, past the parted doorway to the warehouse, and once polished loafers were enveloped in dust. An open, flowing overcoat that came down to his knees began to seep in the smell of it all. The foulness of ash and the inexorable stench of death rivaled for the lasting aroma on his clothes. Eyes of an unfeeling concoction of blue and green observed the scene, and he remained expressionless and unafraid. He had seen far too many obscenities to be shaken.
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There was a shift, an aversion to his gaze, when the space was notably shared. Not by the wraiths of death, but by a breathing body, rigid in despondency.
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"An act of this nature was unpreventable."
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The words were not from the origins of a tender heart, but they were not spoken with a jarring severity. To a mind that was vulnerable, perhaps he was a fortified crutch, a wall to rest one's head. Poseidon was known for tumultuous bitterness or an inscrutable tone, and very little lurked in–between. As it always had been, his voice was a blaring force and it stretched outward, displacing the unsettling silence. He was eyeing the square of the man's back, and the maimed plush that he held in his hand. Poseidon looked to the ceiling, once touched by the ends of flames, and then to the man opposite of him.
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The elder God's shoes were a detected sound, stepping over rubble and what was left of bodies. For a widespread building, swept clean of those that occupied it, the two of them did not exactly feel alone. The man appeared heavy with woe, and the air was flecked with a divinity separate from his own. A demigod, whose blood Poseidon could not determine. He was molded by the grace of humanity, a thing that Poseidon did not share.
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"The most incorrupt are steadily at the center of war."
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Poseidon looked to the mound of mother and child, declining to blink.
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"Zeus has shown his discontent in many forms."
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There was an implication that hid behind his words, and he needn't explain it.
Celesta
Through the ashes floating on air, over the silenced voices and the innocent lives lost, Conner heard a faint tapping against the marble floors. His back straightened as he recognized the sound of footsteps approaching - slow, and a little too casual rather than the hurried gait of someone who was there to help. Whoever it was, they weren't in a rush to see if there were any survivors. 

*"An act of this nature was unpreventable."* 

The voice preceded the stranger and Conner's jaw clenched at the word *Unpreventable.* As if a god had *Accidentally* Walked through the Sanctum and burned it to the ground by breathing too hard. As if attacking refugees who had done nothing was just an act of nature that no one could have stopped. As if they weren't standing in a ruined building surrounded by the scorched bodies of innocent men, women, and children. 

*Unpreventable* Was the wrong choice of word. Unpreventable was an excuse monsters liked to use to justify their actions.

Turning his head just slightly to get a view of the stranger in his peripheral vision, Conner felt a chill run through his veins. The voice wasn't recognizable, but the figure that stepped around rubble and over debris was. Muscles tensed with the desire to react, but Conner moved slow and steady and remained calm despite every part of him wanting to turn and fight. It would be stupid to fight. He was no match again the god of the sea. *Poseidon.*

Deep breath. Flying under the radar was what kept him alive for years, so he forced himself back into that mindset. Back into the man hiding his true name from the gods in order to keep himself and those he loved safe. He was in no position to stand alone against Poseidon, but that didn't stop him from voicing his discontent.

He stood up slow, his head still turned slightly but bowed. Half hidden by the hood over his head, Poseidon would hopefully not get a clear look at his face. He wasn't known yet, but he didn't want to give the god a chance to commit it to memory. 

"You and I will just have to disagree that this was the "Center" Of war." His voice was low, but steady. Faced with such a terrible crime, it would be difficult for *Anyone* To keep a level head - anyone who gave a shit, anyway - but he managed. "Whoever did this had to go out of their way to target it. This was a message." A message heard loud and clear. Felt in his bones. 

The statement about Zeus was not lost on Conner, and it didn't surprise him. His father's treachery was known by many. The destruction of the Sanctum wouldn't be the first casualty in Conner's fight against him, but it was a huge hit. What he *Didn't* Understand was why Poseidon was even there. His lack of care for humanity was clear and confirmed by Esmeray. There was no reason for him to be lurking around the Sanctum unless he had some sort of plan or ulterior motive. 

Or unless . . . He was responsible for it.

Either option seemed fitting, so Conner was on high alert. If Poseidon was there because of the destruction that Zeus wrought, he might have been looking for Alexios to make some sort of deal. No harm in hearing him out. 

"I never thought I would see a god walking among mortals." He pocketed the plush, though he wasn't sure why. "To what do I owe the honor of your company?" The words felt like poison on his tongue, but he swallowed them anyway. Under the radar. That's where he needed to stay for as long as possible.
Cynthia
Poseidon, with an amass of eternities beneath the inscrutable depth of his eyes, had easily recognized the unrest before him. It stirred in the demigod's physique, hardening the makeup of his muscles and stroking the strain of his nerves. The God was the inducer of a polluted and beastly dread, with merit that demanded one's respect and awareness. The earth–shaker was no ghastly lurker, he was no serpentine shape among shadows— unlike his brother, who took to darkness and its innate seclusion, Poseidon embodied the ocean's hue. He was graciously pecked by the sun's persistence, dusted by animated freckles. His eyes detained a saintly shade of blue, as if they were mere globes of the Atlantic. With such coveted traits came the contrast of what rested beneath— a blackness, so malignant that it outweighed what parts of him were fleshly.
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He epitomized the boundless ends of the ocean, with its conundrums and perils. The water that mingled with the pit of the earth was of the same quality to what plodded over his heart.
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Poseidon's discerned divinity was what slowed the demigod's advancing posture, but it was something else entirely that steadied him. A scarce courage, and Poseidon did not take his gaze from it. The vivacious heart of a stallion, constrained in the chest of a man.
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The mortal spoke, and though his words were brazenly earnest, Poseidon felt that they were restrained. He took his hands and clasped them behind his back, a quiet suggestion that Poseidon would remain still. With his assured build, dressed in black, one might believe him to be a breathless statue. The young man's features were mantled by a hood, and the God settled on its subtle timidity. Were there secrets to find in the crevices of his skin, or a disdain in his eyes? Eyes that have rested upon the fabled Alexios?
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Whoever it may be, Poseidon would ensure his own personalized triumph before leaving the ravaged foxhole that was once the cosseted sanctum.
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"A message, yes. That is plain. You do not believe that the lives of the feeble have not been placed at the center of war? You stand before me, among their ash and bone, and disagree? Affliction clouds you— these lives are not the war's cause, but they are its favored casualties. From the inception of time, it has always been this way."
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He could not evade his own cruelty. Unlike the cloaked man, Poseidon spoke loudly, with a tone that wakened unease. The temper that he famously nurtured, however, could not yet be found. The furrow of his brow, the dire curling of his fist— it had not found a reason to ascend beneath the surface. By the demigod's insistence, with stealth could Poseidon's scales become tipped by petulance.
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In a divided silence, the mutinous cogwheels at the center of the stranger's mind seemingly began to turn. If he looked with intensity, he could snuff out the scent of slaughter in its entirety. Poseidon sustained the mind of a shrewd sage without the mortal signs of decomposition— the hooded man desired from the God, just as Poseidon demanded from him. He was a notably selfish king, yet if the exchange left a savory note on his tongue, Poseidon could become amenable. Amenable within reason, with propositions that would allow him to prosper above all else.
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Poseidon eyed the plush that was now taken by the stranger, curious. A choice of compassion that he could not understand, nor imitate. It nearly made him squint, and Poseidon was driven to take a step nearer, enhancing his view. The words were a false nicety, if Poseidon could label them as such— he saw nothing in them but a delayed rehearsal. A bundle of withered supplies separated beneath his shoe, and he proceeded to neglect the building's despondency.
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"You are no common mortal. The blood of man meddles with a lesser divinity inside of you."
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A remark like a blade, yearning to prick the skin and taste the blood. His expression did not shift, but his tone offered and probed.
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"The message you see was not one–dimensional. It is not only for those who were intended to preserve the welfare of this refuge, but for each headman and their values. For your *Alexios*, despite his inclination to anonymity."
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Celesta
Standing in the presence of Poseidon himself would have made normal humans crumble to their knees - *Should* Have humbled any who were in the company of such a powerhouse. He was a force of nature that couldn't be controlled, a strength that couldn't be beaten by mortal hands alone. Every movement he made shook the foundations of belief, and every word he spoke forced fear into the brave. 

Conner wasn't immune to the fear. It crawled into his skin and burrowed into his muscles, making his body stiff and rigid as he stood before the God of the Ocean, a sea wall staring down an approaching storm. Each moment alone with him grew that fear, but with a touch of anger alongside it. He didn't budge save for the smallest flinch when Poseidon shifted to put his hands behind his back.

Was it bravery or fear that rooted him in place? Or was his bravery a result of feeling the fear by standing his ground? What else could a god take from him after he already lost so much? 

"I believe they don't have to be," He said, the strength of the sea wall keeping his voice steady. "A war between gods doesn't need to be fought on the backs of mortals, yet here we are."

Those that suffered the most were those that weren't even involved in the conflict. Casualties of war were common, but that's not what the destruction of the sanctum was. They had not been caught in the way of a godly battle, they had not been at some important location of interest. They were in a safe house meant to house those displaced by the war, and they were specifically targeted. It was a war crime committed to send a message, and the message was that Alexios's efforts had been noticed and were not taken lightly.

Conner's back straightened as Poseidon stepped closer, but he still didn't turn. He began to doubt the integrity of his biggest secret; if he turned to face the god, would he notice a resemblance to his own brother? Would he figure out exactly who he was? Poseidon's questions didn't reassure him. 

"Yes," He said, simply, wondering if Poseidon's own words were an ode to pride that wouldn't allow him to delve deeper. Zeus was hardly a lesser god, but Conner hoped the belief would drive him away from the scent. 

"Doesn't this message just further fuel Alexios's cause? If Zeus intended for him to cease his involvement, I feel like this might only increase it."