Terrence
The heavens themselves seemed to cower under the weight of Zeus's fury, the skies darkening with every smoldering thought. As he strode through the echoing halls of Olympus, his footsteps resonated with the force of his ire. The air, charged with the promise of a storm, seemed to crackle with the same raw energy that coursed through him. Each of Poseidon's slights had stoked the fire of his anger, and now it burned with an intensity that could not be contained. The silence that greeted his attempts at diplomacy was a bitter pill, one he refused to swallow. 

Zeus would wait for no one. His power demanded recognition, and his brother's insolence would be met with the full might of his fury. With a heart hammering like the anvil of Hephaestus, he resolved to confront Poseidon. He would to unleash the tempest of his rage upon what his brother loved if he refused to hear him. He would damage whatever was in his path as Poseidon had done his reputation. A forceful hand forked through his hair, energy flickering at his finger tips. The tension in the air was palpable, a prelude to the clash of titans that loomed on the horizon.

Bristling with indignation, Zeus recalled the last time he attempted to approach Poseidon. He turned him away, despite his persistence. Unwilling to speak with him, his brother threw a fit like a child. Quite unkingly, he thought, for someone yearning for the throne. The sun fell that night, and when it rose again, there was a new plan in place. Steeped in deception, a masterstroke fueled by his simmering wrath. He would arrive cloaked as a sailor, nondescript and seasoned by the sea's caprice. His approach would be silent, a shadow amidst the waves, eluding the vigilant gaze of Poseidon's loyal guards. In this clever disguise, Zeus would ensure a private audience with his brother, an opportunity to unleash a promised confrontation that would echo through Olympian. 

He *Almost* Couldn't wait. 

—

Zeus, master of guile and transformation, shed his celestial form for that of a mariner, weather-beaten and coarse. His divine raiments exchanged for the garb of a common sailor, his skin bore the grime of the sea, and his hair, once kempt and shining, now hung in matted locks, heavy with brine. As he stepped off the creaking boat, the soles of his worn boots met the detritus-strewn sands of Olympian's coast. The pungent stench of salt water snaked into his nostrils, an odor he found most unbearable. 

His eyes, a tempestuous sea of blue, scanned the horizon for his brother, the earth-shaker. With each crashing wave, his heart beat a rhythm of wrathful curiosity, pondering what words would be exchanged upon their fateful meeting. Would Poseidon recognize the fury veiled behind the sailor's guise? Would he sense the electric tension coiling in the air? The anticipation of their encounter was as palpable as the ocean's mist that clung to his weathered skin.

He meandered near the shore line, searching for Poseidon with a fierce, unforgiving gaze. His feet sunk into the sand with every hurried step, his shoulders risen and tense. When he once knew his brother, he would come to the ocean often to think. He imagined he would need to think now. But with every passing moment, his impatience only grew. The steady creep of waves worked to hush his thoughts. Finding himself tired of searching, for the first time upon his travel, he drew still. His gaze momentarily softened as he scanned the coastline. Then suddenly, he was there. Amidst the hushed whispers of the shore, stood Poseidon. The calm that had once settled in Zeus's gaze now sparked with the familiar flare of betrayal. 

There he was, the brave being who chose to defy him. 

—

Zeus, cloaked in the guise of a common traveler, edged closer to Poseidon with a deliberate pace. His heart slammed against his ribcage, a wild drumbeat of fury and adrenaline, yet his face was the picture of serenity. A wry smirk pulled at the corners of his lips as he emerged beside his unsuspecting brother. Aligning himself with Poseidon, he adopted a similar pose of quiet contemplation. His hands nonchalantly slipping into his pockets, concealing the tempestuous energy crackling at his fingertips.

The air around them seemed to thrum with the weight of unspoken thoughts. Above them, the ashen clouds had begun to churn. An electric charge of expectancy built until Zeus, ever the instigator, pierced the quietude with a voice that melded seamlessly with the symphony of the sea's whispers. 

"Quite the view, isn't it?" There was a pause as he turned to try and catch his gaze, "The sea and the sky can put on one hell of a show, can't they?" His smirk replaced itself with a smile as disingenuous his disguise.
Jill
Poseidon could often be discovered here, standing by the reflective coast. One might say that his movements were predictable in routine if it weren't for his ever–shifting heart. There was seldom a rhyme or reason to it. In Olympian's prospering Metropolis, he curled his nose to it all — the chirps of sardined cars, the futile materialism, the incandescent lights that took the place of stars. Here, there was one thing that would always be his. Forever would he claim the wafting of waves on boundless grains of sand, reaching for him. The ocean murmured to him, in a bygone language that only he knew, and it brought him here. Today, however, he stood with an unplaced purpose. Within him, below that primitive calling of the ocean, was something else. He was meant to be here, at these particular passing minutes, and he could not yet comprehend why.
⠀
There were not many occupying the shore, and fewer could be found in the water. He was not always so fond of mortals in their curious crowds, but it was the innate serenity of the coast that made them the slightest bit tolerable. Even in the most dreaded of storms did his chest rise and fall with an uncommon tranquility. The water was his, and it was his most devout partner. Humans and their presence here came to him, wielded in the form of a double–edged blade. Some valued the water for what it was — a thing of both peace and violence, only to be wisely nurtured. On the other face of the coin, with humanity's inherent sin came wastefulness, littering the beaches and salted seas.
⠀

It was not pollution or nonchalant beachgoers that soiled his thoughts, not this time. Now, something greater stood at the pit of his mind, in the shadowy outline of a god. He was reminded of it, now, with eyes of blue that looked above to morose clouds. As the current thrashed with Poseidon's displeasure, the clouds darkened with Zeus's rage. The two of them, for separate reasons, had been angry. Zeus, however, was everywhere. Poseidon could not escape the heavens themselves, for even the sun still leaked through the water.
 ⠀
Prior to Poseidon's declaration of an irreparable defiance, the two of them had never truly been cordial. Affection and loyalty were fleeting, intangible things. Mutually, they were brothers birthed from violence, with mouths that delivered callous words and hands that only knew fists. Zeus and Poseidon were, debatably, equals. They found similarity in vexation, and like the weather, they could not learn lasting stillness.
⠀
He knew Zeus, and he knew that the thunderous deity would not sit comfortably until Poseidon was addressed. It was far too damaging to his brother's stronghold of an ego, to decline his consultation. What would it matter? Poseidon decided that there was nothing to discuss. There was a time for assembly, and there was a time for unguarded wrath. He had sat in quietude for a moment too long. Poseidon would not be found pacing the floors of his kingdom in discontent. There was work to be done.
⠀

Some generous length from him, a young girl filed through seashells, bleached by the sun. Her hair was a strawberry blonde, and she placed a cracked one to her ear, yearning to hear the ocean. It seemed that mortals always had their sweet, absurd rituals, even now. Poseidon's head turned from her just as she looked to her father behind her. There was another presence, drawing itself closer to him, and he presumed it was nothing he would deem valuable.
⠀
*"Quite the view, isn't it?"*
⠀
It came from the opposite direction of the girl with the seashells. His eyes met ones of a similar shade, stricken with the vigor of the tide. When their gaze met, the waves crashed together, and the clouds dared to darken.
⠀
Sailors were a favored group by Poseidon, touched by his divine grace. If they blessed him on their travels, he would grant them fortune to be found, and a teetering ship to avoid the most vicious of storms. He was seemingly younger than Poseidon in appearance, with skin that had been pecked from an unforeseeable time away from land. What stories a sailor could tell. Yet, this felt like no ordinary mariner. In the depths of his eyes, there was an untapped energy, bountiful in size. Poseidon's head tilted, as if he awaited to be impressed.
⠀
The wind imprinted wrinkles into the button–up of linen that the sea god wore. Far from his feet, the shallow waves brought new shells and sand dollars to the shore. The man spoke, and Poseidon clenched his jaw, bothered by the sky's attention.
⠀
"The tides have been feverish." He spoke at a distance, with a voice that was always resolute. The smell of foam and salt delighted him, but there was something in the air that brought an ache to his muscles. "Sailors must place a higher value on the sea. Isn't that so?" Poseidon's eyes glared into the shape of the seaman's smile.
Terrence
Zeus stood tall, his eyes shot daggers into the churning waves, piercing them like sharpened knives. Poseidon, ever the coward, stood hidden amongst the sea. Unafraid to meddle with mortals, yet quick to evade his superior. The anticipation in Zeus's heart was palpable, steady and resolute, as he prepared for the impending clash. The air around him thrummed with energy, each heartbeat a drumroll that resonated with the rumble of a distant storm. The sky mirrored his wrath, swirling into a dark and furious grey.

*"Sailors must place a higher value on the sea. Isn't that so?"* 

Zeus, his figure a bastion against the brooding sky, listened intently to the murmurs of Poseidon's voice, carried on the wind and waves. He pondered over his brother's ambition, the audacity of his claim to superiority. Poseidon spoke of sailors' reverence for the sea, their prayers more often cast into its depths than to the skies above. In the quiet storm of his thoughts, he could not help but scoff at his brother's audacity. Poseidon was as the sea is to the sky—forever bound to the earth, his realm a mere shadow beneath the firmament of Zeus's rule. As they stood shoulder to shoulder, he felt the disparity between them; a world apart, he was confined and subordinate. 

In the silence, Zeus's mind thundered with unspoken contempt, his gaze fixed beyond the horizon, where his power, like the sky, knew no bounds.

Still cloaked in the guise of a sailor, he felt the weight of Poseidon's gaze, a silent challenge flickering behind the sea god's eyes. Their locked stares were laden with an intensity no mortal could withstand, a storm brewing in the quiet before the fury. Inside Zeus, a searing anger ignited, flames licking at his heart, the anticipation of his impending revelation simmering like a volcano on the brink of eruption. And then, with the power of thunder rumbling in his voice, he spoke.

—

"Even the sailors know who's *King*," Zeus hissed, his voice a serrated whisper that sliced through the quiet. Each syllable was a barb, hurled with disdain, as if Poseidon were nothing before him.

Suddenly, the air was crackling with an electric charge. The sailor's form began to twist and contort, a spectacle unfolding before the eyes of the awestruck onlookers. The winds picked up, howling like the furies as the transformation erupted. His form elongated, and his stature soared towards the heavens. The cloak of humanity fell away, revealing the divine majesty of Zeus, his eyes blazing with the fury of a thousand storms.

As he relinquished his celestial form, the firmament above mirrored his transition. Distant thunder rumbled like the drums of war, heralding the god's simmering wrath. Lightning flickered across his form, an indelible mark of his divine essence. There he stood, a figure of awe-inspiring potency, the storm's crescendo a testament to his unyielding spirit. The charged air awaited his command, a silent overture before the symphony of the gods would resume.

"What? Cat got your tongue, brother?" He stepped forward now, "You may only run for so long."
Jill
The mariner scrutinized the fluctuation of the waves as if he detested their proximity. It perplexed the earth–shaker, as if a fleshly body should not dare to shun what the gods have presented. Poseidon's sanctity was a weight like no other, with the density of welded armor strapped to a weak man's back. Lesser gods felt it, and were reminded of their own might, brittle when it stood on its lonesome. When he stood among men, Poseidon stimulated the rapid beating of uncertain hearts. His gaze could scarcely be neglected, and the recollection of him was kept through the remaining course of time. The god's regard for others should have been a souvenir. Mortals could not always place the origins in which he derived from, but his power was known. It stole breaths and coaxed tears.
⠀
A shoulder's length away, the human of the ocean did not weaken beneath Poseidon's force. His bearing remained noble, and his eyes were zealous with an untold purpose. Poseidon yearned to reach within the young man's chest and take his heart, until it no longer pattered in confidence. Such courage was blasphemous.
⠀
The sky had been in a long–lasting scuffle of luminosity, but it seemed to surrender to the arrival of clouds, as gray as smoke. Beachcombers and sanderlings alike were discouraged by such shifts— flitting birds, however, sensed a greater darkness to evade. Disheartened beach–goers would gradually gather their garments and head for land, but the gods would not halt their duties to ensure their safety. If sand was to be sprayed with blood rather than salt, so be it.
⠀

Poseidon, steadily, began to see his brother in the psyche of the seafarer. Their eyes did not bear a similar shade or shape, but they were fervid with a zeal that Poseidon could not stomach. Zeus, a face that was far too intimate despite their avoidance, was now present in his mind. Was the man given Zeus's good fortune, with the measly task of catering Poseidon's enraged flame? Mortals could be casualties and pawn pieces alike. He wished to remind the seaman of the severity of a sea storm, to ensnare him in a whirlpool that did not cease from churning him to bits. The man and his brother were a blur, now. His great illusion was lost on Poseidon, until he spoke in an inflection that could only belong to one. The piteous ruler of the gods.
⠀
The pounding of thunder entwined with the whistling of air, and Poseidon stood stiffly as a witness of such transformation, unafraid. He was still with rage. His revered blood ran as cold as the arctic sea, and his eyes darkened with Zeus's commanded clouds. It had been his brother. Their souls had been reunited without Poseidon's consent, and the headman of the tides was upsetting the water without thought. His unrestrained temper was provoking the seas and the creatures that lurked beneath them. Sharks smelt for distant blood, fish scurried from the direction of hostile waves. Their god was angry, and he would not spare any life.
⠀
Zeus shed his dull rags for a cloak of truth, and Poseidon recoiled at the sight of his face. Never would it leave him, and such an act of deceit fed the god's ambitions for the throne. The ruler of Olympia was dressed in hissing flashes of lightning. He challenged Poseidon in the delight of his own domain, beckoning to pollute the only place that he could find peace. Poseidon would not allow it.
⠀

Poseidon retreated with one step to the water, and the tide had risen with such haste that it was pulling away the trinkets of humans. His jaw clenched, and with a slight curl of his fingers, the waters moved with it. "*Zeus*. You dare to approach me, *Here*? Hidden, shrunken under the guise of a feeble mortal?" His unfastened emotions forced the twitching of a grimace on his features, brought to fruition in disbelief.
⠀
The residents of the coast began to quiver, teetering between a frigid fear and unfathomable greatness. Limbs that longed to run were weighted by the sight, akin to the glory of angels descending from the heavens. Only these were no angels.
⠀
"You are the unchanged coward that you have always been. I do not run from you, brother. You wish to speak when no words remain for you on my tongue. Only initiative remains, that of which you lack." The waves were gargantuan and monstrous, now, and coming down with severity. At his desire, strands of water began to morph with a serpentine structure, winding around him and lifting him from the earth. The organic physics of water bent at his will, and it whispered to him as if it longed for his requests.
⠀
His physical form nearly shook with pulsating fury. There was no time to groom for the destruction to come, but Poseidon was, seemingly, always anticipating it. "A god that comes to me in the skin of a sheep is no king."
Terrence
Zeus's gaze met Poseidon's, ablaze with the wrath of a legion and something horribly rotten within him. The deep repugnance he felt for his brother clawed at his core, there was no cure for it. Not until Poseidon was plucked from the ocean, and discarded rightfully. The disdain in his brother's eye was an insolent glimmer of challenge. He watched Poseidon sink towards the sea, and as if it was a taunt, he took a sharp step forward.

This contempt, this betrayal, it did not weaken him; rather, it ignited an inferno of rage unknown to even him. He watched the tide rise before him, and in return a storm rolled in, forming far too close for mortal comfort. At his command, the clouds deepened in color, thick bolts of lightening forked throughout them. The air, charged with electricity, teased his skin with warmth, and in the prelude of the clash, Poseidon spoke. 

His brother, ever the instigator, behaved like a man with nothing to lose. With every word there was deepening anger, a fire blazed in his chest. With eyes deep as earth, for a moment he was still. Stiff against the horizon, lightening flickered at his finger tips. Unstable as he remembered him, he watched Poseidon unravel. 

Pathetic, and all too familiar. 

"I am the coward?" His words were followed by a scoff, "Look at you now. You shrink before where you feel safe. You mope around like a mutt that likes to be kicked."
 
At the behest of Zeus, the winds rose with fervor, twisting the clouds into dark funnels that swallowed mortals and burrowed into the sand. And there, at the heart of the tumult, Zeus ascended. With a wild heart and a hunger for vengeance, he listened as thunder boomed in the distance. The echoes of it ghosted throughout his veins, each rumble pumping with his blood. Before him was only a boy, brimming with emotion and far too much time on his hands. He was a pitiful image of a sea king, let alone one to lead the Gods. 

—

"*Poseidon.* King of a fraction of what is beneath me. Always confined to earth like the bottom feeder we know you to be." 

With challenging fury, Zeus unleashed the strength of the storm. The heavens split open, and torrential rains came lashing towards the earth. The wind, a sudden frenzied creature, roared to them. Its breath twisted through the sand, uprooting all that dared to stand in its path. Lightning fractured the sky, a spiderweb of anger to cast over the beach in stark, flashing silhouettes. 

"Did you forget yourself? Brother, I have *Never* Feared you. Your whole life you have wished to be better than me. Remember, *I* Am the reason you stand here now. Every morning you should thank me. Without *Me,* The sea would not belong to you. You would be nothing." 

He corrected himself. 

"You *Are* Nothing."

Without further warning, Zeus would strike. The air crackled with tension as he clenched his fist, extending an arm towards what he aimed demolish. From the brooding tempest above, a lightning bolt was born. Swift, fierce, and scornful. Crackling with unbridled fervor, it tore through the air like a beast hungry for flesh. Its jagged edges glowing with fury, ready to strike with a force to shatter all tranquility. In his face he showed no mercy, before him was what he planned to destroy. 

Until then, he could not be satisfied
Jill
*The sea and the sky can put on one hell of a show, can't they?*
_ _
It was once spoken on the fervid tongue of the charlatan sailor, and though Poseidon did not favor the sky's likeness to the sea, it could not be denied. If Poseidon and Zeus were to stand among men, rid of the smokescreen of mortality, then an execution of savagery would they witness. A sanctitude of theirs, however, could not be safely observed. One could not witness the wrath of a God and turn from it, unscathed and settled. Divinity was pestilential to mankind's inherent weakness. Abhorrence, like a cancer, waded throughout him and his relentless seas. The anguish of Zeus would not be enough— Poseidon yearned for what he always did, from the distant genesis of time.
_ _
It would be the day that humanity's abominable, modern society would know the twist of a true horror. The earth–shaker, lord of horses, patriarch of seas— Poseidon would be known, in the tallying of bodies and the pollution of water. Men would know who it is that they must pray to.
_ _

In the eyes of Zeus, there was a reflector of shared aversion. In such aversion, the two brothers were swindled of seeing their similarities— perhaps it was a willful ignorance, to not understand one another. The ocean's altered tide lifted him ardently, and with irony did such heights bring him closer to Zeus's own skies. Misshapen clouds were bordering on the hollow hues of blackness, as void as the uncharted pits of the sea. With each dash of lightning, Poseidon was certain that he could see its gleam in the restlessness of his brother's eyes. Zeus was blistering with heat, and Poseidon was disconcertingly chilled.
_ _
"You lack the spine to have come to me maskless. I stand in my own domain, and you wish to *Provoke* Me. You are more akin to the seaman than you know. A rambler that has regretfully pulled away from his course, and trekked in dire territory."
_ _
The young girl who had spent her time accumulating seashells was now cradled in the arms of her father. If Poseidon held interest, he would see that each bleached shell had been scattered involuntarily about the sand. She held him with such might that her skin had gone pale, and her complexion was flushed by the commotion of tears. As anticipated, her father wished to flee, but was preserved in the awe of the divine. His limbs were leaden, and the mass of the Gods was tenfold. Naivety, endearment, and trust— Poseidon lacked such virtues, and would drain it from the occupants of the shore. He peered down to the girl, decisive.
_ _

"I will not attend to the prayers of men, nor will I pardon any that have come here."
_ _
Then came the water.
_ _
In some contorted absurdity, the Fates must have been amused. The water came, from sea and sky the same. His voice, of an amplitude that would sway the mortal mind, emulated a clap of thunder as he spoke. It exceeded the bellow of the winds, and rang like a chime of death.
_ _
The rain pelted the weaker flesh, and the ocean thrusted to the seaside with the dread of a tsunami. Poseidon's skin was misted by it all, and soon, he was saturated— it dripped from him, flattening his hair and dousing his clothes. In this form, he recklessly balanced the familiarity of the storm and the thrashing of fury. His seas, without charity, enveloped the fright–stricken humans, impotent to the force of the tide. The consistency of lightning had become a faulty lighthouse, failing to have ushered them to safety.
_ _
A great bolt, concocted by Zeus with intent, probed the waters and shook him. It arrived with the potency of such detestable declarations, and Poseidon glowered, eyes wide with the nourishment of violence.
_ _
"I do not *Wish*! I am!"
_ _

Limbs were taken by the sea, and could not stay afloat to receive the treasures of air. With the upsurge of his rage, the earth began to quake.
_ _
"There, that is your damning defect. You cling to what you believe that you have earned! Eons have passed, and yet you are halted by entitlement. No longer will you be granted respite from me— this earth that I hold dominion over, it will know that you are no longer worthy of reverence."
_ _
The energy of electricity came against the ocean, and the wind graciously assisted the current. From afar, buildings quivered and hearts hastened by an omen they would soon know.
_ _
Poseidon spat, the salt–meddled seawater fluctuating around his form.
_ _
"You are a ludicrous stain on the value of Godlihood. Mortals shall utter hymns of your annihilation."
_ _
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