Part 26 (1/2)

As he reflected thus, Zeus' thought moved through L1 to L4. At the limit of L4 no one, not even Hera, could remain with him. On a far time-line, Alexander remotely heard the rumble of thunder, and s.h.i.+vered. Pan too heard it, as did anyone, everyone on all versions of the 'sphere. While Zeus moved up the registers, fewer and fewer kept pace with the fury and speed of the communication as he pushed higher and higher gathering up the entire Chronosphere into himself. He left all but One far behind. Still he kept driving up farther and farther where no G.o.d had been before.

Tension mounted like atomic plasma - acceleration upon acceleration - it was hardly bearable, even for him. Surely the very Earth itself would break rather than sustain this onslaught. Gaia shook. Her seas raged, Her mountains s.h.i.+vered, Her skies stormed. Her very centre heaved and Her tectonic plates slipped and s.h.i.+fted. The entire planet fell gradually to a violent shaking that threatened its very axis. A violent cosmic wind drove into the centre of the storm and promised to send the Earth into an oblivion far beyond its proper orbit.

At the very heart of the storm, in his very core, the Great Zeus increased his power and pushed the registers of time to the farthest edge of their limits - until he sensed what he sought.

'Enough! I hear you! Do not break the Universe to reach Me!'

There is no way of reproducing even a crude version of the true interaction that now occurred between - what and what? History communicating with Spirit? Life-Force with Creation. Past, present and future fusing, soaring into places beyond knowing, outside time, beyond universes? Beyond the stuff of myth!

Was what happened Zeus calling Yahweh? One Great G.o.d to another? Was it the core of Yahweh calling from within to Zeus the Great Deity on behalf of Creation. Was it life-force itself calling Creativity and Regeneration to heed its origins? Whatever it was, what happened next was to change the world for ever.

The world s.h.i.+fted its conceptual axis.

Invisibly.

Inexorably.

Actually.

For the next aeon, if the world was to last.

Zeus communicated with Yahweh for the first, only and last time!

Bizarrely, most mortals had more pressing preoccupations and did not notice that things had changed for ever!

Chapter 9.

It was a changed Zeus who eventually allowed his white-faced wife into the penthouse suite. Hera immediately entered a high-level meld with her husband, and once beyond the need to know he was intact after the dreadful shaking of the world, she attempted to prise from him, the full import of his work.

'I have melded with Yahweh!' His communication with Hera was less than the total of what had occurred. Hera saw she had only part of him. Although she had as much of him as she had always had, there was a new-grown part of him that was inaccessible.

'You are different, my husband. You are greater than you were.'

'Things have changed, wife. I have melded with Yhawhe!'

'What does it mean? Masterful one. Gaia spoke to us all, she shook with emotion, she frightened even the G.o.ds who know her so well.'

'It means my little cuckoo that half our work is done. This part was the hardest. I had to offer all of us, you hear me Hera! All! The Pantheon, everything! Even Chronos and Hades! Gaia Herself I gave!'

Well into a meld on L3 the Great Earth-Shaker, G.o.d of the skies, transferred some of his newness to his long-suffering spouse and sister. This G.o.ddess practised in the relations between men and women, male and female was shocked at what he had had to contribute to achieve his new trinity and she correctly guessed he let slip only the half of it.

'And in return? What did Yahweh bestow?'

'My heart's desire.' Zeus gathered his wife to his vast bosom. They reclined on a sofa entwined.

'He would have it as you would? The New Trinity?' Hera asked on L3.

'At the price as I have said.'

Alongside the increase Hera felt in her husband, there was a different authority in the nature of the meld as if there were parts beyond Zeus that led to places where she was unable to follow without his guidance.

'What does it mean My Lord?

'I only partly know myself. We have made a new settlement between us through which we add His might to our own and vice-versa. But we yet lack the third ingredient to make the Trinity whole - to make it work. To change the myth within, the one carried by mortals in themselves without the need for external symbols. So we can be free.'

'We work night and day on Ios for this,' replied Hera. Hephaestos, Ricardo and the woman Penelope work on the means. Myself, Thea and Mnemosyne work on the content. Others work on the dissemination.' She also privately wondered what exactly he really meant by being 'free'.

'Goes it well?'

'As well My Lord as it can.'

'What of the boy in Elysium? Has he brought Hades?'

'As we speak he comes. Themis, Athena and Ares will bring Chronos.'

'We must have him too.' Zeus' communication carried veiled warnings. 'You understand it must be complete, there must be no gaps for Time to leak out, no alternative timelines for mortals to follow. There is only one way now. I have melded with Yahweh. The thing is done for ever. We have no place else to go. All is given even that which I do not control. You must understand. ALL given. ALL! Hades and Chronos are crucial. The 2012 deadline remains. It is All or it is Nothing!'

Hera remained silent for a long while, she searched in their meld for more signs of the meaning of his meld with Yahweh. Some of the things he let her see were different from before. She saw a distinct s.h.i.+ft in perspective from the time of the defeat of the t.i.tans. Then the prospect from the top of Olympus showed the dominion of the Pantheon over the things of the Earth. It was a familiar outlook. It was how things were. Even with the view s.h.i.+fted to accommodate a modern, commercialised position from the top of the Olympic Tower, the aspect was in proportion to her relations with mortals. Everything fitted. Nothing was too fanciful, nothing was beyond one's grasp provided a little effort was made. Even now Europa's children could be brought back to a proper sense of proportion. Hades controlled the failures and held the ever burgeoning timelines under Zeus' control. But now there were new appearances she 'saw' through their meld. Her relations.h.i.+p with Gaia through the Pantheon had always denoted the outer boundaries of her universe. She of course knew there were other wider limits and probably other universes elsewhere, with ever wider borders, and ultimately no boundaries at all. Just time and s.p.a.ce, one ent.i.ty. Of these she paid no mind. They were interesting in their way but inaccessible and she left them to themselves. Now, in the meld she saw Gaia clearly as one among other similar Gaia's. There were other worlds, other populations of sentient beings. Doubtless other G.o.ds too. She saw through Zeus, part of Yahweh, was interested in the possibilities of these as new diversions. She was tempted, just a little but not really interested in following them up. He clearly had the intention one day to do so. She was too 'earthed' in Gaia. As part of something greater, she could see his temptation to abandon Her Earthly mortals and try elsewhere. But not as Himself. As part of this new Trinity. A renewed power of the Divine, fit to go a-hunting. Renewed thus he might well go. Well if he went it would be without her. She was too much part of Gaia and her offspring. So too were most of her closest companions, only Zeus would play-away, she thought. But he has given ALL. Must it therefore be that we all go too?

She searched the depths of the meld for clues. She found nothing immediately to help her. Without G.o.ds men were free to choose Gaia for themselves. This was right, this she was doing. But beyond Gaia she knew she would not go, even if she could. She would rest in the souls of people and speak to them from within. Happy with the idea, she snuggled into the breast of her Lord and let it be. Soon she would be back on Ios and at work.

Back at the Circle of Time, Hades came to meet Alexander.

It was a deliberate act.

Planned.

A strange thing in itself in a futureless realm. It betrayed something of the complexity of the nature of this much accused G.o.d.

He had spoken a long time with Persephone while Alexander gathered his hordes in Elysium.

'I know who and what I am.' He spoke quietly and with dignity. 'Only you know with what hurt and vexation I accepted the gift of the Underworld from my brother. I still cleave the hurt to myself, and I relish the revenge I will have. I keep it to savour on a distant timeline as a reminder.'

'A reminder - of what my dark one?' said Persephone. 'I cannot believe it's simply because of poor luck in the lottery of selected tasks after the t.i.tanic War - is it perhaps of other matters, perhaps more malicious? Do you challenge Zeus? Do we do it together as husband and wife? I need to know, I will be quizzed mercilessly on my return.'

'I do not know, wife. I do not yet know, and I may not ever be sure. It eats at me not knowing. You understand how at first I only wanted to swap this gift of the Underworld with any of my kin who would have it. But I was unable to strike a bargain. I was constantly told by the Pantheon, and several lesser G.o.ds, (which was worse) that I had something rare and rich; as rich in its way as the present world of Zeus. So I reluctantly took my place in Erebus. And I find I relish, nay I luxuriate in it. From the moment of my transition from Olympus I found it rich and full of variety. It was a totally new experience which never wanes. Indeed, I delight in every moment. My power is as absolute as only Zeus knows it. I have a universe of souls - all mine. There may not be future, but my past swells and swells and I now have more of the world than my brother. I can now switch the tables. I come up as Zeus goes down. Do you not revel in the delicious irony?'

'My Dark Lord. 'I too cherish the sharing the completeness of Tartarus, Erebus and Elysium. More than Zeus' empire of troublesome unknown quant.i.ties. I get pleasure from the gradual and inexorable building of richness of experience, good and bad, coming to you, the world pa.s.sed down for ever. Indeed it is glorious. So what if people made you and this world into something dark and awful? It's true, Tartarus, we must own, is a bit unpleasant. But you keep its lid well bolted down'.

'Aye Lady. So I do. I was right to have pity on Chronos and released him from his banishment among the defeated monsters of the War. That was no place for such a great king - even if he richly deserved it. He grasps the timelines still in his huge fist, and needed somewhere more comfortable for his task of eternal holding-on. If the remaining nastiness heaves and strains a little from the monotony of awfulness for its own sake, it is only natural. If I let one or two out from time to time to play at a little exercise, it shows the world what is really bottled in there, it keeps the balance. It shows the real value of things'.