Time Remaining: 2 Days
Zeus had many sons - Apollo and Hermes had been infants during the Titanomachy, the result of flings with the titans Leto and Maia, respectively, before Zeus betrayed and imprisoned their families. Ares and Hephaestus had been the fruit of Zeus's marriage to his sister, Hera, after the Titanomachy. After them, Zeus had begun siring children by mortals, often dipping multiple times into the same gene pool. Heracles' mother, Alcmene, had been one of Zeus's countless great grandchildren. Alcmene's demigod grandfather, Perseus, had certainly done Zeus proud, and her father Electryon had even born some of Zeus's more remarkable traits, but Alcmene herself had been unremarkably mortal. Despite that, when Zeus decided to revisit Perseus's bloodline one night, the result had been the powerful demigod Heracles.
Of all the sons of Zeus, Heracles fell the closest to the tree – at least that’s what his father said – but at the end, he was still mortal, like Perseus, rather than immortal, like Apollo. Over a hundred years, his dark brown hair had grayed, his prodigious god muscles – his most memorable and praised trait – were now barely a rival for his half-brother, Ares. His back hurt from years carrying the same ridiculously over-sized club, and he relied more and more on the Nemean lion’s pelt to protect him from injury – he wasn’t as fast as he once was. Heracles was an old man, and he knew that better than anyone else.
At one time, Heracles would have been happy for that. He’d murdered his own wife and children in a fit of blind rage, and once he’d honored their memory with a lengthy penance, he was ready to join them in the afterlife.
But then his father had come to him and broken the bad news – there was no afterlife. The dead did not travel to Elysium, or Hades, or Tartarus - the people there were still very much alive. The dead traveled somewhere else... or perhaps nowhere at all. Zeus didn’t know, and for that reason he’d fought tooth and nail to ensure a long and healthy future for himself. Anything to forestall oblivion. While Zeus didn’t really care that much about most anyone else, he’d always had a special love for Heracles. When he’d shared the truth with his son, it had crushed the man, but then Zeus had given him a new faith, a new mission – to become immortal, and to become a vessel for the divine power that would make him an Olympian.
To that end, Zeus had given him some of his most dangerous and challenging labors. His latest task, however, came from his sister, Athena. Zeus had long ago required something from Athena, some girl’s location, Heracles was fairly sure, and in exchange Athena had asked for one favor from Zeus’s favorite son, no questions asked. Now, decades later in Heracles’s twilight years, Athena had finally called in that favor.
Today’s labor – infiltration and assassination. Athena was sending her personal mercenaries into Tartarus to extract the legendary Titan, Prometheus. Heracles's task was to help the mercenaries get to Prometheus, then kill the lot of them, making it appear that he'd prevented the release of a dangerous criminal.
Athena's agents were not the sort that Heracles normally worked with. The man, Odysseus, was somewhere between a rogue and a nerd; a bookish scoundrel. The woman, Penelope, was his newlywed wife –and while she hadn’t been a burden on their travel, Heracles didn’t really see what she had to contribute to their quest, beyond carrying Athena’s owl around so that the goddess could monitor their progress. A job was a job though, so he'd lead them down into the underworld, put old Prometheus out of his misery, kill the human witnesses, and let the owl watch.
The Acheron was a generally unremarkable river, save for being exceptionally dark. Even on the sunniest, clearest days one couldn’t see anything more than two feet under the water. Maybe that was why Odysseus had ‘cleverly’ deduced that the entrance to the underworld must be on the river bed. The reality was much more mundane. Heracles walked a ways down the river’s bank, found a particularly large boulder right on the water, and heaved it into the water.
“Ah ha!” Odysseus said, “You’re damming the river so that we can reach the secret entrance!”
Herakles rolled his eyes and pointed to the hillside from which he’d plucked the boulder – there was a large opening into the hill, like an open wound in the Earth.
“I see,” Odysseus nodded as he pulled out a torch, “Well done. Good thing we brought you along.”
Athena’s owl took off and flew into the cave opening first. That was fine with Herakles – escorting a dumb animal wasn’t part of his contract. If it flew headlong into some horrific monstrosity, he’d be spared the creature’s creepy, piercing stare. Two hoots sounded from inside, and Odysseus cautiously led his girl into the cave. This was going to be a tedious escort mission.
The back door to Tartarus led to a spiraling stone staircase that wound around the inside of a deep hole, descending into the dark bowels of the Earth. The stairs were so old they could have been mistaken for a natural formation – millennia of dripping water had eroded them in some places, and laid down calcite deposits in others. The hole also didn't descend perfectly straight down, making the descent disorienting.
By his reckoning, it was a hundred, maybe two hundred feet down. He decided to toss his torch down into the hole and count how long it took it to stop. It didn’t fall too long – maybe three and a half seconds – he could still do that. Without any further explanation to his traveling companions (who seemed more uncomfortable with the steps now that they could see the bottom), Heracles hopped off his step and fell feet first.
His impact cracked the stone where he landed, and released a boom that rolled up through the staircase. Dust and gravel sprinkled down from above. It also rattled him a bit more than he’d expected – he really needed to find that cure for mortality. Fortunately, the two kids couldn’t see him stumble when he landed, or see him wincing now from the cramps it had caused in both legs. He sat down on the bottom step, pulled out part of his lunch, and waited for the lesser mortals to catch up. The creepy bird flew down to perch on a step on the opposite side of the hole and stare at him with its piercing eyes. Partly to allay his own discomfort being alone in the bottom of a deep hole with a bird that kept looking at him like food, Herakles began singing bawdy songs to pass the time. When Odysseus reached the bottom he was livid.
“Don’t like my taste in music, huh?” Herakles said, “I guess I should apologize – I forgot there were ladies present.”
Penelope, still standing on one of the steps, reached out and smacked Heracles upside the back of the head, “We are SNEAKING into a VERY DANGEROUS place, and you are making enough noise to wake the dead – which right now, is something to actually worry about.”
“Look, sweet cheeks, don’t tell me how to do my job...” Heracles said.
“My name’s Penelope. That is the only name you will address me by.”
Heracles laughed, “Right, well, I don’t really care babe, I’ll pretty much call you whatever or whenever I want. You can slap me if you want – I don’t mind, but you’ll probably break your wrist.”
Penelope stormed past him, and Odysseus didn’t say a word.
“What? You’re not going to defend her honor? Tell me not to talk to your girl that way?” Heracles tried to bait him.
Odysseus looked at him calmly, “No.”
“Too afraid of me?”
“No, I’m too busy thinking of ways to murder you,” Odysseus said.
Heracles laughed, “Good luck with that. Stronger men than you have tried to kill me!”
“But have any smarter men tried?” Odysseus asked. The two men stared at each other for a moment before the owl took off down the tunnel they’d reached. Odysseus calmly walked after his wife and the owl.
The tunnel was a long, wide, slightly downward-sloping shaft with almost no breeze to move the stale air around them. Even Herakles was bothered by that – it was like being buried alive. At last, the shaft reached a large atrium, which itself did have a cross breeze, thanks to two other larger tunnels entering it on either side. The domed ceiling housed something that produced a steady red glow that lit the area.
“Where are we?” Odysseus whispered.
“The crossroads of hell,” Heracles said, “Those tunnels continue on for miles in each direction opening up to the surface in different places – the one to the left goes all the way out to Cape Tainaron. But our destination is that gate straight across the room.”
“The one guarded by the giant, three-headed dog?” Penelope asked quietly. Indeed, straight across the way – less than a hundred feet from them, was a massive slumbering beast. It looked to be well over a thousand pounds, probably closer to two thousand, making it bigger than most bears. And quite unlike bears it had three large heads with thick jaws. Its coloration and the shape of its heads immediately reminded Odysseus of the creatures that had nearly killed him in North Africa, but that’s where any similarity ended. Its fore limbs looked to be especially powerful. Its shoulders flanked a high, arching back, with a thick mane that seemed to writhe.
“Huh,” Odysseus said, “Cerberus is actually a thing.”
“Three heads to watch three doors,” Heracles nodded, “Plus all the snake heads.”
“Snake heads?” Penelope asked, “What snake heads?”
“That mane on his back isn’t made out of fur,” Heracles said.
“Right, so how did you get past him last time?” Odysseus asked.
“Last time? Last time I came down here to get him. I didn’t need to get past him, I wrestled him, leashed him, and dragged him back to the fool who’d paid me to do it.”
“So this won’t be a problem then?”
“Well, he was smaller last time we met, but I don’t have to take him alive this time, so that makes life simpler.”
“You’re going to kill him?” Penelope asked, “Isn’t he just doing his job?”
Heracles shrugged, “So am I.” The demigod walked out into the center of the room, looked back and forth for a moment, stepped back four steps, and then banged his club on the stone ground. The sound echoed in the large room, and all three of Cerberus’s heads shot up to attention. When they saw Heracles the beast launched into motion and ran straight at him. It came to a sudden halt just a foot short of Heracles, however, when it hit the end of its chain.
“Hades didn’t even get you a new chain, did he?” Heracles said, “Well, let’s get this over with.” He hefted his club and swung it over hand for a mighty blow, but Cerberus’s central head reared back and caught the club in its powerful jaws – even a decade ago, Heracles's swing would have sent those teeth flying through the air like shrapnel, but now Heracles fought to hang onto the weapon as the dog twisted and shook its central head side to side. The other two heads opened their jaws wide, and revealed long snake-like creatures where their tongues should have been. One of them struck far enough to sink its fangs into Herakles’s leg, and dragged him close enough that the larger mouth was able to sink its teeth in as well. Herakles shouted in anger and pain.
Adresteia swooped around the edge of the room, skirting the fight and landing next to the door.
“We’re just going to leave him?” she asked.
Odysseus bid her move quietly around the room while Herakles tussled with the beast. They’d nearly made it to the door when the nearest head took notice of them and started barking.
“Follow my lead!” Odysseus said as he took off running. Penelope ran after him without question. Cerberus finally tossed Herakles aside and charged at the couple. Odysseus slammed his spear into the iron loop Cerberus was chained to, and threw all of his weight behind it. Penelope threw herself into Odysseus, and the combined force behind the spear pried the loop apart, popping the chain. Odysseus rolled to his feet and pulled Penelope behind him as he brought his spear up. Cerberus slowed his charge to an indecisive trot.
“Come on,” Odysseus said, brandishing his spear, “You can fight us until your master comes down to see what’s going on, or you can run for it while you have the chance. Go chase some cattle, or find a nice green tree to mark.”
Cerberus looked at them, looked at the tunnels, looked back at them, and then took off down one of the tunnels running as fast as any horse.
“That was your plan?” Penelope smacked the back of his shoulder, “How could you possibly know that was going to work?”
“Hey, like I said before, the only reason to chain a dog to your porch is if it won’t stay in the yard.”
Herakles dragged himself to his feet and limped over. The man had been thoroughly trounced by the guard dog, and the bite on his left leg looked pretty nasty, but none of his injuries seemed to be life-threatening. He wrapped a cloth bandage around his leg while Odysseus and Penelope solved the puzzle that served as a lock for the gates into Tartarus. When they found the right combination, Odysseus pulled out the handle at the center of it, twisted it ninety degrees, and pushed it back in.
The door rumbled open.
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