Contents
Chapter 8: Men Who Kneel
Overview
Before the Titan missions launch, Persephone secretly meets Alexis, confirms their Hades–Demeter lineage, and urges her to embrace difficult power. Augustus gives Alexis a pager and demands she prioritize her safety, while Kharon overequips her. Artemis arrives, reassigns their hunt to Rome, and imposes a new Titan-tagging decree, signaling escalating war after Medusa’s escape.
Summary
On the predawn of her first Titan assignment, Alexis leaves her room and is intercepted by Persephone, who arrives in smoke with a sleeping dragon. Persephone embraces Alexis, confirms she carries the blood of Hades and Demeter through Persephone’s father Iasion, and frames their lineage as powerful yet hard to control. She urges Alexis to embrace difficult power, then vanishes to avoid federation detection.
Alexis reaches the atrium where Assembly members prepare. Augustus kneels, gives her a pager to summon help, and demands she prioritize her safety over all else, pressing a possessive, threatening insistence and a tender forehead kiss. Patro and Achilles interrupt; Augustus and Patro trade barbs about competence and Alexis’s past.
Kharon steps in, loads Alexis with extra holsters, weapons, and Titan handcuffs despite her protests, asserting he will decide what’s necessary for her protection. The charged dynamic among Augustus, Kharon, Patro, and Achilles leaves Alexis conflicted as she jokes with Drex about their odds.
Artemis arrives in a crack of power-laden red mist, announcing Hades and Ares are tracking abnormal Titan activity in Australia. She dispatches teams: Agatha and Drex to Canada, Augustus elsewhere in South America, and reassigns Alexis with Patro and Achilles to a Titan sighting inside Rome’s protected zone. Notably, Artemis’s mist engulfs Kharon but avoids Augustus and Achilles.
Artemis issues a new federation decree: captured Titans must be tagged through the lower lip with engraved identifiers. She warns that Medusa’s actions have accelerated war, the federation is watching, and they must capture or die trying, then departs, leaving dread hanging as the teams move out.
Who Appears
- Alexis (Hercules)Protagonist; confirmed daughter of Persephone, struggling with fear as missions begin.
- PersephoneSecretly visits; claims Alexis as daughter of Hades–Demeter lines; urges embracing difficult power.
- AugustusPossessive husband; gives pager, demands Alexis prioritize safety; protective and threatening.
- KharonOverequips Alexis with weapons and cuffs; controlling, protective; targeted by Artemis’s mist.
- PatroMentor; taunts Augustus, asserts capability; assigned with Alexis to Rome.
- AchillesMentor; receives coordinates; Artemis’s mist avoids him; tense, glaring at Alexis.
- ArtemisDelivers assignments, imposes Titan-tagging rule, warns of escalating war, and departs.
- DrexComrade; anxious about the mission; assigned with Agatha to Canada.
- AgathaAssembly member; receives Canadian coordinates; continues rigorous preparation.
- NyxAlexis’s serpent companion; provides sardonic, adoring asides amid tension.