There’s a saying in this world, it doesn’t matter how strong or powerful or godlike we may be, all our tales end with eternal judgement by the fallen God in the ice cold throne.
The eternal Fate of everyone who lives in this world is to die.
But what happens when you defy fate and survive death itself?
My father once told me a tale of the Ghost of Arcadia, a once loyal warrior of Zeus who escaped Tartarus itself time and time again for vengeance against the Gods betrayal.
Yet every time he escaped the underworld, he left a little part of his soul behind. And in the end, when the Gods finally grew bored of his visits and dispatched him once and for all, he was but a soulless monster put out of his misery.
Just like the man who mentored him became.
Peter Durante was a man unafraid of death who would run into danger without the slightest hesitation. He’d survived the war against the Elders, he’d survived the brutal adjustment period of the Gods so he thought nothing could ever take him down.
Maxwell had barely begun working with him before some junkie shot him right between the eyes. Another casualty of the streets until one week later, he rocked up outside Maxwell’s home with a tiny hole the only evidence he’d ever been hurt.
Every few months, the cycle would continue. He would be cut down, throat slit, burnt alive, beaten to death and within the week, he’d miraculously resurrect. The man who defied death because the world needed a savior.
But every time he came back, Peter was a little angrier, a little darker, more violent and destructive. Those he would have beaten up before he nearly killed, the sweet soulful savior became a violent vigilante as more and more of his soul began to fade away.
By the time my father had to put him down, he began to attack innocents over victimless crimes, a shadow of his former self.
Because you can survive death and the underworld if you’re strong and determined enough but you’ll always come back less then you once were.
And Drewitt, can you truly say you’re the same person you were before that fateful night in the Groves or is something missing inside?
That single bullet didn’t just temporarily take away memories, it caused a kink in the woven strings of your fate that the universe will need to fix.
Teddy won’t be the first to try and end the Explorer’s life, it’ll keep happening again and again and every time you’ll end up on that slab with your fate still in flux.
Tombstone can’t help you, Charon wouldn’t ferry you and I don’t even know if Hades himself could grant you what you need.
Because the moment you followed his greed for Ambrosia was the moment the universe lost Faith in you.
Cherish what you left Drewitt because not even a hero can save you now.
Even if I would.