Chapter 6: The Choice Made

“Time is what we want most, but what we use worst.”

— William Penn, Some Fruits of Solitude (1693). Copyright © public domain.

Time was a funny thing to Gaia. Whether it was years, decades, centuries, millenia, or eons could have passed all around her, and she would have known.

What she did know is what concerned her the most. From her children’s dealing with Cronos, after the consumption of Aether, Cronos had been a model ruler.

He had helped broker a peace between Oceanus and Pontus, he gave others room to create, he did not interfere unless called, and while he did not dote on his daughters, he had not consumed them either.

With what she heard, the more she considered the matter, the more she began to wonder if plotting with Rhea for the downfall of Cronos was the right thing or not.

These sort of thoughts led her back to the Underworld’s gloomy ground.

Night and Earth would meet once more to sate Mother Earth’s need for wisdom. They were both older than the ground beneath their feet.

Mother Night stood beneath a firmament of cosmic black speckled with faint lights and unnatural hues.

Nyx’s gown mirrored the sky but also the night of its mistress. Diamond starlight were scattered throughout. At her throat rested a necklace of liquid shadow. When she breathed, the stars caught in her gown’s folds pulsed faintly.

Gaia stopped just behind Nyx. These Primordials did not spend as much time with one another as they should. After all, they are siblings, but where Gaia’s future had been above with the Titans, Nyx’s was down below with the Chthonic children of the Underworld.

Nyx regarded her visitor carefully for a moment. When she recognized who had come, she spoke in a welcoming manner.

“You have come a long way, Sister,” Nyx remarked.

Her voice was spoken with an airy depth. She was the Night. To have an expansive abyss-like quality to even her manner of speech was not only natural for her but expected.

Gaia smiled before she inclined her head. This was the Underworld. While Gaia still had authority in the Living Realm, this was the Underworld, and it was to Nyx that she gave respect.

Perhaps, there would be a King of the Underworld someday. After all, the service had a male ruler, but until that day, it was to Nyx that Gaia looked to with respect.

“Yes, and I apologize. I know it has been quite some time.”

Nyx did not respond quickly. She considered her Primordial sibling attentively.

“What causes turmoil within you?” Nyx asked.

“What makes you believe I am troubled?” Gaia asked, curious.

Nyx almost let out a laugh. She turned fully. This served two functions for her. The both of them could examine one another better, and Nyx could comfortably converse with her sister. No matter the order, how many children they bore, or the events occurring on any part of Chaos’ creation, they were siblings.

“I know you, Gaia. I think I am one of the few beings in existence that can tell when something is on your mind.”

The Earth Primordial let out a long breath.

“My son is king. He wrongs very few, and I believe he is repentant of the wrongs he has done,” Gaia started.

She did not let out another sigh. Instead, she looked to Nyx, who seemed to be encouraging with a listening look about her. This encouraged Gaia more than anything else to continue speaking.

“Rhea is bearing children. The other Titans have expanded their dominions. All the errors of life seem to be made right in them.”

“Is this not all as you intended all those years ago when you came seeking my daughters’ advice?” Nyx wondered.

The question was not a reminder, nor was it asked as a way to keep score. Nyx cared for Gaia, so there was no ulterior motive to the asking other than to make sure that Nyx could understand. Once she had comprehension of her sister’s concerns, then (and only then) would Nyx offer any advice.

“It is,” Gaia answered. “I worried that the kingship would breed problems for Cronos and make him overreach and become cruel like his father, but it has not.”

Gaia shook her head and rubbed her temple.

“All that I might have wished for my children has come to pass and more. There’s a golden peace where we all might live forever. And yet, I feel sorry for myself, conflicted about what I should be doing.”

She held herself back from revealing the depths of the prophecies at play here. Gaia was not sure what it would mean to try and trick the Fates or force their predictions to come true. Further still, she did not want to involve Nyx.

Gaia had only trusted Rhea in this endeavor because she loathed Cronos. He was unfairly unjust to her, and that was motivation enough for Rhea to follow Gaia into whatever tumultuous events they planned.

“And you have come, seeking counsel?” Nyx asked.

Gaia had stopped speaking, and the Primordial of Night suspected that there would be more that needed to be said, but she would not push. Motherhood was a complicated situation. Nyx knew that more than most. All of her children had different needs, so this was the same to her.

When Gaia nodded, Nyx did her best to speak.

“I doubt I could direct you better than my daughters. It is their power to see events, not mine.”

“I do not mean to dabble in prophecy in this issue anymore,” Gaia said.

That was true enough, but a deeper truth was that she feared involving herself with the Fates more. They told her that they would not reveal the destinies of others to her, and the fact that they had brought down Ouranos told Gaia to be cautious.

Those were reasons enough to not seek them out. They were too dangerous to seek instruction on how to navigate the path ahead.

“But you are my sister, Nyx. By every measurement, you are my equal, so if there was anyone who might offer me advice...”

“It would be me,” Nyx finished. “We are both ancient, but we have lived different lives, Sister. What makes you imagine that I might have an answer that you do not,”

“Because you have a different perspective,” Gaia said quickly. “Maybe there’s a pattern to all of this that your daughters see, but I want help, not to become someone’s slave or try to command another.”

A flash of pain and cold words exchanged burned out from Nyx’s mind.

“Neither I, nor my daughters, created the pattern that you want help through,” Nyx said. “And it sounds like you’re a child in need of advice, not guidance from a sister.

“Then who should I see?”

Nyx turned her head and lifted her right hand. A tall archway of dark stone came from the ground of the Underworld. In the area that should have only had air, there was an inky, liquid blackness that writhed with unpredictable life.

“I know that...” she breathed, barely getting the words out. “That leads to—”

“Our creator,” Nyx said distantly.

Gaia could not know all the depths and pains Nyx had had with their shared sire. After all, while Gaia had been close to her children, Nyx had been close to the Progenitor.

“Go to them, and I am certain that they will give you truth.”

Gaia’s gaze flicked to Nyx before bouncing to the entrance. She was unsure of this path. As far as she knew, no one had gone to the Progenitor since the creation of all things. Even then, the Primordials were born, and then they were pushed from Chaos’ Realm.

Nyx turned to allow her sister to make the choice.

The arch shuddered when Gaia’s barky hand touched the entrance. The dark portal flexed and then the surface stilled into perfect emptiness.

Gaia stepped into the arch.

Regardless of what was coming, she needed answers for her fears.

Sending Gaia to their predecessor might have been a mistake.

Nyx could not know for certain, but she could recognize the confusion and hurt in Gaia. She was struggling with Olympus. Whatever Cronos and the Titans were doing, it was having a tangible effect on the Earth Primordial.

That much of it was clear.

However, Nyx was not acclimated to all of the news and going-ons of the Living Realm. Her daughters would be a good source for help, but Gaia communicated that she was against that path.

If Nyx was too obsessed with Chaos that Chaos would send Nyx to speak to the Fates, maybe Gaia was too obsessed with the Fates, and the smartest thing Nyx could do was get Gaia to look to a higher power for answers.

It was the best she could think of. Nyx hoped she had made the right choice.

She did not know what to expect when she entered. It had been a long time since she had been born in this Realm. Emptiness would have made the most sense. After all, what could possibly exist outside of the fabric of materiality?

It was like imagining someone outside space and time. Gaia knew it was possible. If there was a maker, they would have to be above their creation and entirely capable of interacting with it.

For all of her thinking of the Progenitor, Gaia found that Chaos’ Realm was neither empty nor still, for it seethed with a life entirely alien to the lands of Greece.

When her attention returned to herself, Gaia found that she stood upon a mass of white stone that worked as a platform for Chaos as well as any visitor. She supposed that she was the visitor. Above the Primordial Queen, whatever passed for the sky (for it was not a heavens designed by Ouranos) moved with serpentine coils of light and darkness. It extended endlessly into the abyss of nowhere to become nothingness.

And there, at the center of it all, was Chaos.

They hovered over the edge of the platform. The churning mass of the sky seemed to react to Gaia but far more so to the complete and incomplete being that stared out at nothing. Their gray skin was sleek like a wet tree branch beneath the changing, casting tints of the domain. They alternated between masculine and feminine outlines. Their limbs were solid one moment and dissipating into shadow and mist the next.

Light, darkness, matter, antimatter, solid, liquid, gas, and every variation in between had a hold on the form of the creator of Greece. It might have been something for Gaia to marvel at if only she had not been born to and by this magnificent being.

Their face was devoid of definition for anyone to latch onto. The vague suggestion of eyes told Gaia where they might be looking. A quiet gravity emitted from their personage.

The Earth Primordial understood why in a way the Titans or lesser Chthonic beings could never know. Chaos was the Realm, and the Realm was Chaos. They were one. If one were to destroy this landscape, they would destroy Chaos. If one were to destroy Chaos, they would destroy the Realm.

Chaos turned toward her.

“Ah ... Welcome, Gaia. You have returned to the source of your creation. Though,” they added with mild confusion. “Your return was not anticipated.”

Their voice did not sound like normal speech. The pronouncement of words was more of a reverberation made by a choir of voices overlapping into one utterance that buried beneath the skin until it rippled through the veins to find the ear of the listener.

“Regardless,” Chaos went on. “It has been millenia since you have graced my dominion with your presence.”

Gaia stood tall, for that was all she could do. The sound of the Progenitor caused a shiver to run up and down her spine at irregular intervals.

“Has it?” Gaia barely got out.

“Since the birth of Ouranos, you have inhabited the Mortal, Living Realm,” Chaos replied.

There was no judgment in their words; neither was their tone scornful or indulgent. There was a quality to it that bothered Gaia.

“Now, you return to your maker,” Chaos observed. “For what reason?”

Gaia hesitated. Was there a correct answer to the question? She could not know. Beyond that, this was not the Progenitor they remembered.

After speaking with Nyx, Gaia had expected some sort of warmth from the originator off the divine. Chaos’ gaze, however, was hollow. Their words were detached. There was nothing of pride or love or empathetic kindness.

Gaia had to force herself to speak. Out of all of her conceptualizations of Chaos, this was not the outcome she had expected.

“I’ve come to discuss Cronos,” Gaia choked out

What was the most important crisis occurring on Olympus barely seemed to make a mark on the creator of the divinities.

“A trivial matter,” Chaos remarked apathetic.

Gaia restrained a glare. For her problems to be considered small made her burn with loathing.

“Trivial?” Gaia got out.

“As you are aware, I created this part of existence, Gaia, it was I who made you and your Primordial siblings, and I shall make more facets of existence,” Chaos remarked. “And yet, despite the immensity you know I possess, you would wish to speak to me of succession?”

Gaia flinched back. To be chastised over seeking counsel was not the result that should have come of this meeting. She was a daughter to Chaos. This would not do.

A flash of annoyance at her nightly sister crossed her mind. Had Nyx known this was how Chaos would treat her?

“Well, yes,” Gaia said, unsure.

For the first time in centuries, she was unsure. She looked to the floor of the platform. None of the transformative nature of the domain held any true wonder for her. The area made her long for the steady constance of her soily earth in the Living Realm.

“Cronos has ruled well...” she went on.

She struggled to find the words. The feelings of inadequacy were overtaking her in a manner unlike ever before. To just stand before the Progenitor and feel unworthy was the epitome of failure. For the Primordial Queen, there was no greater calamity than this moment.

“Despite his poor decisions with his half-brother, he has brought peace to his dominion. He’s done well as a ruler. There’s stability; there’s happiness. And yet...” she continued on despite her hesitancy. “I made a vow to work with Rhea in removing him from power. Now I worry that I may have been too quick in agreeing to work with her. I am uncertain if I should move against him.”

For all the words spoken by Gaia, Chaos regarded her in silence.

“And you have come to me, after millennia, to seek permission?” Chaos wondered.

“I—” Gaia stopped.

There it was again. The dismissive inquiry, the disappointed cadence, the indifferent demeanor to all that Gaia found important. It all deserved to be challenged.

But then, a sudden, stinging sensation on her palm made her glance down. She found a thin cut with a single drop of golden ichor.

“What the...? Did you do this to me?”

“Did you imagine that you could enter this place without consequence?” Chaos wondered blandly. “To come to this Realm, life essence of the divine is required.

“I am your daughter!”

“You are a visitor today. Potentially an interloper tomorrow,” Chaos remarked offhandedly to the exclamation. “The price is a small one to open the boundary between realms.”

Gaia sighed. When the air left her mouth, she allowed the intrusion of her ichor. She had come for advice, and she would not be distracted by mild pain, and the costs to entering Chaos’ Realm.

“I apologize, but I need to know how best to handle the situation of my offspring.”

“Apologies are beneath you,” Chaos rebuked. “I created you to steward the lands of my making You were to hand down authority from one generation to the next without it consuming your life...”

Gaia’s eyes narrowed. “What are you saying?”

“A steward is one that takes care of things. Generations are a father to a son,” Chaos said. “A mother to a daughter. That is the order of things.”

Gaia’s breath caught. For her creator to sum her up in simple sentences and be no more worried about it than most are concerned about the weather unsettled the Primordial.

“Is that all I am? To you? To existence?”

“No one is only their design,” Chaos answered. “I may have made you to shape the earth, but this was only the outline of your personage. What you choose to be defines the rest. Queen. Grandmother. Lover. Friend. Fighter. Or simply an observer. You are as you choose to be.”

Gaia’s mouth opened, but no words emerged.

“You seek my counsel, Daughter,” Chaos continued, “because you already know the answer you want to make in your heart. If you wish to be more than your design for the cycle, then conduct yourself accordingly.”

“You would have me betray my son?”

“I would have you choose.”

Gaia stepped forward in annoyance at her parent, but Chaos lifted a hand like a leaf in the breeze.

The realm around the two seemed to collapse. A twisting pull stole Gaia away in a stumbling mess.

When she opened her eyes and had control over her faculties, she found herself standing upon the sunlit grass of her island.

She turned her head to look all around herself. How in all of creation did Chaos do that? Before she even could consider the question more, Gaia stared down at her hand. The cut had already begun to close.

It was apparent how the Progenitor had done what they had done. They had created everything. Clearly, it would be an easy feat to dismiss Gaia.

The Earth Primordial found herself staring out at the ocean. Thoughts of a castrated Ouranos flashed through her mind. She considered the words of Chaos that lingered within her mind.

“No one is only their design.”

Regardless of the intentions of Ouranos and Gaia for their children, they had become far more than either of them had intended. Maybe that was what Chaos was inferring in a roundabout way.

That she had doubts about harming Cronos could be all that was required for Gaia to stop herself from this usurpation of her son.

After all, she could not be despondent like Chaos or cruel in parentage like Ouranos. No ... Gaia was steadfast and patient. She was the Earth Primordial.

She could not play favorites. To choose one child over the other would be wrong. Unfortunately, this meant she would have to displease her daughter. However, displeasing Rhea was nowhere near as final as deposing Cronos.

The child would understand. She could forgive. She was young.

And after all, Rhea had lain with Ouranos. The least she could do was being understanding of Gaia.

Cronos paced back and forth in his private chambers within the halls of his palace.

For all his rage at his father and his wife for their infidelity, it seemed that time had dulled that even that most grievous of wounds. He had helped cultivate a Greece that his father would never recognize. The enormity of his day to day decisions after becoming king were weighing more heavily upon him.

From helping his brothers make wonders to consuming Aether, the Titan King was starting to wonder if he was making the right choices.

When he cherished his time with Rhea in what he believed to be lovemaking, he found himself content with life. There was joy in the union for him. He could find himself blissful with what he had. The past had no hold on him in those small instances.

When his mind went to Rhea’s first child, he had ruin his own happiness. With Aether, Cronos had good reason to consume him. Ouranos’ taint needed to be removed from the world.

The act had been entirely necessary.

His current predicament was not the same as it was not demanded of him.

Hades, as Cronos heard Rhea call the child, had done nothing wrong to him. He was the proper son of Cronos. Was this not what he had wanted all along?

If Cronos did to Hades what he had done to Aether, he would be doing far more than an injustice to his actual heir. He may very well be playing into the hands of the Fates. But if he gave Hades the throne, would he not be giving into their hands anyway? Was there a right choice to make?

He did not want to be manipulated, but even as he thought on the subject, he recognized some facets of unfairness in himself. Hades appeared so alike to a young Cronos. Is that not what he had always wanted? Children with Rhea had been his deepest, truest dream before it had been stolen away by Ouranos’ selfish appetites.

As the moment of genuine thought was passing over him, Cronos could not believe himself. Even still, after all these years, the actions of his father still haunted the Titan King and his reign.

He wrestled with the decisions he might make, the consequences of those choices, and where it would all lead. He could not find an acceptable answer.

Strangely, for all of his thinking of actions he might take, he never considered the alternative that the Fates were right. Not because he was adverse to their wisdom, but rather because it made him confront a dangerous truth: He was not meant to rule.

In the end, he was torn between his fear of prophecy on one hand while not becoming a monster like his father on the other hand. Those were the only probabilities worth considering, and so they dominated his mind.

It might have been easier to just let go. Try as he did to not consider that reality, the strife would be over if he simply relinquished his throne.

The problem was that it was not so simple anymore. Reality had expanded since the days of Ouranos. There was the Great Flame in the sky. The seas were teaming with nymphs thanks to Oceanus and Tethys. It was a world taking shape rather than the outline Ouranos had dominion over.

Taking a moment, Cronos stopped pacing. He believed this pause would help him think.

The room was silent save for the whispers of his conflicted conscience. Cronos leaned back and fixed his gaze toward the ceiling. The answers were not there, but he searched for them as if they were.

The dancing torch flame mirrored the flicker of doubt in his heart. For every choice, he knew there would be repercussions. Someone would judge him harshly no matter what he did, and this led him to what he believed to be the most incontrovertible fact: There was no solution to the dilemma.

Expelling the air from his lungs, decisiveness overtook him. He went to the nursery in deliberate steps.

He had not gone into the room often because his children brought him no joy. His daughters were a reminder that Rhea had not bore him a son, and thinking of a son only made Cronos imagine the prophecy. It all seemed to compound on itself.

Three girls had been raised in the room that he found himself staring at.

He felt no threat from them because the Fates had foretold that only his son could depose him. The girls were innocent in all of the events going on around Olympus. Harming them would be immorality itself because, in the end, they had done nothing wrong, and ... he had to begrudgingly admit that they were his daughters. They deserved to be princesses on Olympus.

All thoughts of daughters and family and royalty and even kindness vanished from the Titan King when he grew closer to the child. Proximity to his son seemed to bring everything into reality all the more for the ruler of Olympus.

Looking upon Hades, Cronos saw himself in the small, helpless deity. He was entirely helpless and trusting of his surroundings. He had been brought into the world; his innocent mind and soul would not be able to conceive of an unjust cruelty being brought down onto him for the simple crime of existing.

When Cronos looked the child in the eyes, he found himself asking a question to himself. Was Hades not his child as well? Did he not deserve the same empathy that the daughters had been given?

Should not a child be given its parents adoration and affection freely? No cost could be required for a son to be loved by his father.

Caressing his son’s cheek with a soft slowness, Cronos considered what it would mean to consume him as he had Aether.

Hades was his son, unlike Aether. Ouranos had done wrongs to Cronos, and Aether was an extension of those crimes. Hades was the spawn of Cronos, and he had committed no transgression against his father. On the contrary, the small being seemed only delight in seeing his sire visit him.

Hades glowed with a light unlike Aether. It was as if divinity flowed through him more naturally than in either Cronos or Aether. Did this mean he had a higher form of consciousness than either as well? Did he recognize his father in a way Aether had not recognized Cronos as his brother?

Rather than let those questions overtake him or to be wrought with jealousy of this perceived power, Cronos felt a bit of pride in Hades’ unique might. Hades’ gifts were a reflection of Cronos.

This had been what he had wanted all those years back. It was being handed to him on a platter more valuable than any precious metal.

To consume Hades would be a betrayal of the ideals he held when he fought his father or even of the dreams he had when Cronos had loved Rhea in the most pure manner.

Those thoughts sunk deep into his mind, imbedding there. Harming Hades would make Cronos just like Ouranos. That was enough of a condemnation for Cronos to leave Hades to rest.

Morning came and went in a blur. When she went to the nursery, Rhea was surprised Cronos had not devoured Hades. Her husband did not make any efforts to speak to Rhea, nor did he readily ignore her. Rhea found that Cronos was sullen but not vindictive towards her or their child.

As the days went by, Cronos did nothing. Rhea becoming more and more concerned. She had been so sure that Cronos would eat Hades as he had with Aether. Finding the baby alive was a surprise, but Rhea was not sure if it was a welcome one or not. Taking a chance on Cronos’ seemingly stable mood, Rhea decided that it was safe enough to go to her mother, Gaia.

The Primordial Earth deity stood, looking out at the ocean where Ouranos had been castrated and murdered. The blood and other fluids from the battle had long been washed away by the ever-moving waters. Rhea suddenly appeared next to her mother, and Gaid knew that news about the baby’s doom would be forthcoming.

“He has not eaten Hades,” Rhea informed Gaia.

Gaia did not reply quickly; rather, she surveyed the Realm of Greece with her preternatural sight, which allowed her to see far and wide. While the gift of magical foresight was not hers to have yet, she could see more of what was happening in the world. She watched, despite Cronos’ erratically sabotaging actions, as her Titan children filled Greece with more divine children than she could imagine.

“That might be for the best,” Gaia remarked, aware of Rhea’s shock.

She was too busy smiling at the lands of Greece to fully care for Rhea’s vengeful mind. More than that, and deeper in her mind, Gaia thought of their meeting with Chaos. The unfeeling nature of the Progenitor might have been the reason for why Ouranos turned out as he did. And Ouranos’ selfish act of taking Rhea might have been why Cronos was how he was.

These patterns were easy to continue if no one did anything; Gaia understood that someone had to stop this cycle.

“How? How is that for the best?” Rhea asked.

“Perhaps, if Cronos can step away from cruelty, there is no reason to remove him from power,” Gaia declared.

Rhea stared in a baffled bewilderment at the betrayal of her mother.

“How can you do that after we have started preparing Hera to be the next Queen,” Rhea almost screamed in questioning.

“You are a mother,” Gaia said distantly. “I see how you care for Demeter, Hera, and Hestia. Even with your disdain for Cronos, you want what’s best for them. I want the same for Cronos as his mother.”

“Even after what Cronos has done?” Rhea cried out.

Tears of pain started to roll down her cheeks. She might have railed and fought, but she knew it would do her no good.

“To your husband? To my little Aether? To me?” Rhea exclaimed.

Without her mother, she could not move against her Titan King of a husband. That was when the cold realization that she was trapped by her circumstances started to set in.

Only with an ally could she make any headway, and she was short on any compatriots. None of the Titans would help her; even if they could, Cronos would not leave her alone with any of those siblings.

Gaia was her only chance at retribution, and with her pulling away, Rhea could feel her vengeance slipping from her fingers.

“Yes, Rhea, even now, after all of his poor behavior, I want him to be better,” Gaia answered magnanimously.

She looked at her daughter to ensure that the Titan Queen understood that this was not done with malice or apathy. Gaia was embracing her deepest meaning of love. Surely, if the daughter could see the depth of affection of the mother, she would find it in her heart to forgive her and more forward.

“If he has it in him to walk away from his evil path, should we not forgive him?” Gaia said. “He is loyal to you, which is so much more than Ouranos was with me. He assists his siblings in improving our Realm. We are prospering better than other Realms from what I have heard from Hyperion. We have so much beautiful potential. We should be glad for the chance for change, not destructively sabotaging it by plotting against our king.”