Chapter Text
The blade almost hit his neck, fortunately he was attentive enough to avoid it. Swiftly tripping the Achaean who tried to behead him. Continuing to fight the other men rushing towards him, his eye catches an opening, successfully taking it as a chance to evade the fight.
Helios' chariot was about to come to a halt,
Diomedes ran quicker.
What's wrong with everyone?
Why are they suddenly so obsessed?
To abandon war for lust,
Have they all gone mad!?
Diomedes sprinted faster, he remembered his Philtatos. Hoping he was still in his tent, Diomedes started pushing his legs to its maximum.
Could he have gone mad too?
Diomedes couldn't do much but hope for the best, as soon as he quickly rushed into the tent,
there he was, the small king sitting calmly on his chair.
Those few streaks of ginger flowing with his curly brown hair,
his heterochromia eyes were as mesmerizing as ever,
one brown with a fade of grey from Athena's blessing,
just like his own left eye,
and his other eye was as blue as a shimmering ocean.
Odysseus...
Snapping out of his thoughts, Diomedes rushes towards Odysseus and pulls him to his embrace. Tears almost beginning to form in his eyes as a sign of relief.
"Dio? Are you alright dearest?" Said Odysseus.
Not a word was coming out of his dearest. The small king began to worry till his dearest finally spoke with a shaky and urging voice.
"We have to get out of here, now."
"What? Diomedes are you—"
Before the man could continue his sentence, he was immediately pulled up from his chair, Diomedes now holding Odysseus on his wrists tight yet still remaining soft.
"I know I am sounding mad right now, but believe me when I say that the men outside are the ones truly mad. We need to leave. Now."
"...Dio-" Odysseus was cut off again.
"Please—Philtatos, I promise I'll tell everything as we're leaving the camp just please come with me and run.."
Diomedes now seeming more stressed as his words now came to a halt. Without anymore hesitation, Odysseus nods and sprints out of the tent with Diomedes wearing their armour and weapons, prepared for the worst.
As they continued sprinting, Odysseus was now fully aware and shocked at what was occurring the whole time he was unaware. The whole Greek army had gone mad just out of the blue and abandoned the whole war altogether as they turned lust-hungry, although they weren't just obsessed with anyone, unfortunately it seems that the whole army had fallen in love with both Diomedes and Odysseus. Now almost far from the camp, they glance back to spot that some Greeks have caught up to them and were quickly removing the far distance as they rushed closer and closer towards the two.
Needing to think of a plan stat, Odysseus was quick to notice a branch that was miraculously loose. A simple shot can have it falling on the Greeks running after them, with that said Odysseus quickly takes his bow off his shoulder and grabs an arrow from his gorytos and precisely shoots the branch just at the right spot, sending the branch down and onto the unaware men who were running to them.
Now having evaded from the chase, also being far away from the camp, the two finally pause and pant heavily as they were exhausted.
"They're eyes..." Odysseus mumbled,
"It looked like they were in a trance."
"Could this whole madness be the work of a god?" Odysseus continues as he regains his breath completely.
"Taking a look back their eyes were pink and spiral" Replied Diomedes, finding Odysseus' question factual.
"But it doesn't make sense how we two were left untouched by what seems to be a love spell..." Odysseus ponders.
"Nevertheless, if this IS a work of a god OR goddess we can't do anything about it. At least for now,"
"-we should find a way to protect ourselves first. Perhaps even change our identities and looks for now to avoid the Greeks catching us quickly." Said Diomedes, breaking Odysseus from his deep thinking.
"True, I remember spotting a nearby village in this path. We should probably replace our armour that shows we're from Argos and Ithaca."
Odysseus pointed out whilst pulling out his xiphos before cutting his hair precisely to make it seem less curly, blending the ginger streaks with the brown hair that was now less curly somehow. He then tore a piece of his chiton that was large enough to cover around his brown eye, leaving only his blue eye for his vision.
"Wouldn't that remove half of your vision?" Asked Diomedes.
"Of course, but it's rare for you to spot a man with heterochromia, I'm the most known man here to have blue and brown eyes correct? Doing this helps me blend in more, I can simply fabricate a lie that I've been into a fight, causing me to lose my vision on my right eye. Also, I covered the brown specifically since people can spot Athena's blessing with it." Replied Odysseus.
It was smart to cover the brown specifically since it'll notify the others that he was a warrior of Athena, Diomedes decided to do the same for his left eye, also trimming his hair short since people have known that he prefers to have long hair.
Odysseus looks down at the trimmed off parts of Diomedes' hair before looking back up to compliment, "You look beautiful with short hair."
"..." Diomedes didn't respond for a short while before replying,
"Shut up."
"What? I was just complimenting you~"
"Not now, when we're being hunted because of some dumb love spell, Philtatos."
"Fair."
"Hey, at least now you can be my left vision, I can even be your right!" Odysseus chuckles.
"We best move quickly and change our armour, Helios is just about to finish his ride." Diomedes replied as he ended the short moment of joy for the two of them.
They went to where Odysseus said there'd be a village. Luckily there was and so was a market with somebody fortunately selling armour. They bought the armour and then left to replace their Argive and Ithacan ones with the armour they bought.
They now looked different to what they used to look like. Incredibly different to further point out.
It was the perfect disguise, they even made up a fake backstory that they made up together so that if they were asked their timelines would line up. Now as they were walking through the forest with their new identities all that was left was their names, they simply couldn't go out using their actual names, they had to come up with fake ones, more specifically, ones that could also be used to fool somebody.
Of course Odysseus was quick to think of one, that man was known for being cunning after all.
"Outis, it's a clever name I say. Especially for its meaning, I bet I can even fool a Cyclops with it!"
Said Odysseus with pride.
Diomedes took a while longer to come up with his own name, but after a while, he took note on how Outis means 'Nobody', so he chose his name to mean 'Nothing'.
"Ouden." Diomedes said.
"'Nothing'... That's incredibly clever Dio, or shall I say Ouden?" Odysseus grinned whilst also making small laughs with a hand curled in front of his own mouth.
"Alright, 'Nobody'" Diomedes laughed back with a joke in response.
.
.
.
.
And so it was decided, new looks, back stories, names and even fake personalities to further disguise themselves.
Now they just need to lay low and form a plan to break the spell that their unfortunate comrades are on.
Would 'Outis and Ouden' break the spell?
Or would they be caught by the lurking predators?
Only the Fates know as of now,
But time will unravel.