AUTHOR'S NOTE: I thought I'd better add something to this, because the first chapter seemed to be turning into a stand alone hit and that wasn't my intention at all. I know what you're about to read isn't really mythological. The good stuff really starts next chapter. Anybody who lives in Seattle and/or is a member or veteran of the Federal Bureau of Investigation feel free to nitpick because I did zero real research for this part.

Special Agent Maxwell James Wright, Federal Bureau of Investigation, adjusted his tie in the bathroom mirror and smiled wide, flashing what his wife called his "thousand-watt smile". The FBI had a pretty standard dress code, but he always tried to look his best. It cost him a pretty penny, but his suits were perfectly cut and groomed, and he had probably the best and most original tie collection in the world (He managed it the easy way: His wife picked them). Satisfied with his appearance he left the bathroom to finish getting ready for work.

In the bedroom he clipped his service pistol to his belt and put on his suit jacket. As he buttoned himself up he looked over at his wife, Tess. The cute redhead had fallen asleep at her drawing table again, wearing boxers and one of his shirts as she drooled on a piece of Bristol board. A freelance graphic designer by profession, Tess had always wanted to draw comic books, and often spent very late nights trying to come up with the perfect new superhero, one she could use to blow away prospective new employers at comic studios and conventions.

"Max" Wright walked over to the table to sneak a peak at what she was working on. Most of the character was obscured by her hair and head, but the face was visible. He shook his head in resignation. Short dark hair, hard eyes, straight nose, thin mouth set in a smirk. As usual, his loving spouse had used his facial features to adorn her superman. The symbolism wasn't lost on him and he was flattered, but it often embarrassed him as well, since he didn't want anybody to picture him running around in long underwear, even if it were just in a line drawing.

He kissed Tess lightly on the cheek, interrupting her slumber for just a second. "Don'go," she slurred, eyes half-open, "ull m'k brkfist."

"I'll get something on the way." Max whispered back, and she nodded slightly just before she fell back to sleep. He took one more second to look at her before he headed off to work.

Traffic wasn't too heavy as he made his way to the Seattle FBI Field Office, so he had time to get a breakfast sandwich and coffee before heading in. He was halfway through his bacon-egg-and-cheese biscuit when he stepped into the lobby of the Federal Building...

...and was almost run down by several agents carrying tactical weapons and wearing body armor. He dumped the food into the nearest wastebasket and rushed to get to his division office. He arrived in time to see it empty out, his partner bringing up the rear with spare armor for him in her arms.

"Get suited up!" Special Agent Trina Rader barked at him. The tall, husky-voiced brunette had a look of urgency on her face to match the frenzy going on around them.

"What'd I miss?" Max asked as he traded his jacket for a bullet proof vest.

"Agents from the Portland Office tracked some kidnappers to a motel outside the city." She said. "They've been holding a state senator's daughter for the past week. The perps are suspected anti-government militia, heavily armed and motivated. So far they don't know they've been found yet. They asked for an assist in keeping the bad guys from bolting, and SAC put out an all-hands alert."

"What about HRT?" Wright asked. He was talking about the FBI's Hostage Rescue Teams.

"The West Coast team has been notified, but it may take some time for them to spool up and get up here. The Portland agents have been chasing these guys for two months. They don't want them slipping away."

They left it at that until they got back to the parking garage, where they joined three other agents as they commandeered an Agency Chevy Suburban. Special Agent Worth Porter, one of the division's senior agents, took the driver's seat and pulled the SUV out of the building. "Glad you could join us, Max." Porter said as he turned onto the street.

"Hey, I was on time this morning!" Wright protested.

"'Early', Max." Porter said. "The key word here is 'early'. The early bird gets the bad guy. Besides, everybody got paged when this went down. What happened to you?"

Wright's mouth twisted up as he tried to remember whether or not his pager had been on overnight. As he turned to take a peek at the device on his belt, Special Agent Ray Sputz (Everybody called him "Spuds") said from the front passenger's seat "Yeah, Max. You don't wanna miss out on all the fun, do ya?"

Dang it! Wright thought. He'd gone to bed before Tess the night before. She probably turned off his beeper so he wouldn't be disturbed...or she wouldn't be. She was a Nazi about having peace and quiet to draw. "Just means more for you, Spuds." He said as he turned the device back on. "I know how you hate being in the office."

"Busy hands are happy hands!" Sputz said as he checked his pistol and locked a round into its chamber.

"Calm down, Spuds." Special Agent Michael Cho said from the other side of the truck. "You know how this usually works. We'll get there, storm in, scream a lot of tough sounding stuff, the bad guys'll pee their pants and we'll lock 'em up and go home. If we do it right, this is gonna end up nice and boring." Cho was a young agent, but methodical and serious. His idea of a great takedown was one where only the suspects found it exciting.

Rader, sandwiched in back between Wright and Cho, did a quick look around to see what kind of weapons were stored in the rear of the truck. "I wouldn't be too confident, Mike." She said. "Isn't there some heavy Eastern philosophy that warns against underestimating your opponents?"

Cho gave her a confused look. "How would I know? I was born in Texas."

This gave everybody a chuckle, and the bantering continued as the FBI caravan of three Suburbans, two Caprice Classics and SAC's personal Crown Victoria made its way through Seattle's streets. The vehicles used lights and sirens to get out of the city, then turned them off as they approached the suspected hideout.

The Starlight Motor Inn was typical of the rest-stop motels that attracted traffic from Interstates all over the country. In fact, its rectangular, cookie-cutter appearance, ancient neon signs and general "1960's Functional" architecture gave one the impression that it was excessively ordinary.

The cars pulled in to whatever space they could find in and around the parking lot and the agents poured out and began suiting up in earnest, donning protective knee and elbow pads to go with the vests as well as FBI jackets and caps. Radios and weapons were then handed out. Rader handed Wright a 12-gauge Ithaca shotgun, and he checked to see if it was loaded and in good working condition.

"Everybody gather around!" Called the gruff voice of Special-Agent-In-Charge Blanchard Sanderson. Everyone turned to see him waving them over to his car. A tall, Black, no-nonsense twenty-year Bureau veteran, Sanderson liked to joke that he had a special gray hair for each "Mother-Bleeping" perp that had ever caused him serious grief before said perp was bagged. If true it said a lot about SAC's career. He had many gray hairs.

When everyone was close enough to hear Sanderson gave an ad hoc briefing. Standing nearby were two more agents, Arness and Stack, who'd acted as advance men for the quick-reaction team. They were putting on their own armor as he began. "Okay, we've got confirmation. We know at least one suspect is here in the motel. Arness?"

"We lucked out on this one." Arness said. "The clerk remembered that someone that looked like Mick Keyhoe checked in at about Two O'Clock yesterday afternoon, using the alias 'Delroy Street' and using a credit card to match." Mick Keyhoe, the prime suspect, was the leader of the militia group responsible for the kidnaping. Though they didn't know every member yet, Keyhoe's acquaintance with the Bureau went way back. "He's altered his appearance." Arness continued, pulling out a picture to show everyone what he was talking about. "He's shaved off his long beard, and apparently he went to the trouble to bleach and cut his hair since we last saw him."

"He's supposed to be in room 17B." Stack said. "Second level, right in the middle. There's access to the level via sets of stairs at either end of the complex."

"There's supposed to be six guys total, right?" Rader asked. "Plus the hostage? That's an awful lot of people for one motel room."

"We're thinking they might have split up when they left Portland," Arness said, "or another perp we don't have a file on checked into another room at a different time. Getting and checking the total list of guests would require another warrant."

"I've got Beacham working on that warrant right now." Sanderson said. Harriet Beacham was the U.S. District Attorney for Seattle. "In the meantime we've already got an outstanding arrest warrant for Keyhoe. If he's in that room, we're not waiting to execute it. So this is how I want to work it..."

"Gun!" Someone yelled. He was looking up at the motel's upper level deck. Two or three agents looked up and around at the word, but the more experienced ones ducked for cover first and were thus better protected when 5.56mm bullets rained down on the scene. One agent took a bullet in the vest, another in the shoulder. Both went down. Other rounds ricocheted off the asphalt of the parking lot and embedded themselves in the FBI vehicles.

"Agents Down!" Someone yelled as Sanderson drew his sidearm and assessed the situation from the cover of his Crown Victoria. It was Keyhoe, firing at them from just outside his hotel room with a Squad Automatic Weapon. The light machine gun had a drum-type hopper for its ammunition and the kidnapper seemed determined to empty it into anything that was remotely dangerous to him.

Sanderson watched as the two felled agents were dragged behind cover then ducked low as the spray of bullets scythed back toward his position. "Radios!" He called out. "Get 'em out and switch to Channel 3! Keep your heads down!"

"So...the bad guy'll pee himself and just come quietly, huh?" Sputz asked Cho as he adjusted his radio. They were crouched down behind a parked civilian car.

"Can I help it if this one's an overachiever?" Cho shot back.

It was a little disorienting when the noise of the gunfire stopped suddenly, and the agents poked their heads out. Keyhoe had ducked back inside. When some agents started to bring their weapons to bear Sanderson called out "Hold your fire!" His attention was riveted to the doors of the other rooms. People were poking their heads out to see what was going on. He got on the radio. "Okay, everybody listen up! Arness and Stack are going to take two men each. Arness will take the South stairs to the second deck and Stack will take the North. Approach 17B from both sides and get ready to breach. Porter, I want you trailing Stack and I want Farnham trailing Arness and I want you guys to clear out the other rooms up there. I want Leland to secure the South stairs and I want Jefferson to secure the North, and I want Rader and Wright to start from both ends and clear out the lower level. Everyone else draw a bead on 17B. If anybody comes out of there with a gun and is in the clear, take the shot! If they had the hostage with them they'd be using her for a shield right now. Move NOW, people!"

They moved. The twelve assigned agents stayed low as they hurried to carry out their tasks. Rader took the South end of the lower level and called out to a couple of people she could see standing in doorways and got them moving to the Bureau cars.

Wright got to his assigned end and took only a moment to ponder how some people could sleep through anything before he pounded on the first door. An indignant "What?!" greeted him from the other side.

"FBI!" Wright called back. "I need you to come out right now!"

A few seconds later the door swung open and a man in pajama pants with a hairy chest, a bald head, a goatee and three earrings in his left ear met Wright with a scowl on his face. That scowl disappeared when he noticed Wright's shotgun.

"Sir, I need you and anyone in there with you to come out and get over to where we've set up. Right Now, Sir!"

"What's he want, Manny?" A woman's voice called from inside. Wright looked past Manny and at the bed. Laying on it was a cute girl with long blonde hair. Naturally, she was wearing the shirt half of the pajamas.

"Ma'am, I need you both to get out of here and get away from this building."

"Look," Manny started, "What the f-"

"Right Now!" Wright commanded. He didn't have time for dispute. He pointed toward the Bureau cars. "That way! Stay low and don't stop till the agents tell you!"

Manny complied with another scowl and the girl scrambled to follow suit, pausing only long enough to slip her feet into a pair of slippers by the bed. As they started for the parking lot Wright looked to the next door. Before he could get to it an elderly woman emerged. "Excuse me, officer," she said when she saw him, "what's going on? I thought I heard..."

"Ma'am," Wright said as he got close, "I need you to move as fast as you can to where we've set up. See those black cars over there? Stay low and head toward them. There are agents there that will keep you safe."

"Oh, my..." the woman muttered just before she set off. Wright headed to the next door and pounded. No answer.

"FBI!" Wright called out as he pounded again. Still nothing. There was a small window next to each door. Wright peeked into the one that went with this room. The blinds were open so that he could see in. The room was dark and the bed didn't look slept in. It could have been vacant, but the only way to know for sure would be to either enter the room or check out the hotel guest book. He didn't really have time for either, so he went to the next room. The door opened before he could knock. A dark-haired woman and a blond, both tall and dressed in bathrobes, were huddled behind it. Each seemed visibly worried.

"FBI?" The brunette said. "What's happening? Has there been a shooting?"

"Ma'am, I need you and your friend to get away from the building. There's some agents in the lot..."

He noticed it as he turned to point. The doorknob from the last door had disappeared. The door was opening. Wright cursed. Whoever was inside must have been hiding behind it.

"Get back inside! Stay down!" He said to the women as he approached the door ever so slowly and drew a bead on it. "Federal Agent!" He called out. "Come out with your hands where I can see them!"

He was almost there when the door flew open. An arm shoved a teenage girl unceremoniously into the open. She looked haggard, and was dressed in nothing but a tank top and boxers and socks. The arm turned the girl in Wright's direction and was followed immediately by its owner, a tall, rangy man in gray sweats and sneakers. He moved the girl to shield himself with one hand while bringing the Ingram submachine gun he was carrying to bear with the other.

Wright had seconds to make a choice. Try as he might, the perp was a little too tall for the girl, who Wright was now sure was the Senator's daughter, to shield him properly. His shotgun was loaded with "slugs" and he had the bad guy's head and upper chest to choose from as targets. If he chose to shoot, his last chance would be while the other guy was focused on him and not directly threatening the girl with his weapon. If he backed off the kidnaper could get away, with Keyhoe covering him from the upper level. The deliberation going on in his mind wasn't conscious. It happened almost instantly, and all Wright would ever remember were the results of his decision. He fired.

The round caught the kidnaper in the neck and forced him back. The odd angle of his body allowed the hostage to break free of him, but it also helped him raise his gun hand, and a reflex had contracted his trigger finger. The Ingram scythed upwards, moving so fast that Wright had no time to dodge.

Heavy weights slammed into his chest as hot knives sliced through his leg and shoulder. The immediate pain was accompanied by the rush of warm fluid down his leg and chest, but as he fell back, Wright's mind was unable to grasp whether what he was feeling was blood or not. The impact with the ground made everything worse, and he let out a cry of pain as he rolled over and tried to stay focused.

"Agent Down!" He heard someone scream as he managed to make a little sense of what was happening. That rush of fluid he felt was indeed blood, he realized, and he had to try to stem the flow in some way. He needed both hands, but he couldn't make his left arm work, and he couldn't focus enough to decide where his right hand would do the most good. By the time he'd decided to apply pressure to his leg he was too woozy to do it properly.

There was more screaming. He couldn't make out everything but he could swear he heard someone tell him to hang on. Then there was more gunfire, and then it was like someone was turning down the volume on the world. Everything started to fade, blur. His senses were dulled, and the last focused thought he could manage was to wonder if he'd been hit in the head as well. He didn't feel it when his body went limp. He could only lay there and find it curious that when he'd been expecting to "black out", the world actually went bright white before he lost consciousness.

Max Wright woke up lying on a hard, smooth surface. It took him a moment to realize it was a tile floor. It was cold as ice but not as slick, and the pattern of the tile was more ornate and colorful than he'd ever seen. He sat up to get a better look at it. Each tile had an elaborate drawing in it, and every drawing seemed to tell a different story.

When the novelty of the floor wore off, it occurred to Wright that it had been awfully easy to sit up. He stood all the way and examined himself. He was still in his armor and FBI clothes, but he no longer had his weapons. His suit was still bloody, but he couldn't feel the blood, or any pain for that matter. His body seemed and felt whole, though that was impossible.

Just when he thought nothing else could surprise him, he took a better look at his surroundings. He was in an immense room, possibly as big as a football field and as tall as a cathedral. He decided it must be some kind of library. There were wooden, floor-to-ceiling bookshelves along the walls on either side, and they seemed to boast an old collection of materials, though there was no hint of dust or age anywhere.

"Are you well?" A voice said, making him jump. He turned in the direction it came from and realized he was at one end of the library, standing a few yards away from a dais, on which sat an elaborately carved throne with soft black cushions. Sitting on the edge of the seat was a tall, slender woman. She had jet black hair, pale skin and lovely features that included an aquiline nose and soft blue eyes. She was wearing some kind of vestment that draped over her whole body, and she was wearing the type of sandals Wright remembered seeing the figures wearing in the classical art Tess had showed him depicting Greek and Roman gods. The soles were held on by thin gold braid, tied in intricate patterns around the woman's delicate calves.

"Uh...I...I don't know." Wright said. "Where am I?"

The woman stood and stepped away from the throne and then down the steps of the dais. She kept walking until she could talk to Wright face to face.

"You are in the Hall of Heroes, Good Sir." The woman said, an English accent evident in her voice. "I am Sybil, and I am your servant."