Gods Gays, and Gills

Chapter 1

“You know, sometimes I think that the gods are a bit kinky,” Samm’s voice was slightly muffled as she licked her strawberry ice cream.

“You think so?” Caster was enjoying his own frozen treat - a sundae. The fudge-covered delicacy was quickly melting as he took his sweet-ass time eating it.

“Yeah I mean, all they seem to want us to do is fuck. Like none of them really care about what we are going to do with our lives.” Samm had gotten to the cone, and was crunching the edges.

“Have you spoken to any of the gods?” Caster pointed out, licking up some of the sprinkles that had ended up on his face.

Samm opened her mouth to retaliate, but was immediately cut off by Caster.

“Aside from those two.” Caster tilted the bowl so that all of the melted ice cream slid into his mouth. Once it was gone, he went back at scooping up little bits of the solid parts with the edge of his spoon. “Everyone around here has spoken to Them.”

“Yeah I know.” Samm stuck her tongue out at Caster. She partially disguised the rude action by taking a big lick of ice cream.

“Why do you even care though?”

“What do you mean?” Samm asked.

“Well lately you can’t seem to shut up about the gods.” Caster reached out to hit the button for the crosswalk. “It's Sona this, soulmate that - did something happen?”

“I guess you’re right, I have. It's just - I want my soulmate to be an actual human being. I want some kind of excuse to just leave this disgusting country.” Samm dashed across the road once the green light appeared, and Caster followed in suit.

“You have a point. Though, I would like to bring up the fact that any children that you have aren’t going to be totally human anyways.” Caster had by now finished his ice cream and tossed the paper cup and biodegradable spoon into a street recycling bin.

Samm didn’t respond. While her own mother had been a human, her father had been half fish - courtesy of Sona, the primary god that controlled this country. Sona liked messing around with fate, causing the soulmates of various humans and animals to be that of a completely different species. His goddess wife, Lee also did similar actions.

As a result of being one-quarter fish, Samm had an extra pair of eyelids. Her fingers and toes were slightly webbed, and her ears were a bit fin-like. She could breathe underwater, and her long hair was dark blue. Her eyes were brown, and her light skin had a blue tint to it.

Caster’s appearance was a little bit more extreme as his father had been a mountain goat. His legs were goat legs, and on top of his head there were a pair of curly horns. His arms and chest had thick patches of light brown fur.

“But yeah, I do see your point,” Caster said. “I’ve never been out of the country either but based on what I’ve seen of other countries online, pretty much anywhere sounds better than here. Not like you can leave though.”

“I could leave if my soulmate was outside of the country.” Samm shoved the last little triangle of the cone into her mouth, crunching happily. She wore a pastel pink crop top and a pair of pastel yellow shorts. Her sneakers were solid black. On her back was a bright red backpack that carried her school books.

“Yeah and what are the chances that you’re going to end up with a foreign soulmate? Those two have this whole region under their thumb.” Caster wiped some sweat off of his forehead with the bottom of his t-shirt.

“Well, my soulmate hasn’t been determined yet, now has it?” Samm pointed out. She noticed a free pile outside an apartment building, and gave it a quick glance over. It was mainly junk.

“Yeah, and the odds are that it's going to disappoint you. Well, if you could be disappointed by a soulmate.”

“Well what if I even out the odds?”

“What do you mean by that- oh shit no! Is this why you’ve been scavenging old bookstores?” Caster jogged a bit to catch up with Samm.

“Yeah.”

“If you try to contact other gods then They are going to try to interfere. You know that right?”

“Yeah I know. It's getting really annoying.” Samm narrowed her eyes briefly as she glared up at the sky.

“I’m sorry what?” Caster stopped in front of Samm, turning around. “So you’ve already started this?”

“Yeah. Remember when my hair turned black for a few days?” Samm pointed out.

“Yeah.”

“I was trying to contact OwO when Sona interfered. He was so mad.” Samm started laughing.

“What. This. This isn’t funny!”

“It kind of is.” Samm choked out though her fit of laughter. It took her a moment to stop. vDuring that moment, Caster tried to act as Samm’s voice of reason, “Can you please stop. If you antagonize the gods too much you’re going to end up dead. Or worse. And why would you even try contacting OwO? That god is only active like halfway across the world! And I know you’ve heard of the things that Zie has done.”

“Don’t believe everything that you’ve read on the internet.” Samm walked around Caster, continuing on the path towards her house.

“As if you don’t base everything you do on the first page of Google.” Caster followed in suit.

“I don’t!” Samm protested, knowing full well that the internet was her main source of information. And why shouldn’t it be?

“Ugh, can you promise me that you’ll be more careful?” Caster pleaded. “I get you want to leave but praying to too many gods is just going to cause chaos.”

“How many is ‘too many’?” Samm asked innocently, approaching the front porch of her home.

“How many have you prayed to so far?”

“Seven. Or eight. I dunno, I’ve just kinda been going after as many as I can,” Samm answered casually.

“Samm!” Caster sounded furious, but through the slight smile on his face, Samm could tell that he wasn’t. “Please don’t try any more, ok? I care about you, ok? You’re my friend and I don’t want to see you end up dead through your own stupidity.”

“Yeah yeah.” Samm rolled her eyes. “I’ll talk to you later, ok?”

“Yeah ok.” Caster watched as she unlocked the front door to her home. “See you later!”

“See you later!”

Caster walked away, heading to his home further down the road. Samm made her way directly to her room. She got to work on her homework. One assignment was overdue and the rest were due the following day. She managed to finish in time for dinner.

Dinner was held on the patio out back behind the house. There, there was a pool of water that was connected to a nearby lake via a narrow, yet deep stream. Samm’s father, Wamm Firt was floating in the water next to the picnic table where the mother, Dammy Firt had laid out the food. It was a vegetarian meal, containing pasta & sauce, and somehow Wamm managed to eat it properly despite having to mainly remain in the water due to his lack of legs.

Samm sat at the table with her mother, ignoring her father’s protests that maybe she could join him in the water for a change.

When the meal was finished, Samm went directly to take a quick shower. After sending a few texts, she set her phone to Do Not Disturb. Samm was sick and tired of getting in trouble for showing up late to school.

Samm sat in her bed, with just the small desk lamp near her bed on, and was skimming through a book of the gods. She already knew about a lot of them. While history was mainly focused on Sona and Lee, there were always mentions on how other gods influenced other “uncivilized” countries as they were referred to as.

Uncivilized? This place was uncivilized. And disgusting. Anyways, there were a few tidbits here and there that Samm didn’t already know about. Celebrities that had followed certain deities and various miscellaneous miracles, etcetera, etcetera. However, there was something that she found interesting.

Lofi, a younger goddess. She hadn’t been around for very long, apparently the result of the union between two other deities. There was hardly any information on her. The only mention of her was in an article on Zono, a god of war.

Samm considered this, then placed the book on her shelf and turned off the light. As she laid in bed, she thought to herself about who this goddess was. After a bit, she made a decision.

Samm closed her eyes and slowed her breathing. She focused her mind, and formed a clear and consistent thought in her mind. “Hello, Lofi. I pray to you today to seek your help and guidance. I hope that you may respond in exchange for my service.”

Nothing happened. Samm sighed, frustrated. It was a pointless attempt. Even when gods answered her prayers they always seemed so disinterested. Or they only answered a group. It's like automated business emails with a lot of gods, isn’t it. They don’t care about people, not really. They just want to fulfill their various agendas.

Samm rolled on her side and fell asleep. Or, she tried to. Just as her mind was slowing and her thoughts blurred, she was suddenly transported to another world.

Samm couldn’t tell if she had been moved physically or mentally, but either way it was jarring. It wasn’t, however, disorienting or violent. She felt at peace in this endless white void. Although, being in an endless white void wasn’t her preferred destination.

Just as Samm was contemplating this situation, she found herself suddenly falling to the ground, landing face-down in a patch of grass.

“Oh! I’m sorry about that,” came a smooth, beautiful, female voice. “Are you alright.”

“Yeah, I’m alright,” Samm reflexively answered, pushing herself up to a sitting position. “Who are-”

She looked up to see a woman standing in front of her. She was huge, at least 10 feet tall, with dark brown skin and black hair. She wore a white dress that seemed to float around her. She was barefoot. Smiling at Samm, she said, “I am Lofi.”

“You’re Lofi?” Samm got up to her feet. She looked down at herself, and realized that she was naked. At least no dirt or grass seemed to be sticking to her. “That’s amazing.”

“It is?” she was glowing.

As she stared at her, Samm could tell that while she appeared large, as typical of a goddess, Lofi appeared like she was a teenager. With her soft face, she looked even younger than Samm.

“Of course it is, I wasn’t expecting you to answer me. Or at the most I was expecting some mass-produced dream in response.” Samm rolled her eyes in disgust at the memory of church meetings where everyone listened to the same regurgitated nonsense from Sona.

Lofi could tell though that Samm was genuinely happy through her limited omnipotence, and how Samm spoke.

“So, what is it that you want for me to do?” Lofi asked Sam. “You said that you had a request.

“Can you arrange soulmates?” Samm asked hopefully.

“Yes I can,” Lofi responded tentatively. A handful of clouds were drifting in the clear blue sky. “Is there someone in particular that you want to be destined to?”

Samm thought about it, something that she hadn’t really before. “No. Not really, I just want it to be a human. And far away from my home. Can you do that?”

Lofi seemed nervous. “Well, I have assigned a few mates in the past. I guess I could do that. Although, Lee is pretty scary. She might have a plan for you. I don’t want to upset her.”

“Look, I’m already seventeen. I could be getting arranged any day now. I really don’t want to wind up with a dog or a horse or something like that. I’ve been trying and praying to as many gods as I could, and you’ve finally answered. I will do anything that you want, please just help me out here.” Tears were preparing themselves behind Samm’s eyes. She didn’t let them fall in the presence of the goddess, but one or two might have slipped away.

“Hey, no, don’t cry. Of course I’ll help you.” Twice the height of the human, the goddess bent down to kiss Samm on the forehead. “There you go.”

Samm looked up as the goddess stepped back again. She could still feel the warmth of Lofi’s lips. She could also feel something strange deep in her stomach.

“Did-”

“Go to sleep.” Lofi cut her off. “All that I ask is that in the morning, you find your compliment and spread word of me.”

Samm nodded absentmindedly as her head grew foggy and the world around her disappeared.

Chapter 2

Samm woke up.

She felt a bit weird.

Her forehead was a bit warmer than it should’ve been, like she was sick, and her eye was itchy. Being groggy from just waking, she didn’t think much of it. Bleary-eyed, she walked to the bathroom. While the path was familiar to her, she still had a bit of trouble navigating.

She wet a washcloth to clean her face, barely paying attention to her reflection in the mirror. As she was brushing her teeth, she noticed something - her left eye was now blue. Not only was it no longer brown, it was more of an oval, more human-like.

Samm blinked her eyes rapidly, trying to focus her vision. Not only did she fail to do this, but briefly, through the left eye, she could see a completely different room. After a bit though, Samm’s vision cleared slightly, and she could see better. Kind of. If she closed her left eye.

Samm finished cleaning up in the bathroom, then made her way back to her room to get dressed. Once she had assembled an outfit for the day, she called Caster.

“What do you want?” he answered. His words were slightly muffled, like he was eating something. “We’re walking to school in like ten minutes, can this wait?”

“No.”

“I swear Samm if you lost-”

“I have a soulmate,” Samm interrupted.

There was a short pause where Samm could hear slightly muffled frustrated yelling from Caster’s end. “Please tell me that this was not because you were contacting some random god you heard on some internet thread and that it was done independently of your actions.”

“I would but I’m not a liar.” Samm smirked, knowing that Caster wouldn’t be able to see it. It hadn’t come from an internet thread, but he was essentially correct.

The gay sounds of verbal keyboard smashing could be heard from Caster as he tried to process Samm’s stupidity. “Ok, ok. Are you sure you have one? What’s setting this off? Where’s the connection?”

“I have someone else’s eye and also I have a sudden and burning desire to head South,” Samm explained. It was hard for her to focus on the conversation. Just explaining this sensation was difficult enough.

“You have what?” Caster was on the verge of screaming again. “Holy fuck, Samm most people get like a- a tattoo or some shit. What kind of god were you talking to last night?”

“That’s not important,” Samm deflected, picking up her backpack, which was already filled with what she’d be needing for school that day. While she really didn’t want to attend that day, she would need to explain her future absence to her teachers. Although, that could be done over the internet.

“Yes, it is important.” Caster sighed. “When are you going to leave?”

“Today.” Samm was surprised by her own answer. Her thoughts were unusually focused. She yearned to leave. These ideas seemed not to be entirely her own. Samm had read plenty of romance novels about what it was like to get your soulmate, and somehow she always thought they were at least somewhat exaggerating. They were not.

Now that she had her soulmate, she wasn’t going to let anything stop her from finding them.

“Well, I don’t know what to say to that.” Caster’s voice got quiet.

“I wish you could come with me.”

“So do I.” Caster thought for a moment. “Is it really that bad here?”

While Samm had an immediate answer, she despised this whole culture of blindly following gods with disgusting morals, she knew that Caster was one to take it personally. “I’m just looking for a change of pace, ok?”

Samm hung up, not even caring enough anymore to regret it. She dumped her bag of all the school books, and grabbed a few change of clothes. After a bit of hesitation, she grabbed a few more items that she thought she would miss.

On the other end of the line, there was Caster. He knew that Samm had been wanting to leave. Why else would she’ve done all this? It hurt that she had mostly done it without telling him, but he understood her feelings. Now that she had a soulmate, it was entirely possible that she would forget about him. He needed to see her again at least one last time. Caster was already dressed and ready, so he just grabbed his bag and sprinted outside to meet Samm before she was gone.

Once she had everything she thought she would need, Samm headed outside to see Caster waiting at the sidewalk by her house.

“Why did you hang up?” Caster demanded, upset.

“What?” Samm was confused, barely paying attention.

“Why did you-” Caster got a better look at Samm. “Wow that really isn’t your eye. Is that a reflection of something else in it?”

Samm covered her eye. She could see an unfamiliar location through it. It was incredibly blurry, but it was somewhere else. This is what her soul mate was seeing right now. She had to find this place.

“I have to go,” Samm stated. She took off running down the street towards the bus station.

“I’ll text you!” Caster called after her. He hadn’t seen anyone go through this before, but he knew enough that she wasn’t coming back.

Samm waited anxiously at the bus station. She knew that in the morning there was a bus that ran from here to a few miles north of the border. It would get there by mid-afternoon most likely. It couldn’t come soon enough for Samm.

Samm’s webbed hands enclosed the phone tightly, making sure not to drop it. The time was checked every few seconds, in anticipation for the bus.

When the bus finally came, Samm took a seat towards the back. She stared out of the window, her vision shifting as her soulmate moved around

The bus arrived as far south as it was going to go, and that is when Samm disembarked. She began walking south along the sidewalk. When she ran out of sidewalk, she walked on the side of the road.

As she headed along, her vision grew clearer. If she closed her own eye, she could see a person standing on the opposite side of a kitchen counter. Samm couldn’t hear what was going on, but it seemed like an active conversation. It was a nice place actually, the more of it that Samm managed to see.

Hoping that this other person would be able to see what she could, Samm made an effort to stop at every road sign that contained any kind of location information and stared at it for a good minute.

It was getting darker and darker out, but Samm couldn’t stop herself from walking. She could feel herself getting closer and closer when a car slowly approached her. Of course, there had been plenty of cars passing this whole time, but now there was one going straight for Samm.

She stepped further off the side of the road, and the driver stopped the car right next to her. He rolled down the window and stared straight at her.

After a moment he said, “Get in,” pushing open the passenger side door.

“Why?” Samm was too distracted to be scared. She was trying to keep moving forward.

“Get. In.” The driver had tan skin and black hair. He appeared more human than anyone Samm had ever met in person. He also looked a bit stronger than she did. Reluctantly, Samm climbed in the car, closing the door behind her. He started down the road, then suddenly his knuckles turned white as he gripped the steering wheel. “Do you have any idea what you’ve done?”

“What do you mean?” Samm looked over at him to see that he was staring straight ahead.

“She was not supposed to end up with someone like you. She-” He breathed out, calming himself down. “Well, it's not my problem what the gods are doing.” Suddenly, he took his hands off the steering wheel and stared up at the roof of the car. “Vermilion bring me back.”

The whole car was surrounded by red light. When the light disappeared, they were driving down a long elegant driveway. The lawn was immaculate with trees cut in weird shapes. The car eventually stopped in front of an enormous brick house.

The door slammed open, and suddenly Samm’s vision came back to normal. She immediately unbuckled, and ran out of the car to the figure descending the stairs before her.

Willow ran down the stairs. Her long blonde hair streamed behind her as she ran towards her soulmate. She didn’t know who it was, but she knew she was in love.

Samm and Willow met at the break halfway up the stairs. Samm collapsed into Willow’s arms as they embraced each other. Now that they were finally united, Samm’s mind allowed her to focus on other things. Like how much her feet hurt from walking all day. Like how it was evening already. Like how her soulmate was wearing a beautiful white nightgown and also she smelled really nice. After a moment, they broke apart.

“I’m so sorry, I wanted to come after you but Daddy wouldn’t let me. He said it was dangerous. I managed to get him to send Harvy after you.” Willow threw her arms around Samm, “Are you ok?”

“Yeah, I’m ok.” Samm patted Willow’s back. “I’m Samm, by the way.”

Willow laughed. “And I’m Willow.” Willow pulled back and grabbed Samm’s hands. “Come on let’s get you cleaned up.”

Sona was, of course, furious. He had had plans for Samm. He had plans for all of his worshipers. Though, apparently, Samm was no longer one of her worshipers. Some other God had given her a soulmate outside of his territory. But which one was it?

There were open lines from Samm to countless other Gods and Goddesses. How would he be able to tell which one actually answered her prayers? Depending on who answered, he could make it seem like he never did.

Sona was almost regretting how rarely he personally spoke to his followers. Usually he would project the same image to many different ones and try to remain vague. As such, he was no expert in personally interacting with a single human.

Frustrated, Sona decided at random one of the Gods that had been selected to contact it. He instantly regretted it as he was transported to the space of OwO.

OwO, was a very strange-looking God. He appeared as the English letters O, w, and O. The letters were nearly four feet deep. The Os were 10 feet high while the w was 5. The white loops were filled with a white void that was unnerving to look at. It didn’t help that the w was crimson like blood.

Sona’s form was less rigid. It could take the form of countless animals, but before OwO’s might, he was a rabbit. Before he had been transported before OwO, however, he had looked like a griffin.

“How dare you disturb me?” OwO’s ominous voice boomed.

“I am very sorry.” Sona bowed his head. Most Gods did not like being disturbed, and OwO was definitely not an exception. “One of my humans has betrayed me, and I am trying to figure out who it was with.”

“One of your ‘humans’ was it?” OwO’s eyes narrowed. It was a sight to behold.

“Yes, that’s right.” Sona was getting a bit nervous.

“I don’t recall any humans- wait.” OwO paused as he thought back. “There was one prayer I didn’t recognize. I was going to get around to answering it, but the human didn’t wait. Though I guess humans have such short lives that they don’t feel necessary to wait for answers.” OwO was getting angry. “I can’t believe that such a creature would decide to waste MY time like this. Especially one of yours. I will find out who made this happen. Don’t you worry.”

Chapter 3

Samm and Willow sat together in a large bath tub. Willow had explained that her family were mostly worshippers of Vermillion, a teleportation god. Her father was an important political figure in this county, but Samm wasn’t very interested in learning the local politics right now. All that mattered in her mind was Willow.

They had discovered that whenever they were close to each other, their eyesight returned to normal. When they got too far though, their eyes swapped so that they would see what the other did. When they were close the insufferable longing was dulled slightly because they were together. It didn’t go away though.

“I have a question,” Willow said, massaging shampoo into Samm’s hair, “If you’re supposed to be under Sona, and Vermillion is supposed to have plans for me, how did we end up together? Not that I am complaining.”

Samm was almost hesitant to answer, though it would have been impossible for her not to tell Willow the answer, “I wanted to leave. I didn’t want to end up with an animal. I searched for a different god to answer my prayers, and I finally found one. She is the one who brought me to you.”

“Does she still answer prayers?” Willow asked.

“I think so.”

The two of them hurried to finish washing away the grime that had accumulated during Samm’s journey.

“Are you ready?” Samm took Willow’s hands in her own. The two of them sat across from each other on Willow’s bed.

“Yes.”

“Lofi. I call upon you now to ask that I may come to your realm and present Willow, who I found by your request.” Samm paused, ready to continue when the world around her vanished, and she found herself back in the flower field. She was naked again.

It didn’t really matter what you looked like in the real world. It didn’t matter what was on your person. In the world of the gods, a mortal just looked like their true self. Though there were variations in how you would end up being presenting depending on what god you were contacting. For example, whenever Samm had been in seminars where Sona would be contacted, she would always look so much more like a fish than she ever did in real life. Samm wondered at times what it was like to stand before some of the other gods.