She said to Jan, "This man is your father. And the boy he is carrying is your twin, Kaz. You must defeat him in battle."

Jan was too stunned by everything to process anything that was happening. 

The man, a very handsome man with blonde hair and blue eyes, said to his son, Kaz, "What she said is true. You must defeat your twin. You have the discipline to do it, and it looks as if your twin has had no discipline."

His twin, Kaz, looked as shocked as he did, but he wasn't struggling to get free. In fact, his father was able to carry him gently on his palm, and Kaz merely bowed his head in acknowledgment when his father told him what was to happen. 

Jan strugggled more voraciously and yelled, "let me go ma! Put me back! I don't belong here!"

“This is life, Janny. Real life. I told you to prepare yourself. I can’t put you back in an illusory paludarium. You need to do something with your life.” his mother said. 

She and the man–who he saw was also missing a pinky finger–turned and walked together. Jan looked beneath him, and saw a bed of orange clouds. His vision spun, afraid his mother would drop him, and he would fall through the cloud. 

“Are you excited, dearest?” the man asked. 

“Of course not. I raised him from a pup, and you raised yours from a pup. Why would I be excited?” his mother grumbled.

“They are lesser creatures. Who cares what happens to them?” the man said. “They now have the chance to become greater creatures.”

“I suppose.” was all his mother said. 

Jan had gone still, realizing struggling was useless. He had resigned himself to whatever fate his mother had in store for him. 

Prepare yourself for anything. His mother's words echoed in his mind. He snapped out of his despair, and tried to focus on what was about to happen. They said I’m about to fight my twin… well, I already know he’s in better shape than me. But when they say I have to fight him, do they mean in physical combat, or in some sort of a game? It sounds like physical combat… what did mom say last night again?

He thought as hard as he could, and then he remembered his mom saying to think of the thing he was most passionate about. 

He wracked his mind. He enjoyed writing, and he was passionate about it, but there was one thing he was even more passionate about. He did it fairly often–it was something his mom introduced to him. 

He remembered it was when he was considerably smaller. He had ripped one of his socks–one of his favorite socks that was embroidered with crabs, some of his favorite creatures–and he remembered being miserable about it. 

His mother’s eye appeared in the sky, and she had asked him what was wrong. He told her that he ripped his favorite sock while trying to catch fish, and she tsked and told him she was going to teach him how to fix it. 

At first, he was defiant. He remembered crossing his arms and complaining that he didn’t want to do it for about five minutes. His mother had finally had enough and yelled at him with a booming voice that he was going to learn, regardless of whether he wanted to or not.

He remembered gulping and standing to attention. 

He followed her instructions as she taught him how to darn a sock. He stuck a needle in it, and it was as if he could visualize, from that one instance, everything about socks. How they were made, how to take them apart, and how to repair them. His mother only had to give him a few instructions, and the rest just clicked in his mind. From there, he began making his own clothes for fun, and had even made his current set of clothes. 

I don’t know how that will help me win a battle, though. 

His mother entered a house. From the outside, the house was wooden–overgrown with vines–with flowers in planters outside the house on the bright clouds below. 

They entered the house together and his mother and the man she was walking with stopped in front of another paludarium. The man said to his supposed twin, “Get in there and fight, my son. Find your passion and your will to win.”

The man dropped his twin inside of the paludarium. His own mother held him on the palm of her hand for a moment. She gazed at him sadly. “I love you, my son. Find your passion. You can do this.”

She grabbed him by his collar again and dropped him inside the paludarium. He landed on his rump on a sea of sand. Jan cocked his head to the side. He had never seen such a large swathe of sand before–especially not of this consistency. He dipped a hand in the sand, and found that it wasn’t very moldable. He lifted his fingers, and the sand slipped through hs fingers.

On the other side of the paludarium, his supposed twin, Kaz was dropped into the cage. Jan backed up against the glass behind him. This cage was much smaller than his home with his castle. 

Kaz looked as baffled as he did. But, Kaz also looked far more… wise than he did. He had a few scars, and Jan was afraid there was no way he was going to win this fight.

“Jan.” he heard his mother’s voice and spun on his heel to see his mother peering in through the glass. 

Jan looked at her silently, feeling his heart thudding violently against his ribcage. 

“Do you want to know why you’re here?” his mother asked.

Jan nodded quietly, too frightened to speak. 

“You are here to defeat your twin in combat. You are a demigod my son, and you are here to discover what your power is. If you knock out Kaz, you can merge with him and become a real god. However, he has that same opportunity. I am the goddess of love, and your father is the god of thunder. You already have a power, you just need to find it." His mother explainded.

"Ma please, tell me more! Defeat him for me! You're my ma, you're supposed to protect me!" Jan begged.

His mother shook her head. "I can't handle this for you Jan. You have to do it. I believe in you, and I send you my love."

With that, she rose to her feet, and he could no longer see her face anymore. He pawed at the glass a moment longer and said, "Ma, good mommies do things for their sons! I thought you were a good ma!"

Suddenly, he felt something wham into his back, knocking the air out of him and pressing him against the glass. He turned around, panting, and saw Kaz running at him, hand raised high. Jan froze in place, he yelled, "I surrender! Please don't hurt me!"

"No surrender! You're going down!" Kaz yelled. 

Jan put up his hands, trying to block whatever blows were coming. 

It was an unexpected blow that came his way. Kaz lifted his chin, his nostrils twitched, and then, puffs of white air, as big as elephants, exited his nostrils and sped towards Jan. Jan yelled and tried to dive to the side, but the gust of air had already hit him, knocking the air out of him again and causing him to slam into the glass. His ears rang, his heart thudded, and he thought it might burst from the pain he was feeling. His vision spun, and he only knew that Kaz was charging him and he had to act quickly if he wanted to live. He tried to get his arms and legs to move, but they were too sore. 

Kaz leapt at him, his nostrils flaring again. 

Jan thought he was doomed, but in that moment, his gaze zeroed in on Kaz's clothing. He was wearing armor with a cotton shirt underneath, with a loose thread hanging off. Impulsively, he reached out a hand and squeezed. 

The thread was pulled loose and wrapped around Kaz's legs, tripping him. 

Jan was sweating profusely. He suddenly found the strength to sit up, despite the pain in his body. His brows knitted, and he clenched his fist harder--his nails digging into his palm until they bled. Kaz's clothes constricted tightly about him, like a snake. 

Jan felt his muscles tensing, and he frowned. He knew he couldn't possibly hold his hand up much longer due to his poor upper body strength and due to how sore he was. He unclenched his hand, his eyes rolled into the back of his head, and he fainted. 

***

There was no awakening for Jan. Instead, there was an awakening for a new creature called Kazajan. It was the size of a regular human, had four horns, four eyes, and four arms. 

Kazajan turned to his father and said, “Where am I? Who am I?”

His father grinned and said, “You are a new god made of two demigods. Quite impressive you are! What do you think, dearest? I told you Kaz would win.”

Kazajan looked at his mother, who was in tears. She growled and said, “What do I think? I think we have created a monster! I’m taking my boy back!”

His father crossed his arms. “If you do that, you will be imprisoned in the underworld. Don’t be silly, darling. Our sons have become a full god!” 

Kazajan could hardly comprehend what was happening. He just knew that there was an underlying thought in his mind–war and destruction, and a place called earth. He asked, “Where must I go?” 

His father was about to answer, when his mother suddenly hit him with a blast of pink power from her fingers. The creature called Kazajan ceased to exist, and was blasted away–back into two separate demigods again, Kaz and Jan.