Nezzar

Part One: Look At Me

Apophis lifted his gaze from the grinning goddess and focused miles ahead. He saw them. Ra, Sekhmet, and Sobek were shooting to his location like arcs of black smoke across the night sky. As he watched their approach, a madness cooed at his appetite, urging him to clamp his jaws around Tefnut's head and devour her while he had the chance. He was nothing near his full capacity. Devouring at least two gods would have made his imminent faceoff with Ra something he could be proud of. But now...

"So, this is how you wish to play," Apophis mumbled as he looked down at the frozen goddess.

"Yes." She hissed the words through gritted stained teeth, eyes shining with dark excitement. "You will know–"

With an enraged shout, Apophis snatched Tefnut by the back of the neck and squeezed. His talons grew sharper as they pierced through flesh and met bones. Black blood spilled down her chin and splattered upon her chest but her crazed grin remained.

Huffing, Apophis turned his gaze to the priestess and her care-child. Mind working fast, he searched for solutions–any loophole that would work in his favour. Finally, he remembered.

"Let me show you how to play." Reflecting Tefnut's grin, Apophis grabbed her by the hair and flew into the night sky. As he gunned for the approaching trio, he sent a command to the priestess and her care-child.

It would be foolish to devour the goddess now. Ra and his lackeys would simply overpower him in the time it took to recuperate after a meal. Though his hunger had grown to a wild trashing thing within him, Apophis subdued it, pressing turbulent emotions down with cold resolve. No one would take his vengeance away.

***

Amon-Ra pulled to a stop when he spotted Apophis. Sekhmet and Sobek did the same, posture tightening as they summoned their weapons and waited.

"I see a woman and a child leaving the scene," Sekhmet said as her eyes tracked their unhurried movement. "Do I kill them?"

Amon-Ra looked in their direction. Black smoke blasted from his nose as he huffed in disgust. "Leave them be. The incense they burn is tainted." He faced ahead once more. "We focus on the snake." And wait for Anubis. Just in case things went sideways, Anubis had promised to fight by his side.

Summoning every ounce of worship he had received, he concentrated it within him. He pictured it as a tight black ball, spinning and throbbing as it waited to do its master's bidding. Apophis was ignorant of the times, ignorant of how much he had evolved from what he was when they clashed all those years ago.

Apophis halted before them, hooded robe writhing like a living thing around his willowy form and a stiff Teftnut swinging by her hair in his left grip. To Amon-Ra's mild surprise, Apophis had chosen to maintain the appearance he possessed when he existed as Quatesh. Cotton white scaly skin and a bald head. His eyes were completely black this time, no green in sight.

"You should not be here," Amon-Ra stated in a conversational manner, as he spoke, he passed silent commands to Sekhmet and Sobek on how to best attack.

A sudden fierce scowl contorted Apophis's face. "You," He jabbed a finger in Amon-Ra's direction, voice turning guttural as he continued speaking, "a little demon who should be grovelling at my feet, who should flee if I so much as glance your way." His frame expanded, the air around him rippling with the intensity of his rising rage. "You dared to fiddle with my mind, to turn me to a maggot kneeling for scraps at your table. Then you imprisoned me."

Burning wings tore through his back and spewed lava as they flapped. His robe and white skin burned away leaving coal-black shiny scales behind. "That you found the boldness–the gall to face me is an insult I will never forgive."