This was a ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
yuletide pinch-hit I picked up, one of the late ones. I don't remember what the deadline was, but it was about a week? I was surprised to get it, because I figured that a pinch-hit that included Wonder Woman would be one of the ones to get snatched up quickly, and I am NEVER that quick. But I got it! And then realized that the characters included Antiope, Diana, Steve, and Etta, and that Yuletide is AND matching. From the prompts, I figured that ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
indiefic meant "or" so you didn't have to write a fic with all of the characters in (given that Antiope DIES before Etta appears, which kind of constrains you to either a VERY particular timespan or an AU of some sort), and if I'd had more time I'd have emailed the mods to ask and clarify the situation, but then I came up with the idea for a five things fic that would work, and got down to banging out some words.
The first draft, which I uploaded to be sure of making the deadline, was very rough. It was LOTS OF TELLING, and very little showing. Was it a complete story that fulfilled the request, sure. Was it the best I could do? Not by a long shot. I just set my head down and banged out words to get something complete, and that was about all you could say about it but my brain was fried by that many words in that period and I couldn't deal with editing it. So I sent it off to the lovely hellabaloo, who confirmed that there was entirely too much telling and too little showing, and also gave some good suggestions about how to fix it, plus a couple of other items I hadn't noticed. By that point, my brain had had a couple of days to rest and I was able to approach it freshly, and that plus the beta comments allowed me to whip it into the final shape.
Title: Five Things Antiope Taught Diana (and One Thing She Didn't Mean to)
Fandom: Wonder Woman (2017)
Characters: Diana Prince, Steve Trevor, Etta Candy, Antiope
Written For:indiefic in Yuletide 2017
Betaed by: hellabaloo
Word count: 6599
Summary: what it says on the tin.
On AO3.
Five Things Antiope taught Diana:
Hidden Disobedience
Arranging for Diana to be trained without her mother's knowledge took careful planning.
"Your tutor believes that you spend all of your afternoons from now on at the Temple with Aunt Menalippe," Aunt Antiope said as they stretched and warmed up. "So do not tell her otherwise."
"Of course not," Diana said, copying her aunt's movements as best she could.
"No, do not let your knee bend, Diana," Antiope said. "Like this." She demonstrated the proper position.
"Why do we need to stretch?" Diana asked. She thought they were going to learn to fight! Stretching was boring.
"So that your body will be ready to do all that you want to do, without injury," Aunt Antiope said. "You don't take your horse out of the stable and go straight into a gallop, do you?"
"No," Diana said.
"You should not do that to your body, either," Antiope said. Once she was satisfied that Diana was doing it the correct way, she continued. "Your Aunt Menalippe believes that after your time with her is done, I escort you straight back to your tutor at the palace and you spend the rest of the day there while I go off to train by myself. So do not tell her otherwise."
"All right," Diana said. "What do I say if Mother asks?"
"Be as vague as you can," Antiope said. She nudged one of Diana's feet to adjust it.
"Why don't you tell Aunt Menalippe the truth?" Diana asked. "She would help."
"We are not lying to anyone," Aunt Antiope said.
"No, but we are not telling them the truth, either. I bet Aunt Menalippe would agree you should train me if you told her." Aunt Menalippe always agreed with Aunt Antiope, or perhaps it was the other way around; in any case, the two always acted together.
"Perhaps she would," Aunt Antiope said. "But I do not wish her to have to lie to your mother the Queen, should she ask."
"Would you lie to mother?" Diana asked. "If she asked?"
"No, for she is my queen and she has my loyalty and my honor," Aunt Antiope said.
Diana frowned, confused. "But you are defying her now, by training me. Thank you for doing so! I love it. But what is the difference between going against her orders, and lying to her about it? Is that not only a rhetorical difference?"
"It is a very substantial difference," Aunt Antiope said. "I am sworn to obey your mother as queen, but I am also sworn to the defense of this island and the governance of its martial affairs. This makes the training of the Amazons—of ALL the Amazons—my responsibility. This includes your training, Diana. In this, your mother is wrong to coddle you. She wishes for you to live in peace; so do I. But my wishes will mean nothing if men find our island, if the gods' protection fails, or if Steppenwolf returns to claim the Mother Box in our care, or if Circe or Eris dare to venture onto our shores. The only thing that will matter then is whether you are ready to face the battle. If I obey your mother and fail to train you, when those days come I will have failed in my duty as General of this island."
"Oh," Diana said. Men and parademons and gods and Steppenwolf were storybook figures, to her; she'd never thought that Aunt Antiope might seriously think they might show up one day. She just wanted to learn to fight because it looked like fun. But on the other hand, if she didn't believe that—if the rest of the Amazons didn't believe that—why did they all (except Diana) keep in peak condition, training daily to fight?
"To do my duty to you, I must do it in secret, as your mother has forbidden it. However, she is still my queen, and I will not lie to her, for that would break my oath to her. And so we must be creative and cautious in what we tell people we are doing."
"Oh," Diana said again. She didn't quite see the difference, but it seemed as if it mattered a great deal to Aunt Antiope.
"Your body should be ready to work, now," Aunt Antiope said, unsheathing her sword. "Pick up your sword, and we shall see what you have learned by watching."
There was so much to do before they could go find Ares, and Diana was practically vibrating with impatience. But she could not leave without Steve—Man's world was a very confusing place, and she could not find Ares without him to help her navigate its pitfalls—and so she had to wait for him to arrange the details he thought necessary.
Or, more accurately, for Etta to arrange the details.
Steve was off doing something—Diana didn't quite understand what, although he had explained it; it had to do with his status as a warrior and the long mission he had just returned from. He had left her with Etta while he was gone, and although Diana had offered to help, Etta had turned her down. So Diana sat quietly by Etta's desk, watching and listening.
"Is there anything I can do to help?" Diana asked.
Etta looked her up and down. "No, dear," she said firmly. "I have everything under control. And there isn't time to teach you all you'd need to know."
One of the strange devices on her desk sounded a bell, and Etta picked up a horn attached to a cord, putting the horn to her ear and lowering her head so that her mouth was even with the horn attached to the end of a stand. "Captain Trevor's office," she said. "Oh, Major Dalrymple, hope you are feeling better, sir. No, the Captain is not available at the moment—" she grabbed for a piece of paper and a pencil, jotting down a note. "I'll be sure to tell him that. Can it wait? Only he's got his next assignment already, and I don't know that he will be back—" There was another pause, in which Diana could just make out a man's voice coming from the horn Etta held to her ear, although not what he was saying. Etta wrote some more on another piece of paper. "Yes, sir. I'll find someone and let you know." She nodded as she spoke. "Thank you. Yes, sir."
Etta put the horn attached to the cord back on its hook on the stand, and handed the piece of paper to Diana. "Could you hand that to Miss Horner, she's the one with the large desk up front, and say it's from Major Dalrymple?"
"Of course," Diana said. Miss Horner's desk was easy to find, as it was facing the opposite direction of everyone else's, as if she were the queen of the room and all the other women were her subjects. Diana strode towards the front of the room, careful not to tangle her legs in the unfamiliar skirts.
As she approached Miss Horner's desk, the other woman looked up with a frown. She looked nothing like Queen Hippolyte—short, plump, frizzled graying hair twisted up in a knot instead of flowing free—but she had the same air of authority. This room was her kingdom, however small it might be, and she expected respect to match. It was the same aura Antiope had on the training grounds. Diana lowered her eyes with appropriate deference. "Etta said to give this to you," she said, handing out the note.
"You're that girl Captain Trevor brought back, yes?" Miss Horner asked, taking the slip of paper and glancing at it. "You shouldn't be in here, but I'll allow it as long as you don't pry and stay out of the way." She made a dismissive motion with her fingers and bent back over her desk.
"Of course," Diana said, feeling oddly like a small child caught watching her elders train. She turned and went back to her chair by Etta's desk, to watch the other woman work.
It was quite educational. Etta told five different officers (all men) that Steve would be doing three different things (none of them going to the front to find Ares, Diana noted), while at the same time trading favors with six different secretaries (all women) for either them or the officers they worked for to do the work that Steve was supposed to be doing.
It was quite like how Aunt Antiope had carved out two hours each day where everyone thought Diana was somewhere else, to train her in. Except that Antiope did not lie. But then again, Antiope served a sovereign worthy of respect, which these officers did not seem to be. And if the only way Ares could be defeated was against the wishes and behind the backs of these men, well. They were lucky to have such a formidable woman to arrange it.
Trust
"So, Diana," Aunt Antiope said, the day after Mother found out about their practices in secret, "now that your mother has agreed that you are to be trained, you will be added to a training cadre. Captain Pyrgomache will be your commander." Diana had run all the way from the Palace to the main training grounds the second she had heard, to find her aunt directing a cavalry drill.
"Captain Pyrgomache?" Diana asked with a frown. The only Pyrgomache Diana knew was the woman in the bakery on Athena's Way who stopped her sisters from giving Diana sweet rolls when she thought Diana was getting spoiled.
"She leads one of our secondary squads," Aunt Antiope said, keeping an eagle eye on her warriors. "I don't think you ever bothered to sneak in to watch them train."
"Are you saying I am not dedicated enough Aunt Antiope?" Diana asked, slightly disgruntled to be put to fighting with farmers and potters and weavers and leatherworkers. They were highly honored for the work on which Amazonian society was built, but … their skills in combat could not hope to match those of their sisters who did nothing else. And Diana wanted to be the best.
"No, I am saying you are young and untried," Aunt Antiope said. "If we had others who were learning, I would put you in with them. But we do not. So you will go with Captain Pyrgomache and her unit, and you will learn to work in a group. And, Diana?" She finally looked down at her.
"Yes, Aunt Antiope?" Diana asked, meeting her gaze.
"On the training field, I am not your aunt. I am your general." The words were not harsh, but they were firm.
"Yes, Au—Antiope," Diana said, and went off to find where Captain Pyrgomache and her women were training.
General Antiope was right; Diana had never bothered to come watch the secondary squads train. There were more of them, but they were not as impressive as the primary squads who were focused on nothing but the arts of war.
Captain Pyrgomache was, indeed, the baker Diana had been thinking of. She looked different, in armor, harder and older. Her unit was already hard at work, paired off with swords and shields, when Diana walked up to them. But she could see them falter as she came near, pausing to watch her.
Diana raised her chin. She was used to being watched. "Captain Pyrgomache?" she said, bowing slightly to her new commander.
"So, Diana, let us see what you can do," Pyrgomache said.
Once Diana had stretched and warmed up, they ran races and lifted weights, and Diana was proud that, although she was much smaller than the women, she was faster than them, and just as strong, and her endurance was no less than theirs. She basked in the admiration sent her way.
But then they returned to sparring, and things did not go so well. Diana was paired with Chalcaor, a short and heavy-set woman, with bulky arms that held a sword confidently.
Chalcaor was not as brilliant a swordswoman as Aunt Antiope, or some of her favorite warriors, but she was solid. Her moves had the quick sureness of one who did not have to think before moving, and Diana was outmatched.
Or at least, she would have been, if Chalcaor had ever fully pressed her attack. Diana flushed. She was not here to be petted, she was here to learn.
"Chalcaor, do not coddle her," Pyrgomache snapped out. "She is not here for you to cosset."
For the first time, she was glad of Pyrgomache, one of the few women on the island who did not indulge Diana's every whim as both a princess and the only child on the island.
For a long time, as Diana trained with Pyrgomache's unit, Pyrgomache had to watch, eagle-eyed, for the point when her women would slack off and treat Diana as a child instead of a warrior. But as Diana learned the arts of war, her unit learned to see her as a comrade and an equal.
But it was not until that year's war games—the first time Diana had been permitted to participate, or even to see them—that Diana truly began to learn the lessons Aunt Antiope had set her there to learn. Not just the fighting prowess, but the discipline of it.
In the first battle, Diana was impatient. Captain Pyrgomache's unit was advancing, but the others were so slow. Diana was much faster, and she was stronger, and so she ran out in front of them instead of advancing in line with them, ignoring Pyrgomache's commands to stop and return.
She was so focused on her attack, that she did not notice the archers to her left, and so left her flank unprotected. And thus it was that a dummy arrow, with a small pillow at the end instead of a point, hit her squarely in the side. And she was out for the rest of the day. Worse, her sisters-in-arms had to re-form themselves to cover the hole she left, and that slowed them enough to give their opponent an edge, which they exploited to win the day.
Captain Pyrgomache railed at her for breaking discipline. Aunt—no, General—Antiope gave her a blistering set-down and ordered her extra shifts mucking out stalls for the next month. The other members of her unit said nothing, but muttered among themselves and eyed her resentfully. Mother was disappointed, and asked if perhaps she was not mature enough to fight, yet, if that was how she would behave.
The next day, Diana stayed with her unit, even though they were slower than she was. It went much better.
Diana wanted nothing more than to run ahead to find Ares by herself. Steve was so slow. Especially once they were off the boat, and on the same continent as Ares was, and she could see the devastation for herself instead of merely hearing stories about it. But she did not know where to find him without Steve's help, and as they travelled she realized that even if she could find Ares by herself, she would need Steve's help to reach him.
Only Diana could fight Ares, with her Amazon's training and the God-killer she bore; but if she did not wish to fight her way through Ares' unwitting tools, she would need Steve to get her through the lines.
"Halt right bloody there!" said another sentry. Diana approved of watchfulness, but this business of checkpoints everywhere seemed to her to be a waste of labor. And none of the sentries wanted to let her or Steve's men through. Nor did they want to listen to her.
But Steve opened his coat enough to show the little pins and ribbons that gave his rank, and talked quietly to them, gesturing back at Diana and Sameer and Charlie and the Chief, and the sentries would relax. Then he showed them his official papers, and they saluted and stood aside, and on they went towards Ares.
Only Diana could fight Ares, but even Amazons needed to eat, and it was the Chief's skills at bargaining and trading which got them the supplies they needed. Diana had never been very good at bargaining and trading; her mind was too straightforward. Her mother had despaired at it. But the Chief could and did get what they needed, when they needed it.
Sameer and Charlie had not yet had a chance to shine, Diana reflected as they reached the trenches and started through them, but she thought they probably would. Steve had brought them along for a reason. Diana might not understand that reason, just as she hadn't understood, that first few years with Pyrgomache's unit, why it was important to train with her cadre and stay with them in battle. But each had something to contribute, and Diana would learn what it was in time.
Learning
Diana was flushed with wine and song, as they gathered around the bonfire to celebrate the end of that year's war games. She had done well; her unit had done its job, and in the individual skills competitions, she had taken first place. "I beat everyone—did you see how I even bested Thermodosa with her spear?" she boasted to anyone who would listen. "When was the last time anyone did that!"
"You did very well, Diana," her mother said indulgently. "Your skills have progressed a great deal."
"Your guard was weak on the left side during that fight," Antiope said. "You were favoring it after the bruise you took in the earlier match."
"But I beat her!" Diana said. "Me, I bested Thermodosa's spear! Even if my guard was weak on one side." She took another drink. "If I can beat Thermodosa, I can beat anyone!"
"Except me," Antiope said with a small smile, pouring herself more wine.
"Oh, let her have her triumph, Antiope," Menalippe said. "She deserves it—it was a great match, Diana!"
Diana raised her cup in salute, drained it, and set it down so she could go join the dancing. She laughed all night long as she leaped through the air, swinging others around and being swept around in her turn.
The next day, she had a headache, and the sun was too bright. The next day, Aunt Antiope ordered her to the practice field early, even though traditionally the day after the war games were over was a day to laze around and recover from the festivities.
"Now is the time to intensify your weapons training, Diana," Antiope said.
"But I already know the sword, the knife, the bow, the shield, the axe, and the spear," Diana said, confused. "And I know them all afoot or on horseback. What else is there?"
Antiope tossed a rope at her feet.
Diana picked it up. "A rope? Are we going to practice jumping from the cliffs again?" That was fun, although probably not on a stomach as queasy as hers was.
"No, you are going to learn to fight with it," Antiope said.
"How can you fight with a rope?" Diana asked. "It has no strength, no edge, nothing."
"You can use it to yank people off their feet, or take their weapons away from them," Antiope said. "The Lasso of Hestia is a truth-telling device, but your mother bore it in combat. You should learn it, too."
Nobody used swords or shields or knives or bows or spears to fight in Man's World, Diana discovered. Only guns of various sizes, some carried by soldiers, some wielded by soldiers in squads, some mounted on vehicles. But her shield and gauntlets worked just as well against them as they did against arrows, only now she had to be even faster. It took every bit of concentration she had, to go so quickly, and to fight when the landscape and the weapons and the tactics were all so very different from anything else she had seen before. No Man's Land was hard, and then taking Veld was hard in a different way. If Antiope had not trained her so well, Diana could not have done it. But she could not think of Antiope, now.
Steve was right behind her, the whole way. And although Steve was used to guns and trenches, he was not used to the way Diana fought in them. That much was obvious in the way it took him time, only seconds but seconds counted, to gape after her and adjust to what she was doing, every time she did something new.
But Steve paid attention. Steve watched, and Steve learned. And so, in Veld, when there was a German gun in the tower of the central building, Steve copied a move of the Amazons, something he could only have seen once before, in that battle on the beach. He led the others out to that piece of metal and called out to her, "Diana! Shield!"
She turned, trusted him, and leaped—and up they launched her.
Diana didn't so much fight the Germans in the tower as she brought the building down on top of them. Which she had never done before, nor had any Amazon that she knew of—but it worked.
After the battle was over, as the dust settled and the people of Veld came out of their houses, Diana and Steve shared a smile.
"Thank you for the lift," she said. "Did you see that on Themyscira?"
"I did, yeah," Steve said. "Figured you'd know what I meant. You really … went through them like a hot knife through butter. You were amazing."
"Thank you!" Diana said. "It is very different from my training on Themyscira, but still effective."
"I'll say," put in Sameer.
"You are very adaptable, too, Steve," Diana said. "Antiope would approve of that, I think." She looked away. There was no time to grieve until after Ares was defeated.
"That's quite a compliment," Steve said, taking her hand. "Thank you."
Love
Aunt Antiope and Aunt Menalippe were not always together; Aunt Antiope spent her days in the training grounds, and Aunt Menalippe spent half of hers in the temple. And Aunt Antiope regularly spent days and nights out patrolling the island, away from the city, so that she and her warriors might know every inch of it in every season and time of day, while Aunt Menalippe never went out on patrol. And while Aunt Antiope often came to the palace to dine or spend an evening, Aunt Menalippe preferred to stay in the temple, where it was quieter.
Nor were Diana's aunts particularly demonstrative. There were many couples who were showier in their affections for one another; Diana rarely saw them kiss, and even then, it was only a peck on the lips. They didn't even have the stormy fights that some couples did. A stranger might not know they were together, not that there were ever any strangers on the island.
But Diana knew they must have something worth having, because her mother watched them wistfully, as if they had something she wanted. And there were very few things Queen Hippolyte wanted that she did not have, so therefore it must be something truly important. So Diana watched them.
And she noticed that whenever they were together, they were constantly turning towards each other.
"The quality of oil for the temple lamps isn't quite up to standard, this year," Aunt Menalippe might say, and Aunt Antiope might respond, "Is it because of how the olive trees produced less, this year? What are you going to do about it?" although Diana knew that Aunt Antiope found agriculture boring and logistics a chore.
Or Aunt Antiope might say, "That new mare of Enchesimargos's is giving her fits—doesn't want to be trained, that one, too independent. Still, she has stamina and intelligence, and it would be a shame not to use her," and Aunt Menalippe might say "Oh? Well, there are few better horsewomen than Enchesimargos. What will you do if the horse doesn't cooperate?" although Diana knew that Aunt Menalippe cared little for horses.
"I thought you didn't like logistics," Diana said to Aunt Antiope after the conversation about temple lamp oil. "That's why you delegate it to Alce." They were out for a ride, enjoying the nice weather after three straight days of rain and training indoors.
"Logistics may be boring, but it is vital to victory in the long-term, Diana," Aunt Antiope said. "And what matters to my wife matters to me, just as she cares about my things." She nudged her horse to a stop at the top of the cliffs, and stared off across the ocean.
Diana followed her gaze. Sometimes, when the light was just right (as it was now), you could see the barrier that protected the island. It shimmered, and Diana wondered what was beyond it, what Man's World was like outside of the stories the older Amazons told her.
"Besides, I could listen to Menalippe recite mathematic manuals for hours," Antiope said, giving her mount's sides a tap to continue down the path.
And when they had been apart, Aunt Antiope and Aunt Menalippe always told one another stories of what they had done while separated, and when they were together, a little part of their attention was always on what the other was saying or doing, even from across the room.
Nobody paid attention to Diana, like that. Oh, she was watched by everyone; but in the indulgent way of an adult watching a child. Her thoughts were only interesting to them as a measure of how well her tutors were instructing her. (This was unfair to her mother and her aunts, and Diana knew it, but it was true that nobody was interested in her as an equal.)
Steve constantly looked at her. Mostly in surprise, as she did something he thought impossible or missed something he thought obvious, but he paid constant attention to her.
"How come you haven't mentioned any friends your own age?" Steve asked, after she told him a story about racing horses with Aunt Menalippe's squad. "Did your mom not think they were good enough to play with her princess?"
"Hmm?" Diana asked, drowsily. The sacks and piles of rope weren't as comfortable as her bed back in the palace, but they were better than a bedroll on patrol, and the sound of the waves was soothing in the cool darkness. "Oh, there were no other children of any age. Men are necessary for reproduction, so without men … I was a gift from Zeus, but he does not give gifts often."
"So you were the only child on the entire island?" Steve asked. "That must have been lonely."
"I had my mother and my aunts and my tutors," Diana said. "And many people wanted to play with me, especially when I was little. I was never alone."
"Yeah, but having friends your own age … it's different." Steve was quiet for a bit, and she wondered if he was drifting off to sleep.
"I never really had friends, either," he said at last. "Dad wasn't that much of a businessman—he tried a lot of things, but they all failed. So we moved a lot, and didn't live in very nice neighborhoods, and Mom was afraid of me catching lice from the other kids, so I spent a lot of time by myself or at home. My parents were great, but it wasn't the same as having someone my own age to play with."
Diana thought back to her own childhood, how there was always an Amazon willing to play with her, but mostly to humor the child they all loved, rather than because they genuinely enjoyed whatever game Diana wanted to play. "No. It wasn't." She could only imagine what it would have been like, to have someone at her own level. Her own mother, her aunts, her tutors, all the women who had helped raise her and care for her … none of them had realized this, how alone she sometimes felt, but Steve had figured it out simply by listening to a few stories.
In London, he wanted her to hide herself and fit in, but he always saw who she was underneath the drab skirt and jacket. (This was a much rarer ability in men than Diana knew at the time, and so she valued it mostly in retrospect.) Even when he didn't believe her, or thought her wrong, he listened and tried to help as best he could.
At the train station, as they made their way among the troops, he saw the ice cream seller and was already turning reaching for his wallet when Diana stopped. "What is in this?" Diana asked.
"Cream and sugar, mostly," Steve said, "with some milk and whatever other flavoring you want. Then you put it in a pail, put the pail in a bucket filled with ice and salt, and keep turning the pail round and round until the cream freezes. Lot of work, but it sure tastes good, doesn't it?"
"Ice?"
Steve looked at her strangely. "You know, what happens when water gets cold enough to freeze?"
"I've read about it, but never seen it," Diana said. "Themyscira is always warm, all year round."
"Must be nice," Steve said. "I don't like cold. So what kind of desserts do you have in Themyscira?" Diana's description of the various kinds of honey cakes and pastries lasted them until they got close enough to the ships to see the wounded men coming off them.
In Veld, as Charlie and Sameer and the Chief explored the town and celebrated with the locals, Steve stayed with her and talked. When they danced, she realized that he was the first person she had ever known who saw her for the adult she was now, and not the child she had been. Also, he was very attractive, for a man. Later, when she invited him into her bed, he was as interested in her pleasure as in her own.
In the few days they had together, he always seemed to know what she wanted or needed before she did. Looking back on it, after years in Man's World, she was amazed at how smoothly everything had gone, given how little she had understood of what the world and the war were like. It was a testament to the attention Steve paid to her wishes and her capabilities, that everything was arranged around her despite her own ignorance, to put her exactly where she wanted and needed to be.
In hindsight, she was ashamed at how little consideration she had given him in return. She had been straining toward her destiny, to the battle with Ares she believed would fix everything, and so she had taken Steve and his help and his attention for granted. She had not been unkind, but neither had she repaid him for what he had given her. It was so rare to find a man who could or would build a relationship on equality as well as love, but Steve could have done so. If he had not died.
She had not thought of it, but if she had, she would have assumed they would have more time.
Sacrifice
The battle on the beach was almost over, and Diana—the only one of those who fought there who had never seen death, or true warfare—let down her guard. She stood there, watching something that caught her eye, not realizing that there was a man with a weapon behind her, ready to fire. The man's weapon was quicker than a bow, and there was no time for Diana to hear it, react, and get out of the way. Not even Diana was immune to injury, and death. Later, Diana would piece together what had happened—how foolish she had been—and rage and grieve. But in the moment, he did not see.
Antiope loved Diana, and Antiope was a general who knew how to weigh out lives and decide who to send to the front lines. And so she did not hesitate to trade her life for Diana's, both as a woman who loved her niece almost as a daughter, and as a general who knew that the destruction of Ares was worth almost any cost.
Diana didn't know all of these calculations until later, after she knew the truth about why Zeus had given her to her mother. But in the end, what difference did it make? Antiope made her choice, and would never have regretted it for an instant.
When Steve came up to her, saying he had to go, she almost thought she was standing on the beach, again, watching Antiope die. It was night instead of day, she stood on a tarmac rather than on sand, and she had time to say good-bye, but the feeling of seeing and feeling the inevitable approach was just the same.
Steve was not a perfect man, Steve was a part of the whole great vile pointless war, and he offered himself to it knowing how empty it was. But Steve also knew that if there was anything to be saved from that war, if anything good was to come from it, saving lives was the first thing to do. (Maybe he learned that from her.) And the people who would die if the plane detonated on the ground, here or in England, those were people he could save.
Steve made his choice, and would never have regretted it for an instant. Just like Antiope.
And again, Diana was left standing alone.
And one thing she didn't get the chance to:
How to go on.
"How can they celebrate?" Diana asked quietly, standing at the window of Etta's flat and staring out at the people on the street below, feeling lost. Ares was dead, but so was Steve. She had not thought that accomplishing her mission would leave her so … hollow. She felt as gray as the skies and buildings. But down on the street below, people were waving brightly-colored cloths and celebrating. "Millions have died, and they cheer? Whole nations decimated, and they are laughing."
"They cheer because the killing has stopped," Etta said. "For a while there, it seemed like the whole world was going to be consumed in the war. And now, it isn't. Nothing can change what's happened, but we can be happy that it's not going to happen any more, surely."
This was true, and Diana could not deny it, but it was the first time since Steve crashed in the beach that she truly had time to stop and think, instead of focusing on the next task to be accomplished.
A week ago, she had never seen a person die. Animals, yes, of course; horses and sheep and pigs and chickens and cats and dogs, they lived and died. But Amazons did not. Amazons lived, and lived, and lived.
And then men came, and they died. In battle, defending their island, but they died all the same. And Antiope, beloved Aunt Antiope, she died for Diana.
And then Diana saw Man's World, saw how filthy and wretched it was, how corrupt and venal its leaders were, how violent and degrading it could be, how little they cared for the victims swept up in their fights. How they worked to build ever greater weapons, so that ever greater numbers could be slaughtered more quickly.
And then Diana met Ares, and Steve died, and she learned that when men did these horrible things, they did it by their own choice. Influenced by Ares, yes, but not forced by him.
Steve was the closest thing to good she had seen since leaving Themyscira, and he was dead.
And the people in the streets were celebrating.
"You haven't eaten anything," Etta said. "Food's getting cold."
"What?" Diana said, turning around.
Etta was seated at the tiny table, munching on toast. She swallowed and repeated herself. "The food is getting cold, and you haven't eaten. Starving yourself won't do Steve any good, now will it?"
It would not do Steve any good to starve herself; neither would it do him any harm. He was dead, and beyond caring about it. But Etta was right, she should eat. Diana sat down and took a slice of toast for herself, and some bacon.
"Now, you've lost a great deal in a short while," Etta said. "Home, family, Steve, all one after the other. Cry all you like—it'll do you good. And there's enough widows around that nobody will take much notice of one more. But there's still plenty of work to be done, to get you settled. I find work always helps with grief, don't you?"
"I do not know," Diana said. "The only things I have had to grieve before are pets and horses. Never people." She knew the rituals and sacrifices and songs for seed-time and harvest, for injury and recovery, for good fortune and bad. But she did not know what to do for the death of a loved one. And she had many loved ones to grieve.
"Oh," said Etta. "Well, work distracts one, so there's not as much time to wallow in grief and let it settle in. Keeps you moving forward, instead of just going in circles. I know when my mum died, it was all that kept me from falling to pieces." Etta paused consideringly. "Well, at least it kept me from falling to pieces permanently. I could only do it as I had time, in dribs and drabs. And then I turned around, and she'd been gone for long enough that it wasn't quite so fresh and painful any more."
"Will it stop hurting?" Diana asked.
Etta hesitated. "No. No, it doesn't stop hurting. It does lessen, and there will be times you won't think about it at all. But then there will be times when it all hits you as if it just happened. Those times do get fewer, as you heal, but I don't think they ever really go away."
"Oh," said Diana, weirdly relieved. It would be horrible to think that one day she might be so used to Antiope and Steve and the others being dead that it would no longer hurt.
It had never occurred to her to wonder if her mother and Antiope and Menalippe were still grieving those who died before the Amazons retreated to Themyscira. To Diana, those older Amazons killed by Ares, by Steppenwolf, by men trying to enslave them, they were stories; to her mother, they had been friends and sisters-in-arms. All of a sudden, Diana understood why her mother had not wanted her taught to fight, had wanted to spare her the knowledge of pain and death. It had not been possible, but Diane understood at last why her mother had desired it.
"So what do we do now?" Diana asked.
"Now?" Etta said. "Well, first, we go out and meet with Charlie and Sameer and the Chief, and perhaps get a pint together. Then we take a few days off. Nobody will be getting anything done, not with the party outside. We share stories about Steve and everyone else we've lost. Then we see about getting you a job to support yourself; you can live with me, I need a roommate anyway. After that …." Etta shrugged. "After that, we see what happens." She smiled. "Ares is dead, and the war is over. Now we see what we can build out of the ruins of what's left."
yuletide pinch-hit I picked up, one of the late ones. I don't remember what the deadline was, but it was about a week? I was surprised to get it, because I figured that a pinch-hit that included Wonder Woman would be one of the ones to get snatched up quickly, and I am NEVER that quick. But I got it! And then realized that the characters included Antiope, Diana, Steve, and Etta, and that Yuletide is AND matching. From the prompts, I figured that indiefic meant "or" so you didn't have to write a fic with all of the characters in (given that Antiope DIES before Etta appears, which kind of constrains you to either a VERY particular timespan or an AU of some sort), and if I'd had more time I'd have emailed the mods to ask and clarify the situation, but then I came up with the idea for a five things fic that would work, and got down to banging out some words.The first draft, which I uploaded to be sure of making the deadline, was very rough. It was LOTS OF TELLING, and very little showing. Was it a complete story that fulfilled the request, sure. Was it the best I could do? Not by a long shot. I just set my head down and banged out words to get something complete, and that was about all you could say about it but my brain was fried by that many words in that period and I couldn't deal with editing it. So I sent it off to the lovely hellabaloo, who confirmed that there was entirely too much telling and too little showing, and also gave some good suggestions about how to fix it, plus a couple of other items I hadn't noticed. By that point, my brain had had a couple of days to rest and I was able to approach it freshly, and that plus the beta comments allowed me to whip it into the final shape.
Title: Five Things Antiope Taught Diana (and One Thing She Didn't Mean to)
Fandom: Wonder Woman (2017)
Characters: Diana Prince, Steve Trevor, Etta Candy, Antiope
Written For:
indiefic in Yuletide 2017Betaed by: hellabaloo
Word count: 6599
Summary: what it says on the tin.
On AO3.
Five Things Antiope taught Diana:
Hidden Disobedience
Arranging for Diana to be trained without her mother's knowledge took careful planning.
"Your tutor believes that you spend all of your afternoons from now on at the Temple with Aunt Menalippe," Aunt Antiope said as they stretched and warmed up. "So do not tell her otherwise."
"Of course not," Diana said, copying her aunt's movements as best she could.
"No, do not let your knee bend, Diana," Antiope said. "Like this." She demonstrated the proper position.
"Why do we need to stretch?" Diana asked. She thought they were going to learn to fight! Stretching was boring.
"So that your body will be ready to do all that you want to do, without injury," Aunt Antiope said. "You don't take your horse out of the stable and go straight into a gallop, do you?"
"No," Diana said.
"You should not do that to your body, either," Antiope said. Once she was satisfied that Diana was doing it the correct way, she continued. "Your Aunt Menalippe believes that after your time with her is done, I escort you straight back to your tutor at the palace and you spend the rest of the day there while I go off to train by myself. So do not tell her otherwise."
"All right," Diana said. "What do I say if Mother asks?"
"Be as vague as you can," Antiope said. She nudged one of Diana's feet to adjust it.
"Why don't you tell Aunt Menalippe the truth?" Diana asked. "She would help."
"We are not lying to anyone," Aunt Antiope said.
"No, but we are not telling them the truth, either. I bet Aunt Menalippe would agree you should train me if you told her." Aunt Menalippe always agreed with Aunt Antiope, or perhaps it was the other way around; in any case, the two always acted together.
"Perhaps she would," Aunt Antiope said. "But I do not wish her to have to lie to your mother the Queen, should she ask."
"Would you lie to mother?" Diana asked. "If she asked?"
"No, for she is my queen and she has my loyalty and my honor," Aunt Antiope said.
Diana frowned, confused. "But you are defying her now, by training me. Thank you for doing so! I love it. But what is the difference between going against her orders, and lying to her about it? Is that not only a rhetorical difference?"
"It is a very substantial difference," Aunt Antiope said. "I am sworn to obey your mother as queen, but I am also sworn to the defense of this island and the governance of its martial affairs. This makes the training of the Amazons—of ALL the Amazons—my responsibility. This includes your training, Diana. In this, your mother is wrong to coddle you. She wishes for you to live in peace; so do I. But my wishes will mean nothing if men find our island, if the gods' protection fails, or if Steppenwolf returns to claim the Mother Box in our care, or if Circe or Eris dare to venture onto our shores. The only thing that will matter then is whether you are ready to face the battle. If I obey your mother and fail to train you, when those days come I will have failed in my duty as General of this island."
"Oh," Diana said. Men and parademons and gods and Steppenwolf were storybook figures, to her; she'd never thought that Aunt Antiope might seriously think they might show up one day. She just wanted to learn to fight because it looked like fun. But on the other hand, if she didn't believe that—if the rest of the Amazons didn't believe that—why did they all (except Diana) keep in peak condition, training daily to fight?
"To do my duty to you, I must do it in secret, as your mother has forbidden it. However, she is still my queen, and I will not lie to her, for that would break my oath to her. And so we must be creative and cautious in what we tell people we are doing."
"Oh," Diana said again. She didn't quite see the difference, but it seemed as if it mattered a great deal to Aunt Antiope.
"Your body should be ready to work, now," Aunt Antiope said, unsheathing her sword. "Pick up your sword, and we shall see what you have learned by watching."
There was so much to do before they could go find Ares, and Diana was practically vibrating with impatience. But she could not leave without Steve—Man's world was a very confusing place, and she could not find Ares without him to help her navigate its pitfalls—and so she had to wait for him to arrange the details he thought necessary.
Or, more accurately, for Etta to arrange the details.
Steve was off doing something—Diana didn't quite understand what, although he had explained it; it had to do with his status as a warrior and the long mission he had just returned from. He had left her with Etta while he was gone, and although Diana had offered to help, Etta had turned her down. So Diana sat quietly by Etta's desk, watching and listening.
"Is there anything I can do to help?" Diana asked.
Etta looked her up and down. "No, dear," she said firmly. "I have everything under control. And there isn't time to teach you all you'd need to know."
One of the strange devices on her desk sounded a bell, and Etta picked up a horn attached to a cord, putting the horn to her ear and lowering her head so that her mouth was even with the horn attached to the end of a stand. "Captain Trevor's office," she said. "Oh, Major Dalrymple, hope you are feeling better, sir. No, the Captain is not available at the moment—" she grabbed for a piece of paper and a pencil, jotting down a note. "I'll be sure to tell him that. Can it wait? Only he's got his next assignment already, and I don't know that he will be back—" There was another pause, in which Diana could just make out a man's voice coming from the horn Etta held to her ear, although not what he was saying. Etta wrote some more on another piece of paper. "Yes, sir. I'll find someone and let you know." She nodded as she spoke. "Thank you. Yes, sir."
Etta put the horn attached to the cord back on its hook on the stand, and handed the piece of paper to Diana. "Could you hand that to Miss Horner, she's the one with the large desk up front, and say it's from Major Dalrymple?"
"Of course," Diana said. Miss Horner's desk was easy to find, as it was facing the opposite direction of everyone else's, as if she were the queen of the room and all the other women were her subjects. Diana strode towards the front of the room, careful not to tangle her legs in the unfamiliar skirts.
As she approached Miss Horner's desk, the other woman looked up with a frown. She looked nothing like Queen Hippolyte—short, plump, frizzled graying hair twisted up in a knot instead of flowing free—but she had the same air of authority. This room was her kingdom, however small it might be, and she expected respect to match. It was the same aura Antiope had on the training grounds. Diana lowered her eyes with appropriate deference. "Etta said to give this to you," she said, handing out the note.
"You're that girl Captain Trevor brought back, yes?" Miss Horner asked, taking the slip of paper and glancing at it. "You shouldn't be in here, but I'll allow it as long as you don't pry and stay out of the way." She made a dismissive motion with her fingers and bent back over her desk.
"Of course," Diana said, feeling oddly like a small child caught watching her elders train. She turned and went back to her chair by Etta's desk, to watch the other woman work.
It was quite educational. Etta told five different officers (all men) that Steve would be doing three different things (none of them going to the front to find Ares, Diana noted), while at the same time trading favors with six different secretaries (all women) for either them or the officers they worked for to do the work that Steve was supposed to be doing.
It was quite like how Aunt Antiope had carved out two hours each day where everyone thought Diana was somewhere else, to train her in. Except that Antiope did not lie. But then again, Antiope served a sovereign worthy of respect, which these officers did not seem to be. And if the only way Ares could be defeated was against the wishes and behind the backs of these men, well. They were lucky to have such a formidable woman to arrange it.
Trust
"So, Diana," Aunt Antiope said, the day after Mother found out about their practices in secret, "now that your mother has agreed that you are to be trained, you will be added to a training cadre. Captain Pyrgomache will be your commander." Diana had run all the way from the Palace to the main training grounds the second she had heard, to find her aunt directing a cavalry drill.
"Captain Pyrgomache?" Diana asked with a frown. The only Pyrgomache Diana knew was the woman in the bakery on Athena's Way who stopped her sisters from giving Diana sweet rolls when she thought Diana was getting spoiled.
"She leads one of our secondary squads," Aunt Antiope said, keeping an eagle eye on her warriors. "I don't think you ever bothered to sneak in to watch them train."
"Are you saying I am not dedicated enough Aunt Antiope?" Diana asked, slightly disgruntled to be put to fighting with farmers and potters and weavers and leatherworkers. They were highly honored for the work on which Amazonian society was built, but … their skills in combat could not hope to match those of their sisters who did nothing else. And Diana wanted to be the best.
"No, I am saying you are young and untried," Aunt Antiope said. "If we had others who were learning, I would put you in with them. But we do not. So you will go with Captain Pyrgomache and her unit, and you will learn to work in a group. And, Diana?" She finally looked down at her.
"Yes, Aunt Antiope?" Diana asked, meeting her gaze.
"On the training field, I am not your aunt. I am your general." The words were not harsh, but they were firm.
"Yes, Au—Antiope," Diana said, and went off to find where Captain Pyrgomache and her women were training.
General Antiope was right; Diana had never bothered to come watch the secondary squads train. There were more of them, but they were not as impressive as the primary squads who were focused on nothing but the arts of war.
Captain Pyrgomache was, indeed, the baker Diana had been thinking of. She looked different, in armor, harder and older. Her unit was already hard at work, paired off with swords and shields, when Diana walked up to them. But she could see them falter as she came near, pausing to watch her.
Diana raised her chin. She was used to being watched. "Captain Pyrgomache?" she said, bowing slightly to her new commander.
"So, Diana, let us see what you can do," Pyrgomache said.
Once Diana had stretched and warmed up, they ran races and lifted weights, and Diana was proud that, although she was much smaller than the women, she was faster than them, and just as strong, and her endurance was no less than theirs. She basked in the admiration sent her way.
But then they returned to sparring, and things did not go so well. Diana was paired with Chalcaor, a short and heavy-set woman, with bulky arms that held a sword confidently.
Chalcaor was not as brilliant a swordswoman as Aunt Antiope, or some of her favorite warriors, but she was solid. Her moves had the quick sureness of one who did not have to think before moving, and Diana was outmatched.
Or at least, she would have been, if Chalcaor had ever fully pressed her attack. Diana flushed. She was not here to be petted, she was here to learn.
"Chalcaor, do not coddle her," Pyrgomache snapped out. "She is not here for you to cosset."
For the first time, she was glad of Pyrgomache, one of the few women on the island who did not indulge Diana's every whim as both a princess and the only child on the island.
For a long time, as Diana trained with Pyrgomache's unit, Pyrgomache had to watch, eagle-eyed, for the point when her women would slack off and treat Diana as a child instead of a warrior. But as Diana learned the arts of war, her unit learned to see her as a comrade and an equal.
But it was not until that year's war games—the first time Diana had been permitted to participate, or even to see them—that Diana truly began to learn the lessons Aunt Antiope had set her there to learn. Not just the fighting prowess, but the discipline of it.
In the first battle, Diana was impatient. Captain Pyrgomache's unit was advancing, but the others were so slow. Diana was much faster, and she was stronger, and so she ran out in front of them instead of advancing in line with them, ignoring Pyrgomache's commands to stop and return.
She was so focused on her attack, that she did not notice the archers to her left, and so left her flank unprotected. And thus it was that a dummy arrow, with a small pillow at the end instead of a point, hit her squarely in the side. And she was out for the rest of the day. Worse, her sisters-in-arms had to re-form themselves to cover the hole she left, and that slowed them enough to give their opponent an edge, which they exploited to win the day.
Captain Pyrgomache railed at her for breaking discipline. Aunt—no, General—Antiope gave her a blistering set-down and ordered her extra shifts mucking out stalls for the next month. The other members of her unit said nothing, but muttered among themselves and eyed her resentfully. Mother was disappointed, and asked if perhaps she was not mature enough to fight, yet, if that was how she would behave.
The next day, Diana stayed with her unit, even though they were slower than she was. It went much better.
Diana wanted nothing more than to run ahead to find Ares by herself. Steve was so slow. Especially once they were off the boat, and on the same continent as Ares was, and she could see the devastation for herself instead of merely hearing stories about it. But she did not know where to find him without Steve's help, and as they travelled she realized that even if she could find Ares by herself, she would need Steve's help to reach him.
Only Diana could fight Ares, with her Amazon's training and the God-killer she bore; but if she did not wish to fight her way through Ares' unwitting tools, she would need Steve to get her through the lines.
"Halt right bloody there!" said another sentry. Diana approved of watchfulness, but this business of checkpoints everywhere seemed to her to be a waste of labor. And none of the sentries wanted to let her or Steve's men through. Nor did they want to listen to her.
But Steve opened his coat enough to show the little pins and ribbons that gave his rank, and talked quietly to them, gesturing back at Diana and Sameer and Charlie and the Chief, and the sentries would relax. Then he showed them his official papers, and they saluted and stood aside, and on they went towards Ares.
Only Diana could fight Ares, but even Amazons needed to eat, and it was the Chief's skills at bargaining and trading which got them the supplies they needed. Diana had never been very good at bargaining and trading; her mind was too straightforward. Her mother had despaired at it. But the Chief could and did get what they needed, when they needed it.
Sameer and Charlie had not yet had a chance to shine, Diana reflected as they reached the trenches and started through them, but she thought they probably would. Steve had brought them along for a reason. Diana might not understand that reason, just as she hadn't understood, that first few years with Pyrgomache's unit, why it was important to train with her cadre and stay with them in battle. But each had something to contribute, and Diana would learn what it was in time.
Learning
Diana was flushed with wine and song, as they gathered around the bonfire to celebrate the end of that year's war games. She had done well; her unit had done its job, and in the individual skills competitions, she had taken first place. "I beat everyone—did you see how I even bested Thermodosa with her spear?" she boasted to anyone who would listen. "When was the last time anyone did that!"
"You did very well, Diana," her mother said indulgently. "Your skills have progressed a great deal."
"Your guard was weak on the left side during that fight," Antiope said. "You were favoring it after the bruise you took in the earlier match."
"But I beat her!" Diana said. "Me, I bested Thermodosa's spear! Even if my guard was weak on one side." She took another drink. "If I can beat Thermodosa, I can beat anyone!"
"Except me," Antiope said with a small smile, pouring herself more wine.
"Oh, let her have her triumph, Antiope," Menalippe said. "She deserves it—it was a great match, Diana!"
Diana raised her cup in salute, drained it, and set it down so she could go join the dancing. She laughed all night long as she leaped through the air, swinging others around and being swept around in her turn.
The next day, she had a headache, and the sun was too bright. The next day, Aunt Antiope ordered her to the practice field early, even though traditionally the day after the war games were over was a day to laze around and recover from the festivities.
"Now is the time to intensify your weapons training, Diana," Antiope said.
"But I already know the sword, the knife, the bow, the shield, the axe, and the spear," Diana said, confused. "And I know them all afoot or on horseback. What else is there?"
Antiope tossed a rope at her feet.
Diana picked it up. "A rope? Are we going to practice jumping from the cliffs again?" That was fun, although probably not on a stomach as queasy as hers was.
"No, you are going to learn to fight with it," Antiope said.
"How can you fight with a rope?" Diana asked. "It has no strength, no edge, nothing."
"You can use it to yank people off their feet, or take their weapons away from them," Antiope said. "The Lasso of Hestia is a truth-telling device, but your mother bore it in combat. You should learn it, too."
Nobody used swords or shields or knives or bows or spears to fight in Man's World, Diana discovered. Only guns of various sizes, some carried by soldiers, some wielded by soldiers in squads, some mounted on vehicles. But her shield and gauntlets worked just as well against them as they did against arrows, only now she had to be even faster. It took every bit of concentration she had, to go so quickly, and to fight when the landscape and the weapons and the tactics were all so very different from anything else she had seen before. No Man's Land was hard, and then taking Veld was hard in a different way. If Antiope had not trained her so well, Diana could not have done it. But she could not think of Antiope, now.
Steve was right behind her, the whole way. And although Steve was used to guns and trenches, he was not used to the way Diana fought in them. That much was obvious in the way it took him time, only seconds but seconds counted, to gape after her and adjust to what she was doing, every time she did something new.
But Steve paid attention. Steve watched, and Steve learned. And so, in Veld, when there was a German gun in the tower of the central building, Steve copied a move of the Amazons, something he could only have seen once before, in that battle on the beach. He led the others out to that piece of metal and called out to her, "Diana! Shield!"
She turned, trusted him, and leaped—and up they launched her.
Diana didn't so much fight the Germans in the tower as she brought the building down on top of them. Which she had never done before, nor had any Amazon that she knew of—but it worked.
After the battle was over, as the dust settled and the people of Veld came out of their houses, Diana and Steve shared a smile.
"Thank you for the lift," she said. "Did you see that on Themyscira?"
"I did, yeah," Steve said. "Figured you'd know what I meant. You really … went through them like a hot knife through butter. You were amazing."
"Thank you!" Diana said. "It is very different from my training on Themyscira, but still effective."
"I'll say," put in Sameer.
"You are very adaptable, too, Steve," Diana said. "Antiope would approve of that, I think." She looked away. There was no time to grieve until after Ares was defeated.
"That's quite a compliment," Steve said, taking her hand. "Thank you."
Love
Aunt Antiope and Aunt Menalippe were not always together; Aunt Antiope spent her days in the training grounds, and Aunt Menalippe spent half of hers in the temple. And Aunt Antiope regularly spent days and nights out patrolling the island, away from the city, so that she and her warriors might know every inch of it in every season and time of day, while Aunt Menalippe never went out on patrol. And while Aunt Antiope often came to the palace to dine or spend an evening, Aunt Menalippe preferred to stay in the temple, where it was quieter.
Nor were Diana's aunts particularly demonstrative. There were many couples who were showier in their affections for one another; Diana rarely saw them kiss, and even then, it was only a peck on the lips. They didn't even have the stormy fights that some couples did. A stranger might not know they were together, not that there were ever any strangers on the island.
But Diana knew they must have something worth having, because her mother watched them wistfully, as if they had something she wanted. And there were very few things Queen Hippolyte wanted that she did not have, so therefore it must be something truly important. So Diana watched them.
And she noticed that whenever they were together, they were constantly turning towards each other.
"The quality of oil for the temple lamps isn't quite up to standard, this year," Aunt Menalippe might say, and Aunt Antiope might respond, "Is it because of how the olive trees produced less, this year? What are you going to do about it?" although Diana knew that Aunt Antiope found agriculture boring and logistics a chore.
Or Aunt Antiope might say, "That new mare of Enchesimargos's is giving her fits—doesn't want to be trained, that one, too independent. Still, she has stamina and intelligence, and it would be a shame not to use her," and Aunt Menalippe might say "Oh? Well, there are few better horsewomen than Enchesimargos. What will you do if the horse doesn't cooperate?" although Diana knew that Aunt Menalippe cared little for horses.
"I thought you didn't like logistics," Diana said to Aunt Antiope after the conversation about temple lamp oil. "That's why you delegate it to Alce." They were out for a ride, enjoying the nice weather after three straight days of rain and training indoors.
"Logistics may be boring, but it is vital to victory in the long-term, Diana," Aunt Antiope said. "And what matters to my wife matters to me, just as she cares about my things." She nudged her horse to a stop at the top of the cliffs, and stared off across the ocean.
Diana followed her gaze. Sometimes, when the light was just right (as it was now), you could see the barrier that protected the island. It shimmered, and Diana wondered what was beyond it, what Man's World was like outside of the stories the older Amazons told her.
"Besides, I could listen to Menalippe recite mathematic manuals for hours," Antiope said, giving her mount's sides a tap to continue down the path.
And when they had been apart, Aunt Antiope and Aunt Menalippe always told one another stories of what they had done while separated, and when they were together, a little part of their attention was always on what the other was saying or doing, even from across the room.
Nobody paid attention to Diana, like that. Oh, she was watched by everyone; but in the indulgent way of an adult watching a child. Her thoughts were only interesting to them as a measure of how well her tutors were instructing her. (This was unfair to her mother and her aunts, and Diana knew it, but it was true that nobody was interested in her as an equal.)
Steve constantly looked at her. Mostly in surprise, as she did something he thought impossible or missed something he thought obvious, but he paid constant attention to her.
"How come you haven't mentioned any friends your own age?" Steve asked, after she told him a story about racing horses with Aunt Menalippe's squad. "Did your mom not think they were good enough to play with her princess?"
"Hmm?" Diana asked, drowsily. The sacks and piles of rope weren't as comfortable as her bed back in the palace, but they were better than a bedroll on patrol, and the sound of the waves was soothing in the cool darkness. "Oh, there were no other children of any age. Men are necessary for reproduction, so without men … I was a gift from Zeus, but he does not give gifts often."
"So you were the only child on the entire island?" Steve asked. "That must have been lonely."
"I had my mother and my aunts and my tutors," Diana said. "And many people wanted to play with me, especially when I was little. I was never alone."
"Yeah, but having friends your own age … it's different." Steve was quiet for a bit, and she wondered if he was drifting off to sleep.
"I never really had friends, either," he said at last. "Dad wasn't that much of a businessman—he tried a lot of things, but they all failed. So we moved a lot, and didn't live in very nice neighborhoods, and Mom was afraid of me catching lice from the other kids, so I spent a lot of time by myself or at home. My parents were great, but it wasn't the same as having someone my own age to play with."
Diana thought back to her own childhood, how there was always an Amazon willing to play with her, but mostly to humor the child they all loved, rather than because they genuinely enjoyed whatever game Diana wanted to play. "No. It wasn't." She could only imagine what it would have been like, to have someone at her own level. Her own mother, her aunts, her tutors, all the women who had helped raise her and care for her … none of them had realized this, how alone she sometimes felt, but Steve had figured it out simply by listening to a few stories.
In London, he wanted her to hide herself and fit in, but he always saw who she was underneath the drab skirt and jacket. (This was a much rarer ability in men than Diana knew at the time, and so she valued it mostly in retrospect.) Even when he didn't believe her, or thought her wrong, he listened and tried to help as best he could.
At the train station, as they made their way among the troops, he saw the ice cream seller and was already turning reaching for his wallet when Diana stopped. "What is in this?" Diana asked.
"Cream and sugar, mostly," Steve said, "with some milk and whatever other flavoring you want. Then you put it in a pail, put the pail in a bucket filled with ice and salt, and keep turning the pail round and round until the cream freezes. Lot of work, but it sure tastes good, doesn't it?"
"Ice?"
Steve looked at her strangely. "You know, what happens when water gets cold enough to freeze?"
"I've read about it, but never seen it," Diana said. "Themyscira is always warm, all year round."
"Must be nice," Steve said. "I don't like cold. So what kind of desserts do you have in Themyscira?" Diana's description of the various kinds of honey cakes and pastries lasted them until they got close enough to the ships to see the wounded men coming off them.
In Veld, as Charlie and Sameer and the Chief explored the town and celebrated with the locals, Steve stayed with her and talked. When they danced, she realized that he was the first person she had ever known who saw her for the adult she was now, and not the child she had been. Also, he was very attractive, for a man. Later, when she invited him into her bed, he was as interested in her pleasure as in her own.
In the few days they had together, he always seemed to know what she wanted or needed before she did. Looking back on it, after years in Man's World, she was amazed at how smoothly everything had gone, given how little she had understood of what the world and the war were like. It was a testament to the attention Steve paid to her wishes and her capabilities, that everything was arranged around her despite her own ignorance, to put her exactly where she wanted and needed to be.
In hindsight, she was ashamed at how little consideration she had given him in return. She had been straining toward her destiny, to the battle with Ares she believed would fix everything, and so she had taken Steve and his help and his attention for granted. She had not been unkind, but neither had she repaid him for what he had given her. It was so rare to find a man who could or would build a relationship on equality as well as love, but Steve could have done so. If he had not died.
She had not thought of it, but if she had, she would have assumed they would have more time.
Sacrifice
The battle on the beach was almost over, and Diana—the only one of those who fought there who had never seen death, or true warfare—let down her guard. She stood there, watching something that caught her eye, not realizing that there was a man with a weapon behind her, ready to fire. The man's weapon was quicker than a bow, and there was no time for Diana to hear it, react, and get out of the way. Not even Diana was immune to injury, and death. Later, Diana would piece together what had happened—how foolish she had been—and rage and grieve. But in the moment, he did not see.
Antiope loved Diana, and Antiope was a general who knew how to weigh out lives and decide who to send to the front lines. And so she did not hesitate to trade her life for Diana's, both as a woman who loved her niece almost as a daughter, and as a general who knew that the destruction of Ares was worth almost any cost.
Diana didn't know all of these calculations until later, after she knew the truth about why Zeus had given her to her mother. But in the end, what difference did it make? Antiope made her choice, and would never have regretted it for an instant.
When Steve came up to her, saying he had to go, she almost thought she was standing on the beach, again, watching Antiope die. It was night instead of day, she stood on a tarmac rather than on sand, and she had time to say good-bye, but the feeling of seeing and feeling the inevitable approach was just the same.
Steve was not a perfect man, Steve was a part of the whole great vile pointless war, and he offered himself to it knowing how empty it was. But Steve also knew that if there was anything to be saved from that war, if anything good was to come from it, saving lives was the first thing to do. (Maybe he learned that from her.) And the people who would die if the plane detonated on the ground, here or in England, those were people he could save.
Steve made his choice, and would never have regretted it for an instant. Just like Antiope.
And again, Diana was left standing alone.
And one thing she didn't get the chance to:
How to go on.
"How can they celebrate?" Diana asked quietly, standing at the window of Etta's flat and staring out at the people on the street below, feeling lost. Ares was dead, but so was Steve. She had not thought that accomplishing her mission would leave her so … hollow. She felt as gray as the skies and buildings. But down on the street below, people were waving brightly-colored cloths and celebrating. "Millions have died, and they cheer? Whole nations decimated, and they are laughing."
"They cheer because the killing has stopped," Etta said. "For a while there, it seemed like the whole world was going to be consumed in the war. And now, it isn't. Nothing can change what's happened, but we can be happy that it's not going to happen any more, surely."
This was true, and Diana could not deny it, but it was the first time since Steve crashed in the beach that she truly had time to stop and think, instead of focusing on the next task to be accomplished.
A week ago, she had never seen a person die. Animals, yes, of course; horses and sheep and pigs and chickens and cats and dogs, they lived and died. But Amazons did not. Amazons lived, and lived, and lived.
And then men came, and they died. In battle, defending their island, but they died all the same. And Antiope, beloved Aunt Antiope, she died for Diana.
And then Diana saw Man's World, saw how filthy and wretched it was, how corrupt and venal its leaders were, how violent and degrading it could be, how little they cared for the victims swept up in their fights. How they worked to build ever greater weapons, so that ever greater numbers could be slaughtered more quickly.
And then Diana met Ares, and Steve died, and she learned that when men did these horrible things, they did it by their own choice. Influenced by Ares, yes, but not forced by him.
Steve was the closest thing to good she had seen since leaving Themyscira, and he was dead.
And the people in the streets were celebrating.
"You haven't eaten anything," Etta said. "Food's getting cold."
"What?" Diana said, turning around.
Etta was seated at the tiny table, munching on toast. She swallowed and repeated herself. "The food is getting cold, and you haven't eaten. Starving yourself won't do Steve any good, now will it?"
It would not do Steve any good to starve herself; neither would it do him any harm. He was dead, and beyond caring about it. But Etta was right, she should eat. Diana sat down and took a slice of toast for herself, and some bacon.
"Now, you've lost a great deal in a short while," Etta said. "Home, family, Steve, all one after the other. Cry all you like—it'll do you good. And there's enough widows around that nobody will take much notice of one more. But there's still plenty of work to be done, to get you settled. I find work always helps with grief, don't you?"
"I do not know," Diana said. "The only things I have had to grieve before are pets and horses. Never people." She knew the rituals and sacrifices and songs for seed-time and harvest, for injury and recovery, for good fortune and bad. But she did not know what to do for the death of a loved one. And she had many loved ones to grieve.
"Oh," said Etta. "Well, work distracts one, so there's not as much time to wallow in grief and let it settle in. Keeps you moving forward, instead of just going in circles. I know when my mum died, it was all that kept me from falling to pieces." Etta paused consideringly. "Well, at least it kept me from falling to pieces permanently. I could only do it as I had time, in dribs and drabs. And then I turned around, and she'd been gone for long enough that it wasn't quite so fresh and painful any more."
"Will it stop hurting?" Diana asked.
Etta hesitated. "No. No, it doesn't stop hurting. It does lessen, and there will be times you won't think about it at all. But then there will be times when it all hits you as if it just happened. Those times do get fewer, as you heal, but I don't think they ever really go away."
"Oh," said Diana, weirdly relieved. It would be horrible to think that one day she might be so used to Antiope and Steve and the others being dead that it would no longer hurt.
It had never occurred to her to wonder if her mother and Antiope and Menalippe were still grieving those who died before the Amazons retreated to Themyscira. To Diana, those older Amazons killed by Ares, by Steppenwolf, by men trying to enslave them, they were stories; to her mother, they had been friends and sisters-in-arms. All of a sudden, Diana understood why her mother had not wanted her taught to fight, had wanted to spare her the knowledge of pain and death. It had not been possible, but Diane understood at last why her mother had desired it.
"So what do we do now?" Diana asked.
"Now?" Etta said. "Well, first, we go out and meet with Charlie and Sameer and the Chief, and perhaps get a pint together. Then we take a few days off. Nobody will be getting anything done, not with the party outside. We share stories about Steve and everyone else we've lost. Then we see about getting you a job to support yourself; you can live with me, I need a roommate anyway. After that …." Etta shrugged. "After that, we see what happens." She smiled. "Ares is dead, and the war is over. Now we see what we can build out of the ruins of what's left."
