April Fool's

APRIL FOOL'S

He realized, after taking a long swig from his soda, that no one had told him whether swallowing the octopus was guaranteed to kill it. With a glance at his perpetual calendar, Poseidon cursed. The first of April. Everyone was in on the joke. Again. He knew it.

The ancient immortal tugged on one of his slimy mustaches, gritting his teeth. A bile-tainted belch escaped, green bubbles rising to the surface with a wobble. "There's more where that came from," mused the sea lord, ruefully.

It's almost as if he knew what was coming. The squid would dig its beak into his intestines, gnawing its way through his enormous water-logged colon. Eventually the octopus would catch up, and the two of them would battle it out. Beaks and suckers and thorny talons would shred his insides, causing him more distress than last millenium's coral casserole. Why, oh why did he always fall for these pranks?

Another belch erupted, this one with a bit of oily octopus ink in it. Those were the worst.

Poseidon's emerald eye twitched in frustration, the whirlpool at its center a roiling mass of elemental fury. His gaze lingered on his trident: a column of marble adorned with a trio of the fiercest titanium spikes. It was never far from his side. Though primarily used for ceremonial duties, he still maintained it as a fisher's tool and hunter's weapon, for encounters of last resort.

"Apollo," Poseidon snarled - though his only audience was the surrounding chorus of sea life. "This is the absolute last time I sit next to you at the Bacchanal. The. Last. Time."

The God of the Seas felt a wriggling in his guts, and sighed.

[Author's Note: the first line of the story was the prompt for this writing exercise.]