Alex and Nic (the twin sons of Hebe and Hercules) were apparently 15 years old, built like the young jocks you would expect to be the sons of the god of strength and the goddess of youthful vigor, and they were leading Derrick Anderson to a gymnasium somewhere on the Mount Olympus Resort Spa grounds. He would feel shy about this except that they, and apparently their father Hercules, had just used god-magic and sex to turn him into a centaur: a real, live, horse-from-the-waist-down warrior-from-the-waist up stud horse man. He was nearly twelve feet tall, and Hercules had gifted him with muscle. He flexed his right arm, and the ball of bicep muscle was so big around that if his shoulder hadn't been equally inflated he wouldn't have been able to touch it with his fingertips. His arms didn't rest quite flat against his sides, held out by thick lat and chest muscle, even though his shoulders were wider and a bit looser would have been normal on a human. He could turn his neck most of the way around, and his waist was flexible, he discovered, as he was able to bend over almost completely back, and he could turn to face nearly backwards. That was because his digestion was mostly in the horse part.
"So what kind of horse am I?"
"You mean what did we base your horse part on?" the twin brothers said in unison. Which was creepy.
"Yeah and please don't do that."
"We liked the Andaluzian, for speed, but you asked for maximum speed and strength both," Nic said. "So we let you choose the horse part."
"You chose the Drum Horse," Alex continued, "but Father felt you needed more muscle. There's a disease that makes horses very muscular, but it's not a good thing like with the double-muscle gene that some other animals have, so he asked Apollo for advice, and Apollo said to give you a bit of his Chariot horses' essence. So you're not entirely mortal, but you're based on the Drum Horse template."
Derrick was a bit taken back. "Not mortal?"
"Nope. That does mean you don't have to relocate to a centaur-universe though."
"Wait what?"
"It was in the advisories before you accepted the spa treatment," Nic said. "Some adjustments included relocation, which would have been necessary if you were JUST a massively muscled and fast 'mortal' centaur. You'd have had to go to Centauria."
Derrick felt confused, but he didn't have time to ask because they were at the 25 Hour Fitness God Gymnasion. It looked a lot like a classical-Greek version of what the popular fitness chains would have looked like, down to having an open room visible from the front where naked Spartans were being drilled in spear-and-sword aerobics by a fellow who looked like Gerard Butler's bigger, much more buff brother. The man nodded to Alex and Nic and looked Derrick over once, frowning slightly, but Nic shook his head no, and one of the soldiers in the class screwed up and the drill officer had to return to the class.
"That was different," Derrick said. "Normally they look at me like a bug, but he looked like I was two bugs."
"Yeah, he wanted you for his army, but you're a guest, not a conscript."
"What are we doing first?"
"You walk... OK. You don't know how to walk WELL," Alex said. He took Derrick to an out-sized treadmill, and pulled down a very modern-looking television screen. A few beeps and the screen showed a horse, standing on a treadmill. The camera moved around the horse. The video treadmill started moving and the horse began moving as well, feet ambling in a normal casual walking gait: left hind foot forward, left front foot forward, right hind leg, right foreleg, repeat. 1, 2, 3, 4. Nick did something with a control and the treadmill Derrick was standing on began to move, and he found himself following the same walk, synchronizing himself with the screen with a little bit of a stutter-step.
"Nice. We'll have you do this for a while, while Alex goes to set up the weights," Nic said. Alex trotted off himself to a different area. Nic waited til he was gone to say, "You don't HAVE to go back with your parents if you want to stay."
"I'd like to see them at least," Derrick answered. "I mean, they're more interested in my Sis, most of the time. But they all love me and I love them."
"That's an honorable thing," Nic said, smiling. "My father had other children, but they were all mortal. He still cared for them as much as he was allowed to."
"How long do I keep just walking?"
"Can you watch this next thing without tripping? It's a trot. Trots have a two-beat. 1-2 1-2 1-2 1-2 like so"
"Dunno, try me," Derrick said. So Nic changed the video playing on the small television to a horse trotting, in slow motion. The left rear and right front legs left the ground, then landed as the right-rear and left-front legs left the ground, and over and over faster. Derrick nodded, "speed it up a bit" and the treadmill sped up slightly and Derrick started trotting. It felt good and the speed increased. The speed got up to just about 25 miles an hour when Derrick said that it was getting to be too fast to keep his balance properly. Nic slowed it back down by half and then showed him a video of a faster movement.
"This is a canter. Notice, three beats. Watch the video repeat slowly and we'll speed up as you go."
The movement was more difficult but Derrick was able to figure it out, and shortly he was cantering. He watched the video and it pointed out that one foot was the "lead" foot, and that it was the one that should be on the inside when going through a curve. He changed his lead foot once or twice, in order to figure out how it felt, and then he was going faster as Nic sped them up.
"What does Nic stand for?" he asked, feeling himself breathing a bit harder. Not enough that he couldn't talk.
"Anicetus," was the answer. "It means 'the unconquerable' ... and Alex is 'Alexiares' meaning 'wards off war'. We basically can stop Uncle Ares from going out without permission."
"How does that even work?" Derrick asked, as he found himself topping off around 20mph. "Also why is this slower?"
"Your trot is like a racing chariot horse, and your canter is normal," Nic said. "And we stop Uncle Ares by basically distracting him, but only if we have to. He doesn't really go around starting fights that often, but he shows up to make sure they work right."
"Ah," Derrick said to both answers. "What next?"
The video slowed back down, along with the treadmill, and Derrick breathed deeper. He was still not tired. This didn't seem right to him, but then, he felt really light, even though he knew he wasn't. The scale on the treadmill said he weighed 2500 pounds, which ... was a lot.
"Gallop. It's a four-beat again, but there's a moment where you fly. I'll show it on the video and then you try switching to it."
Derrick complied: that is, he started moving so that he pushed off with one foot and all the other three feet were moving up already, and he was moving along... the treadmill spun up faster, and faster. He felt like he was levitating almost. The speed said 65 and he was breathing, but not gasping. Nik had a stopwatch going. After five minutes, Derrick felt like he had to slow down, and he said so, finding it hard to talk. He kept galloping though, at 45, and gradually felt his heart rate slowing a bit. He kept going for another 15 minutes before Alex came back and said, "OK, come on, you need to do this other stuff too."
Nik showed Alex the printout from the control box. Alex smiled.
"OK, you have the speed part. Now, strength. We have a few good tests here."
Alex led them to a training room with several pieces of equipment, including a very heavy set of kettle-bells, a squat rack, and a sled, along with some yokes, free-weights, and a complicated set of horizontal bars.
"Humans in good shape can do a pull-up. Can you?" Alex says, jumping up a foot and a half to grab onto a horizontal bar about even with Derrick's shoulder. He starts doing "muscle-ups" -- pull-ups that flow into holding the chin-bar at waist level.
Derrick looked around, to find a pull-up bar that wasn't that far up, but it didn't take him off his hind feet. He reached up and pulled, and it somehow held his weight. He found it easy enough to pull himself up, even with the heavy horse-body behind himself, but his feet never left the ground. Nic pointed him to a higher bar, one that needed a bench to reach, and he grabbed it, hanging his entire body from his hands. It began to feel heavy. He pulled, and was able to do a few chins, before he felt his arms and back growing tired.
"OK, that's pretty good," Nic said. "Let's see what you can drag around."
The sled was laden with a lot of metal. A LOT. Derrick wondered if he could even move it.
He could. It didn't even take much effort.
"What's on this?" he asked.
"About three tons," Alex said.
"That's not nearly enough," Nic said. "He's part draft horse. They can pull 25 or so times their weight, with good shoes."
"Shoes?" Derrick asked. "Do I need to get shoes?"
"Well, yes and no. Your hooves are basically giant toenails, and you're gonna need to protect them," Nic answered.
"But for now you can get by with horse-sandals like the Romans and Greeks used to use," Alex continued.
"So ... are we done in here?"
"Yeah," the brothers answered. "Let's get you shoes."
"OK, hop on," he said and they got onto his back. It felt a bit kinky, really, but he didn't mind it when Nic grabbed around his waist loosely. "What speed?"
"Keep it to a walk," Alex said. "I'll bounce off otherwise."
"OK," Derrick replied, and ambled out the door, following the cues Nic gave him to get to one of the barns. A man there looked up and whistled.
"You're a big one. You want nail-ons or boots?"
"Uh, Boots please," Derrick said. "Hey, will this be added to our bill?"
"Nah, they're part of the spa package," Nic said.
The man stood up -- he was a bit lopsided, with a huge, and muscular upper body, but one of his legs looked to have been injured, and he had a fancy prosthetic brace on it.
"Hm. You can use the good ones," he said. "I have to find some in your size, but that's not a problem. Hey, I see you've got a bottle of Hebe's nectar there. I better make you two sets."
His work-room was swept clean and had little dust in it, but part of it was a forge, and it was hot. Derrick found he wasn't uncomfortable, but it was still hotter than Alex or Nic liked, and they stayed in the waiting room while the man came back from his storeroom.
"OK, over here," he said. "Come to Phausty. So you're a guest. Why'd you go for this?"
"Didn't really know it would change me this much," Derrick answered. "I mean, I love it, I feel amazing, but ..."
"But the front office isn't being up-front about what happens here."
"I guess."
The man went around from foot-to-foot, cleaning them with a brush and a rag of some sort of alcohol. It took three different shoes before he was happy with the first foot, and the rest, he was able to take from the matching set. He put a smaller set in a box and handed it to Derrick.
"So these are easy to get on and off, but you need to see a farrier once a month to make sure your feet are in good shape. You're a big guy and even if you drink that stuff, you'll be needing to keep up on 'em." 'Phausty' slapped him on the hip.
"Thanks. Hey, is there anything I can do for you? I mean, a tip or anything?"
"Nah, it's fine. Unless you want to play around a bit."
"Not sure what you mean?" Derrick said.
"Play, you know, like you did with the boys and their dad."
"OH!" Derrick paused. He looked at the man. Somehow, when Derrick was a 15 year old earlier in the day, it would have seemed creepy, but he was a grown centaur in the prime of his life, and he could tell that this guy was kind of ... not respected as much as he should be, because he had that leg thing. But that was ... just stupid. Besides he was nice, and pretty handsome otherwise.
"Sure. What would you like to do?"
The man looked at him, speculatively. "Nothing today. Maybe in a few years. You gotta settle back down before anyone else gets to play with you. But I'll remember the offer."
Derrick grinned, and shook hands. "Thanks."
When he and the brothers were heading back to the main building, Nic and Alex waited until they were around the corner past a copse of trees before they both demanded to know what he was doing.
"You OFFERED to LET Hephaustus PLAY with you!"
"Uh, is that bad?" Derrick wasn't sure it was bad. The guy was really nice.
"He's a tinkerer."
"So?"
"Nevermind. You'll find out later," Nic said.
As they came up to the building, Derrick saw his parents and his sister arriving on one of the little motorized tour-carts.
They looked his way.