He's long since lost feeling in his shoulders. Perhaps it is blessing to not feel anything, though it is the raw emptiness that has haunted him for millennia. His family scattered, they would visit him from time to time, those that still remained. Though it was few and far between. Traitor whispered and branded on his skin. He opened his eyes and was met with amber ones. "Prometheus."
The other nods and sits beside him. "You've been freed." Obviously of course, how else would he be here? Though he needed the affirmation. Sometimes, though not always, he dreams, many more fantastic and removed from reality than the next. Prometheus sighs and moves to lift part of his burden from his shoulder. He sighs and shifts to a more comfortable position. "Oh Atlas how far we've fallen."
His brother continues to visit him. He lights fires sometimes. They watch the world go on. Prometheus asks him if he wishes to see them, his family. He shakes his head and looks up at the stars he holds. He can't.
They watch the humans, the fragile little creatures that used to embody both purity and deviance in one simple form. Prometheus watches them with something akin to fascination. He admires them still, these beings that he risked so much for. He wants to taunt his brother with the visions he sees of those precious humans in the future. He wants to tease that his brother, who had the wisdom to side with almighty Zeus did not have the sense to put his faith in something greater than humanity, but he doesn't. He is still his brother, family. They do extraordinary things for family. In fact, he is still suffering for choosing his family. Yet humans, for all their mistakes, can still move the divine, even he, the man who can't be moved. Birth, pain, death, love. Perhaps they are the only ones who truly understand it. Life.
Cities grow, and their memories become jumbled as they adapt. They morph to fit the new fables. Civilization is fickle. They stare at the blood, the demolished cities, and for once Atlas is torn that he was in fact right. "Well brother, do you regret it?" Prometheus looks up, eyes bright like the flames he gave away. "Yes." They watch the fire burn in front of them. "They weren't ready." Well maybe Zeus was right about something after all.
They don't look up at his stars anymore. The city lights and gases have almost entirely blocked them out. He pities them for losing sight of what they once knew so well. When Prometheus visits him the next night, he finds it in him to finally ask. "Show them to me." Prometheus smiles, knowingly. "Of course."
Aegle, Erytheia, Hesperia, and Arethusa are first. They are beautiful, finally free from their burden and overbearing Hera. Dancers. He watches them for what seems like an eternity practice. Though in a second it changes and he's met with Maira who's lost her heart to another mortal. He can't be angry though, not when he sees the small bundle in her arms. His other children have stayed in the stars, preferring the heavens to the earth. Though there is one left. The one who truly haunts him in the dark hours of the day. Calypso.
Her prison has changed, but it is a prison none the less. Though Zeus is not so cruel now, not when time has finally begin to wear away at a temper that used to roar at the slightest insult. Wisdom. Perhaps he's finally gained it. No. Calypso is in a small town, with broken homes, but she is not lonely. Though in her heart, he knows she longs for more. She is his daughter. For them, even the sky is not enough.
"Go to her." Atlas meets his brother's steady gaze. He raises his brow. Prometheus laughs softly, before his face turns grim. "Let me take the burden for one day." He shakes his head. "You've already born enough punishment brother." It's true. He would rather shoulder the skies than suffer as Prometheus has; loving a woman who would never be his, loving mankind too much, having his liver torn from him every morning for years, but most of all regretting each day for the rest of eternity what the gift he gave has done to the creatures he once adored. The skies don't seem so heavy compared to that.
"I can bear more for one day." Words die on his lips. How to explain that it is not the burden that holds him back, but instead a fear, the fear that he will be set free from his prison and walk away never looking back. Could he do it? Abandon it in favor of what? Peace. The warrior in him has finally stilled. "One day." Prometheus echoes. He licks his chapped lips. "Upon the river Styx." There. He's done it. He will not abandon. He will not sink lower. He still has his pride. His is still a Titan. "Lend me your burden." Prometheus whispers. Then for the first in eternity, he stood tall on his feet.
What a queer sensation, the feel of his feet crushing the ground beneath them. He walked for miles before he finally decided to try out these new inventions, cars, he thinks they're called. Hephaestus must have had a field day with these. He muses behind the wheel as the miles fly behind him. He glances up at the stars for a moment, but quickly looks away.
He hadn't realized until he'd stepped foot into the town just how damn small it was. Rundown gas station. Older homes with porches and a few rocking chairs. Quiet. The kind of town where everyone knows everyone, and kids play out on the street till dark. He finds her walking the streets swollen lips and tasseled hair. He pushes the bile rising into his throat now. Millennia and he can't help but play the protective father. She's frozen mid-step, dazed. It's a dream she's had, different setting but same feeling. There's a brief instant that she ponders if perhaps she's finally gone mad. He steps closer right underneath the light post. "Father." She breathed. The whisper hits him like a thousand brick walls. He shocks her then as the tears fall, shoulders rolled forward, hunched. He's the shell of the immortal he once was, hardly a warrior. Sure, the scars still decorate the flesh on his back, but the fire that fueled the battle has long since went out. His bones creek as he buries his head into her chest breathing in her still sweet scent. "I've missed you too." She said with a gentle kiss to his temple.
When the rivers have ceased, she takes him by the hand and leads him to her home. It's a large house at the end of the street. No porch. No swing. Though it's got one hell of a garden. They lie on the grass, cool air settling above them. "It's not so bad now." She murmurs eyes still dazzled at the heaven above. "I live with them." She pauses her eyes momentarily torn from the stars. "It's so human." It comes out thin. He sighs. "But they leave." She smiles though it's filled with more than just sadness. There's a certain wisdom in Calypso now, weathered in experience and the brokenness of more than just a heart. "Or they die." She sighs and looks back to the stars, looking fondly at her siblings from their home in the sky. "My greatest regret was not fighting for you." He said softly reaching for her. She sits up slightly. "I should have pleaded with Zeus. You were young then. Your innocence an excuse." She laughs as she turns to him. "I knew what I did. You taught us yourself father. Family is family, and no one in our family is born without blood on their hands."
"Look how we have suffered for that folly." She links her arm with his. "But we are here are we not, surrounded by so much beauty. Look at the humans." She smiles slightly. "From the moment they are born, they are dying. Yet, along the way, though they rage and war, they build, help, save." She pursed her lips. "They love. They can still see beauty through pain. You have forgotten that Father. In your eternity, you have forgotten beauty." He says nothing. Neither of them do. They lay in the grass until Apollo lights the sky. The sun streaks her hair, framing the top of her head. He savors it, locks it away in the back of his mind, the peace of this moment and the ethereal glow in his daughter. He pulls the keys from his pocket and plants one last kiss on the top of her forehead. "You are wiser than I."
He drives straight through to his brother. Wordlessly, he takes back the skies. "How have you born it for eons?" Prometheus asks. "Pain of the body is not pain of the mind." He says. "Nor the heart." His brother adds looking thoughtfully out into the void. "You may yet be freed Atlas." He laughs and shifts under the weight. "And until then I wait." His brother shakes his head. "And do what?" He casts his eyes up to the stars. This time he stops to take them all in. His heart warms at the sight of the clusters whose namesakes are his blood. "Watch the humans." He finally says, "It seems they may yet have something to teach me."
There's a long silence before Prometheus speaks. "And if they destroy each other."
"We will still be here." He closed his eyes recalling clear eyes and soft grass underneath. "Waiting to see what comes next." He opens his eyes and meets his brother's gaze. A wily grin stretches across his face, a sliver of the Titan he was slivers back up to the surface. "We have eternity after all." Prometheus smiles, a flame at his fingertips. "That we do."