Meh, I haven't had it in me to write for my other stories lately, so I've been working on a few one-shots (not that they'll make up for my lack of updates), but this one turned out to be less of a one-shot and more of a drabble. Feel free to drop a review, I would greatly appreciate it.
Disclaimer: Percy Jackson and the Olympians belongs to Rick Riordan, not me.
The Revolutionary War. The Civil War. The World Wars.
So much death.
Destruction.
Misery.
Grief.
So many parents with nothing to do but weep over their losses. So many veterans, scarred by the past, visions haunting their dreams. Humans aren't meant to live forever, yet so many leave before their time.
Parents are not meant to bury their children, yet so many do.
Some, a thousand times over.
One would think that after centuries of seeing their own children slaughter and kill one another their immortal senses would dull to the pain (misery). That would be the rational thought, and maybe even a bit true; but not wholly.
One thing kept many of them loyal to their mortal children, to take part in grieving:
The mortals themselves.
So many men and women, touched by the Olympians, siring and bearing their children. The mortal grief caused their calloused hearts to bleed. Because somewhere, deep inside…
…they still loved them.
Each flower the Olympians would lay on a grave finally meant something. Not just some (meaningless) gesture of (worthless) condolence, but the part of them that made the immortals more like the humans than they would ever know: their emotions. Their sadness. Their utter and pitiful grief.
But that still didn't make them human; mortal. They would still be cursed to bury their children for all of time, no matter how much they didn't want to.
It wasn't because they cared.
It was because they loved.