"Don't tell me," you moan and groan at me (I can hear it from here), "the gods visit you on your birthday? Does this happen all the time? But they won't visit us, their children? Not fair!"

No, it's not fair. I had forgotten that that was the day I turned nineteen, but as I looked at the cupcake (An extremely blue cupcake at that), I wished it hadn't been. I'll admit it, I never looked forward to my birthdays, and you can all thank your parents for that. Every single one of them comes in to check up on me, tell me how glad they are I'm not following in my family's footsteps, offer me a treat to lull me into a false sense of security, and then spend the next hundred waking hours talking about themselves and how great the things they've done are. Apollo and his good looks and haiku's, Hephaestus and his many, many inventions, Aphrodite and her reflection, Athena and her wisdom and guidance, and let's not forget Poseidon and his great demigod children.

"I had a friend's, friend's mom make it especially for you," Hermes rubbed his chin, "don't know what the fascination with the colour blue is, though."

"It's great, Hermes," I forced a small smile and set it on the table littered with harpy feathers, "thank you…"

"…"

"…Well?"

"Well what, Aeneas? I was hoping you'd at least try it and let me see if the inside is just as blue as the icing."

"Aren't you going to ask me if I feel any more evil than last year?"

He sighed and leaned back on the sofa, his hair taking a more peppery shade of grey. "I know this is tough on you, Aeneas. I remember coming to see you on your fourth birthday and giving you some cookies from May, my wife. You were so happy staying here with your father while he worked. It gave all of Olympus great relief to see you like that."

"Tough. That's all you can say?" I should have been happy he wasn't going on a rant about how hard mail delivery was nowadays as he had back then, but to sum my life up as "tough" wasn't cutting it. Especially after I glanced around to find the harpies had seemingly shed feathers on every piece of furniture to make it homier for their guests. Another group of monsters to clean up after in my own home.

"Children of the gods always face troubles-"

"I'm not one of your children," I reminded him, "I'm Gaea's son. My siblings are either scattered across the world without form or trapped beneath a mountain or in a pit. I hear their voices in my sleep, begging me to find them. I have to live with monsters on a regular basis because they're too scared to try and eat me or they're trying to convince me to come along for a demigod hunt. I can't even walk beyond thirty feet of the cabin thanks to Hecate placing a barrier around it!"

"We send you food and supplies, do we not?"

Would a drama queen have gotten up in a huff? Because I sure did. I left Hermes and the cupcake and marched to the fridge. I pulled out Marge and Abigail's meat and dropped it on the counter. "Thanks for the supplies."

"Well, I suppose it's a good thing that's about to change."

"…What? You're sending me a vegetarian menu now?"

He was standing beside me now, cupcake in hand. I wanted to get mad, but honestly, he was one of the easier gods to deal with. He didn't brag so much as get excited. And after hearing what my brother had done to one of his children on Olympus, I wanted to make him happy somehow. I carried the guilt Kronos never felt.

"The cabin's become too small for a young man your age, Aeneas." He handed me the cupcake and reached his hands behind his back. "Starting today, you are no longer a prisoner of this forest."

One of the gods admitting I was a prisoner? Unheard of. They were so used to sugar-coating my predicament I was afraid him telling me would cause his tongue to burn up. But to out of the blue (cupcake blue) tell me that I was leaving? I would have liked to say I handled it better than I had. I didn't.

I fainted.

You can stop chuckling now. It wasn't like I felt faint before it happened because I was so shocked at the revelation. Once Hermes had told me that I wasn't a prisoner anymore, something in the back of my mind snapped, and darkness overcame my vision and thoughts. I even had a dream. A memory of the past...what? You want to know what I dreamed. It's sort of personal…okay, yes, I know that the dreams of you demigods can be extremely important, but this was just something from the past…alright, alright, I give. Are you children of Hermes? So pushy.

It was short and choppy. I'm eighteen and it's the summer of last year. I'm inside, reading Great Expectations and sharing a laugh with Pip and Joe, when I hear my father yelling outside. Then I'm at his side. He's on his knees, crying and repeating "Gaea" over and over. My mother's most human form vanishes into the ground. Then Hera is before us, and she guides father beyond the invisible barrier so I can't follow. She waves her arm, and he just walks off without looking back. I call his name but he won't respond. And then I'm alone…

And then I wake up. The cupcake has a bite out of it, resting on my chest. I pick it up and look around, confused and once again alone. I can't smell Hermes anymore, so I know he's left me, and without a single fond memory shared.

Oh, and I'm also sitting in the middle of Manhattan park on a bench with a backpack by my feet, people staring.

Alright, so I've never done this with a story before, but for as long as I can, I'm going to try posting daily chapters. I've gotten so sucked into the Percy Jackson books that this story flows much easier than others, not that I don't enjoy the others. Bare with me if I have to switch to every other day later on, but for now I'm on a roll and I'm not gonna let it stop.

Oh yeah, and Aeneas is trapped in Manhattan. What are the odds?

until the next chapter!