Disclaimer: I only own the plot and my OCs. Anything you recognize as not mine belongs to Rick Riordan, Greco-Roman mythology, and/or their otherwise respective owners.

Author's Notes: Hello, everyone! Sorry for the really-late-in-the-day update – I've spent most of the past two days resting – not sleeping, though. Unfortunately I can't do that due to my internal clock -_- – because I still feel pretty awful. Ah, well. C'est la vie, right?

As a gentle reminder, the next update after this one will be on July 6th. Like my last break, I will still be around because I don't really have a life outside of fanfiction and sims at the moment, so you don't have to worry about that. ;) And, in the very unlikely that I do not post on July 6th for whatever reason, I promise you that that reason will be posted on my FFN profile and the AO3 summary, okay? Like I said, this event is extremely unlikely, but I also want to keep you guys prepared in case my health issues have not let up by then. :)

So, with all that being said, I hope that you all remain well and safe over this break! Seriously. 'Tis a worrisome world out there as of late.

Sincerely,

~TGWSI/Selene Borealis

~The Finding Home Saga~

~Finding Home~

~Chapter 21: I Meet My Maker & His Siblings~

You know, whenever I thought of how teleportation would feel as a kid, I always imagined it as feeling painless, like how Star Trek portrayed it to be.

So, you can bet your ass off about how surprised I was that being teleported – or, at least, side-along teleported – was not a pleasant feeling at all. Rather, it felt like I was being squeezed into a tube that was spinning around at a hundred miles per hour, only to be suddenly spat out like I was a cannonball that had crashed right in front of the Empire State Building, except the sidewalk underneath me refused to bow down to the pressure and instead made my feet hurt and gave me the strong desire to puke.

"Oh," I said as I swayed on my feet, trying not to lose my balance, or worse, my lunch, although the constant city noise all around us wasn't helping matters much on either of those fronts. "I don't think that was as cool as I thought it was going to be."

Next to me, Hades chuckled. "Yes, I'm told that most mortals feel that way," he replied. "Don't worry, though, because this is probably the one and only time you will ever have to experience it."

"...Glad to hear it," I mumbled.

"Really? Are you sure about that, punk?" a familiar voice asked me.

I froze at the sound of it.

Hades didn't, though – although I guess that's to be expected, given the fact that he's the Lord of the Dead and all of that, on top of being the uncle of...

"Ares," he greeted the god with fake pleasantry, which I didn't blame him for. I mean, Ares had been a part of the plot to help overthrow Olympus and all that, no matter how direct or indirect his part had been. "How...interesting it is to see you here, given what I have just been told about how my helm of darkness and your father's master lightning bolt went missing."

Nervously, I turned and looked at Ares, too interested to see how he would react to having the truth rubbed in his face to just ignore the guy. Unsurprisingly, though, the god of war seemed unfazed at it, as evidenced by how he shrugged from where he was leaning up against the Empire State Building and said in response, "I don't know what the punk told you, Uncle, but I had no part in stealing anything of yours – or Father's. In fact, the only reason why I'm here is to collect the kid, because Father wants him on Olympus right now."

Hades raised an eyebrow. "Then, I imagine he'd be fine with the boy coming along with me, then, seeing as how I have...crucial information about the theft of both his symbol of power and mine. Information which, young Perseus, here," here, he gestured to me, causing Ares to glower down at me in a way that made me just know that he wanted me dead right now, "swore on the River Styx was true? Are you willing to do the same, nephew, to prove that his supposed lies are, in fact, false?"

Thunder boomed overhead at both mentions of the River Styx, causing Ares's glower towards me to worsen. And despite how much I knew that he wanted to kill me, I couldn't help but grin at the sight, causing him to bark at me, "What are you smirking at, punk?"

"Oh, nothing, Lord Ares," I said smugly. "Although...now that you mention it...I do want to thank you. For giving me the backpack, I mean. And for letting me and my friends stay at the Lotus Hotel and Casino. We really couldn't have solved this mystery without you, you know?"

And with that, before the god of assholes could say anything else, I quickly walked into the lobby of the Empire State Building, with Hades trailing behind me – and yes, you read that correctly. A god was actually trailing behind me.

At the front desk, a guard was reading what looked to be a Harry Potter book, and was so engrossed in it that, when Hades asked for the key to the six-hundredth floor, he replied, "There's no such floor, sir."

I did my best not to snicker at his words, especially when Hades gave him a look that looked like it could literally kill as he leaned forward and said in a low voice, "Really? Because I happen to have it on good record that, not only is there such a floor, but, as its gatekeeper, you have a duty to give me the key, seeing as how I am the Lord of the Dead and all that."

The security guard stiffened. Then, with wide eyes, he looked up from his book and stammered out, "R-right, sir."

Hades scowled. "Lord Hades," he corrected.

"L-lord Hades," the guard said as he put down his book and fumbled around the desk for a key card, before he handed it over to the god. "H – here you go. Although, I should warn you, there's still another day until the summer solstice, s – so – "

"You just let me worry about that," Hades interjected with a grim smile, before he turned to look at me and gestured for me to follow him. "Come, nephew. Let's get this over with."

The two of us walked into the elevator without much further ado. As soon as the elevator doors closed, though, my uncle slipped the key card into a slot, causing both the card and slot to disappear and be replaced with a bright, red button that said 600. Hades pressed it easily enough, and not even a second later the elevator began going upwards as muzak softly played over the speakers.

Inconspicuously (or, at least as inconspicuously as I could manage), I quickly looked over at Hades, trying to figure out why we were going up through the Empire State Building to Olympus instead of...you know...just straight-up teleporting there? I mean, he was the god of the Underworld, right? Surely he could manage that?

But a small voice in the back of my mind said, "no, he can't. Remember, Zeus pretty much banned Hades from Olympus except for the summer and winter solstices, so it figures that he would be petty and only let him come through this entrance, too."

Despite the fact that I had no proof that that assumption was true, my stomach still clenched at the thought, because damn, wouldn't that be a shitty thing to do to your own brother? Especially after he already got the "short stick" with everything else?

Before I could spend anymore time pondering on that, though, the elevator dinged and the doors slid open. Both Hades and I stepped out, but unlike him, when I did I almost had a heart attack.

I was standing on a narrow walkway in the middle of the air. Below me – below us – was Manhattan, except it was Manhattan from the height of an airplane. In front of us, white marble steps wound up the spine of a cloud, into the sky. My eyes followed the stairway to its end, where my brain just could not accept what I saw.

"Look again," that small voice from before said.

I am, I replied. It's just...really there.

From the top of the clouds rose the decapitated peak of a mountain, its summit covered with snow. Clinging to the mountainside were dozens of multileveled palaces – a city of mansions – all with white-columned porticos, gilded terraces, and bronze braziers glowing with a thousand fires. Roads wound up crazily and misshapenly to the peak, where the largest palace was, gleaming magnificently against the snow. Precariously perched gardens bloomed with olive trees and rosebushes, and I could just make out an open air market filled with colorful tents and a stone amphitheater built on one side of the mountain, while a hippo-dome and a coliseum were built on the other.

All in all, Olympus was the picture-perfect image of an Ancient Greek city, except it wasn't in ruins. It was new, and clean, and colorful – the way that Athens must've looked twenty-five-hundred years ago.

Next to me, Hades chuckled. "Impressive, isn't it?" he asked rhetorically – or, at least, I hoped he asked it rhetorically, because I was too dumbfounded to reply. "Welcome to Olympus, nephew. Now, come along."

Dazedly, I followed after Hades through Olympus. We passed some giggling wood nymphs, a marketplace packed with all sorts of sellers and businessmen, a small crowd of a bunch of good-looking teenagers who were probably minor gods and goddesses, and even the nine muses. All of them were talking and laughing, and overall having a good time, as if they weren't even worried about the impending war...

...At least, not until they saw Hades, that is. Because wherever he went, people stopped, and stared, and whispered to each other as their eyes widened and their faces paled, because obviously they knew how big of a deal it was for the god of the Underworld to show up to Olympus unannounced, and on a day that wasn't the summer or winter solstice.

As for me...well, no one really looked at me. They were all to busy looking at him. But, I didn't mind the lack of attention, because it allowed me to look at everything in complete, gobsmacked awe as I trailed after Hades up the main road and towards the big palace up at the top of the peak, which was a reverse copy (as in, it – along with everything else here – was white and silver, compared to the Underworld's black and bronze) of Hades's palace in the Underworld.

I realized then that Hades's must've built his palace to resemble this one. My gut clenched again at the thought.

Hades and I walked up steps that led up to a central courtyard, before walking into the room that was just past that...

...Although, now that I think about it, "room" really isn't the right word, because the place made Grand Central Station look like a broom closet. Massive columns rose to a domed ceiling, which was gilded with moving constellations. And twelve thrones, built for beings the size of Hades, were arranged in an inverted U, just like the cabins at Camp Half-Blood. An enormous fire freckles in the central hearth pit, and it was being tended by a little girl who I recognized as the girl that had been tending to the camp's fire my first day at Camp Half-Blood...a little girl with loosely-curled chocolate brown hair who was wearing a brown, moleskin cloak.

It didn't take more than a second for me to realize that the little girl had to be Hestia, the goddess of the hearth and the eldest of Kronos and Rhea's children, especially when I saw the occupants of the four thrones that were occupied – the four middle thrones – above her.

Like Hades, all four of the gods were in giant human form, but I could barely look at them without feeling a tingle, as if my body were starting to burn. Zeus, the Lord of the Gods, wore a dark blue pinstriped suit. He sat on a throne of solid platinum. He had a well-trimmed beard, marbled grey and black like a storm cloud. His face was proud and handsome and grim, his eyes a dark, electric blue.

As Hades and I got closer to him, the air crackled and smelled of ozone.

Sitting to the left of Zeus was Hera, the goddess of marriage and the second youngest of Kronos and Rhea's children, sitting on a throne that was pure white and had various etchings carved into it like her cabin did. Like Hades, she looked like she was straight out of Ancient Greece, as she was wearing a white silk chiton with a golden girdle, along with golden sandals. Her skin was perfect, her nails manicured, and her face was gorgeous. Her honey blonde hair was done up in some sort of elaborate twist, while her dark brown eyes – the same color as Hades, Nico, and Bianca's eyes – were both warm and welcoming and cold and calculating at the same time.

I instantly knew then that I didn't want to get on her bad side.

To the left of Hera was Demeter, the goddess of agriculture and my stepmother (which I may or may not have gulped at). But, strangely enough, I wasn't scared of her at all, like I was with Zeus and Hera, because where Hera was both warm and cold, Demeter was just pure warmth. Everything about her, from her loosely-curled chocolate brown hair, to her golden-green eyes, to her dark green summer's dress and brown sandals, and even to her wicker chair-shaped throne, was warm and comforting, like an early summer's day...or my mom.

Yeah, you read that right. Demeter reminded me of my mom.

I didn't look at her for too long, though, because I quickly turned to look at the god who was sitting to the right of Zeus – the god that was my father. Like Demeter and Zeus, he was dressed more modernly for the occasion – leather sandals, khaki Bermuda shorts, and a Tommy Bahama shirt with coconuts and parrots all over it. His skin was deeply tanned, and his hands were scarred like an old-time fisherman's. His hair was black, like mine. His face had that same brooding look that had always gotten me branded as a rebel. But his eyes, which were sea-green like mine, were surrounded by sun-crinkles that told me he smiled a lot, too.

Against my will, my throat closed shut. My eyes watered. This was my dad. The one person who I had wanted to meet more than anything in the world.

...Although, I have to admit, I was a little surprised that his throne was a deep-sea fisherman's chair, even if it was a relatively cool-looking one with a black leather seat and a built-in holster for a fishing pole, which held a bronze trident that had green light flickering along its tips.

Next to my dad, Zeus straightened in his chair as a glare formed on his face. "Brother," he greeted Hades, with a tone that was clearly lacking in anything remotely resembling hospitality, or even kindness. "May I remind you that the summer solstice is still a day away?"

Hades merely smirked in response, before saying, "You may, brother. But I do not come here out of bad will. Rather, I come here out of good faith, because our nephew here just returned me my helm of darkness after proving to me his innocence, and telling me who the real perpetrator of the theft that took both of our symbols of power is. Perseus, if you may?"

At once, Zeus, Hera, my dad, and Hestia – who I quickly realized had golden flames for eyes – turned to look at me. But not Demeter. No, her eyes had been on me since the moment I had stepped in the room, watching me with both interest and...dare I say it...love?

I didn't give her much thought at that moment, though. Instead, I nervously stepped forward, before I bowed to all of them. "Lord Zeus, Lady Hera, Lord Poseidon, Lady Demeter, and Lady Hestia," I said, before I began to tell all of them almost everything that had happened, just as it had happened, carefully making sure to leave out all of my dreams except for the last one with Kronos, for reasons that I was just only beginning to realize. I shrugged Ares's backpack off of my shoulders once more while I was talking, before taking out Zeus's master lightning bolt, which was beginning to crackle in his presence, and laid it at his feet.

After I had finished, there was a long silence, broken only by the cackle of the hearth fire.

Zeus opened his palm. The lightning bolt flew into it. As he closed his fist, the metallic points flared with electricity, until he was holding what looked more like the classic thunderbolt – a twenty-foot javelin of arcing, hissing energy that made the hairs on my scalp rise.

"The boy must be telling the truth," he said. "Otherwise, Styx would've taken him into her depths. But that Ares would do such a thing...it is most unlike him."

"He is proud and impulsive, brother," Demeter replied as a light smile danced across her face. "It runs in the family. But, I'm afraid that that isn't the matter that we should be focusing on."

Hera nodded primly. "She's right," she said. "Husband, if our Father truly is rising – "

Zeus raised a hand, silencing her. "We will speak of this no more," he said, only to hurriedly add when all of his siblings glared at him, "For now. I must go personally to purify my thunderbolt in the waters of Lemnos as quickly as possible, in order to remove the human taint from this metal."

He rose and looked at me, and for a second, I thought I saw his expression soften by just a fraction of a degree. "You have done me and Hades a service, boy," he said. "Few heroes could have accomplished as much."

"I had help, sir," I replied. "Silena Beauregard and Katie Gardner – "

But he continued on speaking, as if he hadn't heard me. "To show you my thanks, I shall spare your life. I do not trust you, Perseus Jackson. I do not like what your arrival – or the reappearance or your cousins," here, Zeus looked at Hades with a dangerous look, "means for the future of Olympus. But, for the sake of peace in the family, I shall let you live, under the stipulation that you never enter my realm, and that you do not let me find you here when I return. Otherwise, you shall taste this bolt. And it shall be your last sensation, regardless of what is to be offered to you."

"Uh...thank you, sir," I said, while internally I couldn't help but think, "regardless of what is to be offered to you"? What does that mean?

Zeus turned to look at Hades again, with yet another hard look. "As for you...brother," he said. "Do not leave Olympus yet. We still have much to...discuss yet, about the reappearances of your children that you previously told us had been killed by your own hand."

And with that, a huge clash of thunder shook the palace, and a blinding flash of lightning illuminated it, causing me to close my eyes.

When I opened them again, Zeus and Hera were gone.

From her place by the hearth, Hestia stood. She turned to look at me, with those strange, golden fireballs of hers that served as eyes, and gave me a gentle smile as she said, "Your uncle has always had a flair for dramatic exits. I think he would've done well as the god of theater."

There was an uncomfortable silence.

After several moments of it, though, Hestia sighed and turned to look at Hades. "Come, brother," she said. "It's been so long since you and I last talked, that I think it would be only proper for you and I to have a chat outside in the garden, don't you think?"

"...I do," Hades said after several moments, before he turned to look at me. "I believe this is our farewell, Perseus. For now, at least. I will not forget the idea that you and your friends came up with, though, because I do think that it will be...beneficial to the conversation that I am to have with Zeus and the other Olympians later."

"Uh...okay," I said. "Thank you again, Lord – "

But Hades and Hestia were already gone, having walked out of the throne room through its doors.

Nervously, I turned around, to look up at Poseidon and Demeter, my father and stepmother, the second power-couple of Olympus, and two people that I had never even spoken to...and only knew the voice of one of them, and that was only because she had not-so-subtly tried to redirect the conversation with Zeus a few minutes before.

I knew that I should say something to them, and that I should greet them by their titles and names and something like that. But, when I opened my mouth, all that came out was a, "So...hi, I guess? Nice to meet you?"

...Jeesh, no wonder so many people thought that I was an idiot.

Word Count: 3,464

Next Chapter Title: I'm Given An Offer I Can't Refuse