Somehow, the train had ended in a New Mexico town called "Cloudcroft".

The town itself looked like it had survived 3 Apocalyptic blizzards and would collapse if another storm stirred up. It just so happened that a small storm was starting right then.

We had walked around half a mile just to get here. I'd imagined we'd have found a proper American city, filled with restaurants that served hot chocolate and gave out free Coats.

But instead, we got a small town with one grocery store and other local buildings selling an assortment of products, including rubber rats.

"Grover, Kath, and Zoë, you guys go get food. We'll look for a way outside of town," Thalia announced, much to the disdain of Zoë. But in the end, Zoë seemed to decide that it wasn't worth the time to argue.

Once we got to the coffee store, I emptied my pockets of the 1 American coins I'd had since 1898.

The cashier looked at my coins and eyed them hungrily, probably meaning he'd take them to the nearest Pawn store.

Zoë and I took seats inside while Grover headed out to bring the other questers inside so they could enjoy some warmth.

"You are not what thou seem," Zoë said, staring at my eyes intently.

"What do you mean by that?" I asked. If she had already cracked open my secret, I'd be toast.

"I have hunted by Artemis' side for millennia. I know when somebody is hiding something, especially when it's a boy," she said.

"You want to know the truth? I caught Bianca sneaking kisses with Percy Jackson," I said quickly to remove any suspicion that I was keeping something from her.

Zoë raised her eyebrows. "Bianca never left my sight on the train."

"Uh... I meant outside."

"I highly doubt your false claims are true, boy." She said, "Now, speak the truth or your tongue will not survive the end of the day."

I imagined the tongue threat was an attempt to scare me into submission. Luckily, I didn't have to give an answer because Grover, Percy, Thalia, and Bianca all burst into the coffee shop.

"We found something in the stables," Percy told us.

I was anxious to get away from Zoë so I got up and followed Percy towards the stables. Why did Cloudcroft even have a stables you ask? Not sure, maybe, I'll never know.

Poseidon's Stables

Something really horrifying was in front of my eyes. The title of the building was so bland that I wanted to clean my eyes with Hephaesteus' lava.

Oh, there was also an overgrown boar that was eating hay at the far corner of the room.

When it turned itself around to view us, I actually managed to recognize it despite it being nearly 4000 years since our last encounter.

"Eary?" I said, my mind working out how to make the Erymanthian Boar not attack the questers.

The boar snorted not so quietly and woke up a sleeping horse in the stall next to him.The stench of poop entered my nostrils as I closed the distance between the Boar and I.

"C'mere old buddy. Give me a big hug," I said though the boar couldn't give me a hug. At least, not physically.

The boar seemed to recognize me when it finally turned around. It made it's way towards me, increasing the smell of digested food in my nose. When it got within 5 feet of me, it squeaked softly as if trying to tell me a message.

Somehow, I knew what he meant.

Where were you?

I remembered the last time I'd been with the boar. It had been a few days before the Titanomachy, when the world was ruled by Kronos.

The boar touched my legs. The sight was reminiscent of my childhood, when I had been free of all the rules, when I could do what I wanted, whenever, with whoever.

I remembered the fond times I'd had with this boar, always riding on his back as it travelled around. Always screaming in delight and joy, always feeling like it was the best day ever: And then, when I had to go, I always petted it's right cheek.

I did the same now. And the boar made a squeaky sound like he always did when I petted it.

Tears started flowing out of my eyes. I felt at a loss of words, connected to the past not through an inexcusable crime but by a bond with livestock.

The questers didn't seem to know what to do.

Percy broke the silence. "Um..."

Which brought me back to the present. That life was long gone now, simply a reminder of a time before the change. If anything, that past was the very thing that was holding me back from coming to terms with the current day. There would be no more happy times now.

My hand left the boar's cheek. The tears stopped flowing. The sadness lingered but it would not overcome me the next time. I would make sure of it.

When the war ended, I couldn't visit him again. Without me, the boar had ravaged multiple cities, and still, the gods kept me away from him.

I was angry... at the Olympians.

"I think we can ride the boar," Grover said anxiously.

"You smell anything?" Thalia asked.

"Something's here... Pan..." Grover passed out although Bianca caught him before he could fall to the ground.

As I was processing his words, I felt a sudden presence, like the sun finally breaking through a long storm.

I felt the presence of nature, pristine and beautiful, not lacking in anything but Human interaction and the cruelty brought by Humans. I was reminded of lush rainforests and marshlands, some of the last natural beauties on the planet. Vast Prairies filled with an abundance of grass. Huge waterfalls that seemed to have no bottom:

I was reminded of all of that by a single presence: Pan's.

Zoë seemed to register the presence too. For once, she looked perplexed and it looked like she'd temporarily forgotten about the "not what you seem" incident.

"Pan..." I muttered. I remembered that certain god's strong Panic! Sound. It wasn't something I wanted to remember.

"What is Pan? Isn't a pan, like, something you use to cook?" Percy asked.

Zoë muttered something in Ancient Greek. Something about an "idiot".

"Show respect boy, Pan is the god of the wild," She said, "But I wouldn't expect a boy like you to know that."

Percy looked offended but he kept quiet.

I led the Boar out of the stables. It still made me feel tingly that this very boar was the one my childhood self had played with.

As soon as I got it out, a shot rang through the air. Percy jumped right in front of me and slashed the bullet midair, something practically impossible for any demigod.

Percy looked shocked, as if he couldn't believe he'd just done what he did.

I picked up a snow covered rock and threw it into the skeleton which had appeared right in front of the questers.

The rock hit the skeleton with such force that it's skull was toppled off it's throne (the body) and fell to the ground. Very quickly however, the skull started levitating back towards it's former place.

As this happened, four more skeletons appeared out of the hazy storm.

One skeleton for each of us if you counted the boar.

The boar charged right into the skeleton who was reforming, catching it's ribs in it's tusks and charged it right into a tree.

Thalia took out her spear and shield. Zoë and Bianca both drew knives. Percy held Riptide.

And me? I picked up a rock and prepared to side with the skeletons.

The boar didn't seem to want to follow the plan. It charged straight towards another skeleton, ramming it into another pine tree and causing several spiky leaves to fall.

This battle was obviously going to end with a Demigod/boar victory. I'd have to improvise.

"Charge!" Zoë yelled as she and Bianca ran towards one skeleton.

Thalia and Percy took the other one but they couldn't seem to kill it. The same happened with Zoë and Bianca.

I headed towards Percy and Thalia. As I ran, my skin got penetrated several times by those spiky leaves the Pine Trees had.

I took a handful and prepared to give the Skeleton a major annoyance.

This plan, as it turned out was very flawed as, A) Skeletons are made of bones and B) They could reform.

The skeleton, annoyingly, wasn't fazed by this attack and punched me in the gut. I flew backwards into the tree I'd collected my spiky green leaves from.

Finally, the boar charged the 2 remaining skeletons while the questers moved out of the way. The skeletons probably didn't like being thrown nearly 300 feet down by an overgrown pig.

"Nice job with the leaves, really helped us," Percy said jokingly.

I didn't feel like replying, especially since the questers' journey west would now be on the back of a former friend that brought the war even closer to my heart than it ever did.

I sat as far away as I could from Zoë. If there was anyone who would spoil the plan, it would be her.

A sense of brewing anger and resentment towards the gods boiled in my heart. They had separated me from Calypso, my only sibling who I was actually close to me. Isolated me from a childhood friend. Sentenced nearly everyone around me to Tartarus.

Why should they be kept in power?

I wrestled with this thought as the boar travelled west with the questers in tow, reminding me of melancholic memories with every bump and every jump I experienced on the trip.

A/N: There's a lot more detail in this chapter. I felt like the pacing of the previous chapters, when rereading them was too fast and ended up writing this which is approximately a third longer than the other ones. If you're interested, this chapter has 1729 words according to whereas the word average for the other ones were 1100.