Chapter 3

Hades sat on his throne, lack of his Helm heavy on his mind. In no way was he worried, however. No, he was rather annoyed that his Helm hadn't returned to him somehow.

The Fates worked in interesting ways, even he couldn't quite figure them out. In the deepest corners of his mind, he was even a little scared.

Give the guy a break. If three mean old Grandmas are sitting around spinning yarn and gossiping about your future, you would be too scared to even try and ask if those teeth were fake or real.

His wife was sitting beside him, humming some new age song she had heard recently from some newly dead musician. He could never understand music, and he could never understand his wife, so he was alright with ignoring her altogether.

He looked at the other end of the room, where a mortal woman was held in a dark cage.

Sally Jackson.

He looked at her, as if asking 'Where is your son?' Her response was a rather dispassionate shrug, which further increased his annoyance.

Where is Percy Jackson?

The walls around him refused to answer his question.

Had he died already? If so, why wasn't he told about it so he could kill the woman and be done with the whole mess?

Thanatos needed to be called.

And so he was.

The god of death appeared out of the shadows, cruelty reflecting off him as darkness wrapped the light out of the room.

All of the theatrics he had learned from Hades himself.

Hades shook his head.

"You called?"

Hades didn't miss the absence of a customary 'my lord' in the salutation. He chose to ignore it for the moment, focusing more on his Helm.

"Indeed. Is the demigod named Percy Jackson dead?"

Thanatos made a show of sighing, opening his laptop (which was rather outdated but he refused to update it) and sent a search going through the last week for 'Percy Jackson.'

Ten minutes of an awkward staring contest between them resulted in no Percy being dead.

"Where is he then?" Hades asked.

Thanatos shrugged. "Your mess." He then made to move back to his office, but Hades stopped him.

"What's with this new found disrespect you seem to have? I have told you, many times, that the bank takes time in updating the salary. If this is about that, I swear..."

"Oh, I actually got my salary on time, this week." Was the literal personification of death smiling? Yes, yes he was.

Alarm bells started ringing inside Hades' head.

"Well then," he tried to remain calm, "What's with this new attitude you seem to have developed?"

He had never seen Thanatos smile.

"Oh nothing big," Hades knew better than to relax hearing those words. "Just found a new employer." Thanatos vanished before Hades could stop him.

New employer?

Death had found a new fucking employer?

He needed answers. He needed them now.

He headed inside his library, which had been kept up to date using the large quantity of dead scholars.

How was it even possible, Death had just found a new job?

This was beyond anything he had ever dreamt of.

Persephone sat on her throne, casually ignoring her insane husband trying to get his shiny helmet back. Honestly, men and their toys... she rolled her eyes.

If he ignored her any longer, she may just take that Paul Walker guy up on his offer. One time wasn't cheating, was it? Nah, it was just exploration.

Harry had landed in a forest for two reasons.

First, he really didn't want to know if his bike had some fuel requirement ten thousand feet in the air. That one just seemed like common sense. He could easily evade literal gods... but gravity was another thing altogether.

Second, he really didn't know how navigation worked. He couldn't just tell the bike to "go straight," he had to look at the landscape below him to determine if the direction was right. The 'point me' spell was a one-time deal. It couldn't quite function as a compass. After circling back to the same spot twice within half an hour was enough for his already tired brain.

He parked, then shrunk his bike, his robes transforming into an attire fit for the jungle, as he made his way through the thick foliage of the undergrowth.

Looking for nothing more than a shade, he was surprised to find a cave going pretty deep inside a small hill. He was more surprised when the mouth of the cave closed behind him, leaving him stranded in the dark cave.

"Hello?" Harry questioned.

"Hello," echoed back, much more definitive.

He lit his wand and started walking slowly on the mossy floor. He could have used the Professor's Port-a-hole, but this was much more exciting. The strangest thing was, he couldn't see any wards on the walls of the cave, even using the spell. How had the cave detected him entering the mouth? And how could it have closed the doors so fast?

He kept wondering as he trudged along, and slowly, very slowly, the cave around him changed. The floor changed from mossy stone to mossy concrete. When Harry did notice the change, he looked back, but the cave was long gone, now replaced by a narrow tube of concrete.

And he hadn't detected even a hint of magic.

Not one to back down from a challenge, he kept walking, now humming the tune of the sorting hat's song.

And it changed again, and this time Harry spotted exactly where the concrete started dissolving into thick vines and trees.

He was surprised yet again when he entered a small room instead of a different jungle, as he was expecting.

In the room he found an old man with a thick beard playing with some type of a strange bird.

"Who are you?" Harry asked, beyond curious.

"A better question would be, who are you?" He coughed. "I am the god Pan, the god of the wild. I know of every living creature in this world..." A wheeze interrupted him, but he went on talking, "Then why, only since the day ago, have I been able to sense you?"

"Do you need help?" Harry asked, alarmed by the way he was coughing.

"Worry not Dark One, I have been like this for centuries hence. No, my death shall be the burden of a different soul, who can carry my burden with care."

Harry didn't know whether he should've been relieved or annoyed, and so he chose to skip the reaction altogether.

"Can't you take some..." he struggled in trying to remember his talk with the kids, "Ambrosia, I think it was called, and get better? Are gods even supposed to die?"

The strange bird tried to fly and landed on his head. The god Pan gently helped it stand up again, even as it prepared for a new flight.

"Life must end, all things must end." Pan sounded rather sad, "When the time comes, nothing would escape death, not even Death himself."

"Bleak."

"True regardless."

Silence stretched in the tiny room.

Harry stood up.

"Well then... if you ever need me, give a call." Harry tossed a Zippo at the god, and a leaf grew out of some vine and caught it effortlessly.

"Fair well, stranger."

"You know," Harry looked around suspiciously, "I was expecting you to either give me a quest, or try to kill me. Probably both."

"Why so?" Pan asked.

"That's just the way stuff happens, unfortunately. I meet a 'special person' who either loves me or hates me, due to something I don't ever seem to remember, and they either send me on a quest or try to kill me."

"How... unfortunate." Pan was truly at a loss of words.

"I know right? And somehow I always seem to survive because of one miracle or another."

"How... fortunate?"

Harry shook his head. "Anyhow, the point is, I was expecting you to make me get you some sort of flower or apple or something that could get you back to normal. And you didn't do that, so thanks."

"You know... a glass of nectar found in..." Pan started laughing at the look Harry gave him. "Don't worry. You're free to go. Just remember to appreciate life once in a while."

"What do you mean?" Harry was instantly on guard.

"No magic can hide the stench of Death surrounding you, stranger. You have killed. You have killed many, and not all of them were in self-defense either."

Harry looked away.

"Just remember," he went on, "there lies some power in mercy, and some defeat in death, be it the ally or the enemy."

"Says the guy who is just about ready to die."

Pan smiled. "Ironic, isn't it?"

And the floor below him opened up, sending him falling through a long tube inside the ground. He shot out of the tube on some sort of puddle. Looking closely, he was back in some industrial tunnel.

He had had enough of tunnels and dying old men, so he fired a strong piercing hex through the roof, which exploded apart, and the tunnel was suddenly flooded with sunlight. He expanded his broom and shot out of the opening, looked around, found a village nearby, and flew away.

"No!" Daedalus shouted in his lab deep inside the Labyrinth, "You were supposed to walk along and arrive inside Camp Half-Blood!"

He pushed a few buttons on his console. "Guess I'll have to improvise, aren't I?"

Heimdall stroked his beard, his eyes seeing everything and yet nothing. The stranger was an anomaly, that much was certain. Even now, as he was flying to the Midgardian village, Heimdall could see how his every decision, every move, was affecting the world.

He didn't have the powers of prophecy, aye, but that didn't stop him from analysing the behaviour of every living thing, and so his guesswork was usually spot on.

He decided to wait before informing Odin or Thor. The stranger was kind hearted, and for that Heimdall would grant him this one gift.

"What do you think?"

His voice was calm, soothing, with an undercurrent of great power beneath his gentle tones.

"We shall see."

Her voice was just as melodious, and yet just as powerful.

And they saw.

And they observed.

An icy wind blew through their cave, rattling the many pots and utensils.

And they saw.

And they observed.

Thanatos appeared into a dingy bar, plagued with violence and sickness. He ordered a bottle of cheap beer and sat down on a hard and rickety seat. He eyes caught some sport channel playing in a small TV.

He took a sip, and heaved a heavy sigh.

Vacation. At last.

AN: Yada yada college yada yada no time. You guys know the spiel by now.

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