Disclaimer: I am not Uncle Rick and I do not own the rights to these characters. I just ship them immensely.

A/N 1: Just wanted to give another shoutout to all of my lovely reviewers! I promise we'll get some Thaluke fluff in here soon ;) I just have to storybuild first hehe.

"Okay, I read it. What's next?" Thalia asked, stopping by Zoë's office.

"Well I think we should stick to realistic for this one. Kind of get the audience involved, you know?" Zoë said around a mouthful of muffin. She had the script on her lap with several scribbles in a dark blue ink. There were messy sketches on her desk as well, some partially colored and some just in pencil. She pointed to a sketch of a backdrop that was facing in Thalia's direction. "Like this."

The script they were designing for was a paranormal thriller type play with some western themes. There would be lots of rigging required for realistic paranormal effects, but Thalia loved to make the audience feel as though the events around them were truly real.

Zoë had thought similarly and had already drafted some of the rigging designs and setting backdrops.

"They look fabulous. The rigging is an excellent idea for tricks," Thalia said. "I'll start flushing some of these out to prepare for manufacturing and you digitalize those backdrops. Give them a grungy, old west feel. Maybe a western tavern?" She brainstormed aloud as she picked up the rigging sketches and left Zoë's office. She popped in a minute later. "You know, we should have all of this done by early March, and our spring break would be right after that. We should go do some research on paranormal movies and stories in Hollywood," Thalia said with a smirk, applying air quotes to research.

Zoë chuckled and looked up from the computer she was logging into. "Any excuse for a trip, hmm? I'll talk about it with the boss-man, if that's what you mean." She raised an eyebrow.

"You know me so well. Oh, and you owe me a coffee," Thalia retorted. She raised the script in her hand and left Zoë's office once again. When Thalia returned to her desk she immediately started drafting up more riggings for effects in the play, and also researched the dimensions.

Later that afternoon, as soon as work was over, Thalia and Zoë left the office to get coffees before parting ways to go home. "Maybe we'll meet the Mythbusters or something while we're in California. I bet they'd know how to help with the rigging," Thalia was saying over her latte.

"Myth busters? What kinds of myths do they bust?" Zoë asked with a blank expression. "Like Greek myths, Spanish myths, that kind of thing?"

Thalia laughed. "No, not that kind of myth." She mused on it. "Well, who knows. Maybe some of that stuff is real. But anyway, they mostly test things like movie stunts and theories."

"Oh. Do they have a TV show or something?" Zoë asked curiously.

Thalia raised an eyebrow, her drink paused halfway between her partially opened lips and the table. "Never mind," she said with a smile and shake of her head. They stayed for a few more minutes to chat before Zoë excused herself, suddenly remembering she was expecting company and had to prepare dinner. Thalia went back to her father's apartment.

"I think I'm going to rent that place near the studio," she told her father that evening when he came in from work. "I think it'll be more convenient for me to stay there long term instead of always crashing here when I'm in the city."

"Of course," Zeus said with a friendly, weathered smile. "You know my door is always open to you should you change your mind." Thalia returned the smile. They both knew the main reason for that was to make up for lost time. But she had to admit that using her father's apartment for a free stay couldn't be her permanent solution. She'd started looking for a place of her own in the last year and there was a small apartment a short walk from her work studio that she liked and could afford, and she'd been speaking with the renters for a while now.

"Yeah, I know. I'm still going to see the renters tomorrow to take another look at the apartment, though, to keep my options open." Thalia finished her mug, said goodnight to her father, and padded down the hall to her room for the evening. In the morning she was up early and dressed to impress, although not too much, for examining the apartment one last time. She grabbed a quick breakfast consisting of coffee and a banana and took a cab to the apartment complex. When she arrived, she saw the man she had spoken on the phone with, Malcolm Randall, and a familiar blonde woman she didn't previously know would be attending with him.

"Mrs. Jackson-Chase?" Thalia asked. The woman turned to say hello, but seemed stumped when she realized who had spoken.

"I hate to ask this, but have we met? I'm usually really good with faces," she said with a slight frown.

"Oh, no. Not personally. I met your husband on the Olympic Airway flight a few days ago. Your daughter is just the cutest thing," Thalia said with a smile, offering her hand. "I'm Thalia Grace."

The blonde woman smiled and returned the handshake. "Annabeth Jackson-Chase. I work with Mr. Randall's company, specifically as Chief Architect in his home designing department, but I also work in the real estate department occasionally."

Ah, that was why she was here. "Of course. Well, I'm ready to see that apartment," Thalia said. She followed Annabeth and Malcolm to the second floor and the apartment on the corner facing the street. Once again she was pleased with what she saw, and within two hours they managed to come to an agreement on the payment and move in date. Thalia would be able to call the apartment her home in mid April, a few short months from now. Thalia phoned Zoë after she stopped for lunch and they celebrated together over the line, and Zoë vowed to take her out for an official celebration when they got to California. When Thalia asked, Zoë told her she had spoken to their boss that morning and he had cleared the trip, pleased with their ever present dedication to their sets. Together they made plans for how the trip would go, and Thalia spent the evening booking an Olympic Airway flight for both of them (courtesy of her father) to Los Angeles and a hotel close to Hollywood as well.

[To be continued. I have several chapters in mind for this story, so we'll see where it goes!]

Please follow and review! This is my first published fic, so I'd love some feedback! Critiques are welcome, rudeness is not.

A/N 2: I've gotten requests and reviews about "guest" characters (such as Percabeth and Jasper) and I just want to clarify that this is still a Thaluke fic, but if I see an opportunity for some cameos, then I've decided to just "roll with the punches" hehe (ie. Annabeth and Malcolm help Thalia buy a house because why wouldn't a child of Athena be involved with the housing industry? HELLO architecture opportunities. FYI Malcolm is Athena cabin's 2nd in command for the PJO storyline in case you didn't know).