Author's note- I own nothing and make no profit.
Well, this is it. It's been a fun and interesting ride. I would like to thank my beta, Valawenel, who has been terrific throughout this entire endeavor. And I would also like to thank the folks that left the kind reviews.
Epilogue
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Jenkins sipped tea and watched as Jake carefully spread an old parchment scroll out on the desk before him and pulled his pen and notebook closer in preparation of the translation. The main office in the Annex was very quiet. Flynn and Eve had gone to someplace called Warehouse 13 hoping to locate a lost artifact that controlled weather. Despite the fact that the pixies had been taken care of, it was still snowing over Loch Ness. Just Loch Ness. It wasn't pink or glittery any more, but it was still snowing. Of course, it might actually be a natural weather phenomenon, but nobody really believed that. Cassandra was upstairs on one of the mezzanines searching for reference books on magical snow.
Now seemed to be as good a time as any, so Jenkins placed his cup in the saucer and chose his words carefully.
"What troubles you, Mr. Stone?"
Jake looked up. "I don't know what you mean."
"Of course you do. You have been very…distracted since returning from the Book of Myths."
"Not at all. I am just engrossed in translating this scroll."
Jenkins reached over and turned the scroll right side up. "Perhaps the translation will be a bit easier, now"
Jake closed his eyes, shook his head slightly and made a soft growling noise.
"Do you wish to talk about it?"
"No. Yes. Maybe. It's nothing. Just something I wonder about."
Jenkins nodded and sipped his tea.
"It's just that I wonder what is real and what isn't sometimes. Obviously the scenes in the Book of Myths weren't real. I mean, I was holding up a planet. So, not real. Right? It was just some story that old guy wrote."
Jenkins remained silent but raised one brow.
"And I get it that there are other dimensions that are real, but this wasn't one of them, right? I know it wasn't real. I explained to Atlas how I knew to trick him. I told him about Hercules and his labors, the golden apples, all of it. If he was real, he would have remembered that and the story about him and Hercules would have ended differently. But it didn't. I checked."
"Mr. Stone, you have a question. Perhaps you should just ask it."
Jake hesitated before answering. "When Apollo healed Cassie, it was just part of the story. It wasn't real. I mean, he couldn't actually have..he wouldn't have…"
"You wonder if he cured Miss Cillian's cancer."
"Stupid, huh? He wasn't an actual god. He was just a character in a book. He couldn't…it's not possible, is it?"
"I don't know."
They both looked up as they heard footsteps on the stairs. Cassandra was carefully stepping down with a stack of books piled high in her arms. She was wearing a short mint green skirt, and a white sweater with bright pink poppies on it that seemed to accentuate her rosy cheeks and sparkling eyes.
"But," Jenkins said "you did come back with quite the sunburn."
Jake turned his attention from Cassandra back to Jenkins, and slowly smiled. "Why, yes, I sure did. Cassie is looking very good these days, isn't she?"
"Indeed."