It would be an understatement to say Annabeth and Percy were surprised when I introduced them to Johnny. The daughter of Athena refused to believe it for quite some time. The son of Poseidon thought the whole thing was hilarious.

"So, Porphyrion. What are you doing here?" asked Annabeth.

Annabeth was much more like her mother than most sons and daughters of Athena/Minerva that he had met. She was a natural-born leader, just like her mother. I always thought that the primary difference between Athena and Enceladus was not their intellect. They were two of the most intelligent beings in the cosmos. Her mind was always spurring, constantly looking for an angle or a weakness.

It was the way they chose to use their intellect. From Tartarus, I watched as Athena had used her intellect to support some of the greatest mortal heroes of all time. Odysseus was the first, though there were many after him. Maria Sklodowska-Curie. Nicholas Tesla. Thousands and thousands more whose names would never be known.

Enceladus hoarded knowledge. He possessed no shortage of it and made sure everyone knew it. It was a waste. Even heroes and soldiers prayed to Athena for safety. If Enceladus were kinder and more generous, he would have been included in those prayers. That was the dichotomy between Athena and Enceladus. Not intellect, but generosity vs. selfishness.

"I am working for a man named Wyatt. I'm fixing furnaces and air conditioning units."

"That's real important out here, and Wyatt can't do it alone." affirmed Johnny, bringing out the burger Percy had ordered.

Percy Jackson was potentially the most significant hero to ever be a child of an Olympian. Even Heracles, who had eventually become a god, had accomplished less. Yet he remained humble and joyful as he was when he was a child. When he entered a room, he had a way of making other mortals at ease that I had only seen a few times in my three millennia of life.

I turned my attention to Johnny, "You know, every time I'm here, I see you. Do you live here?" Johnny smiled and shrugged.

I turned back to Annabeth and smiled sheepishly, "Sorry, that was bothering me."

"Why should we let you live?" asked Annabeth. Percy looked at his wife, a little taken aback by her aggression.

"Last time we had met, I was just following my mother's orders. I want to be able to my life to my own accord." That was the truth, the best I could tell it. I couldn't recall any moment I wasn't playing my part in Gaea's agenda. Hell, my creation was a part of Gaea's agenda. I was an instrument of warfare from my very conception. The idea that I could be anything else was probably a shock to the two demigods. It was honestly still a little bit of a surprise to me.

"And does your own accord include killing Zeus?" asked Annabeth.

"No."

"There's no way." said Percy, "You've met the guy. He's a prick."

I nodded, Percy's sudden quip eliciting a smile out of me, albeit a swift and faint one. "That he is. However, I've come to the realization that the reason I was created does not dictate my destiny. I think you both can relate to that to some extent."

Both of the demigods went silent. I had struck a chord with them.

"Is there anyone else here who can keep an eye on you?" asked Annabeth, after almost thirty seconds of silence.

"There is a demigoddess near the north end of town, her name is Ophelia Cross, and she is a daughter of Triton. I think that would make her your niece, technically."

The

After a few awkward yet sincere goodbyes, Annabeth and Percy left to arrange a deal with Ophelia and Josias.

Later that day, after Wyatt had taught me the differences between the ungodly amount of different types of screwdrivers, hammers, and nails, I returned to Lucy's fishing shop. I don't know why I kept finding myself there. There was something special about Lucy, but I had no idea what it was.

"Good evening, Lucy," I said, ducking into her shop.

"You know, Porphyrion, I still don't know who you were arguing with last night," said Lucy, her fingers interlaced underneath her chin and a mischievous smile on her face.

"I'll tell you about her if you tell me about Grimsley." I offered.

Lucy's smile melted off her face like an ice cube in Mimas's forge. I was tempted to return my offer before Lucy turned around and opened a minifridge behind the store counter. She brought out two beers and offered me one. I accepted it. I had never been a big fan of beer. There was a reason Dionysus was only the god of wine. The authentic Greek god of beer was named Silenus. He's exactly as delightful as you think. And there's a reason you've never heard of him.

But I drank it anyway.

"Grimsley and I met when we were nineteen and twenty." Lucy started, "We both worked in a restaurant down in Albany. Working and bussing tables to work our way through community college." Slowly but surely, Lucy's smile returned. "He was never quite as good as me, but he never needed to write his orders down. Always got it right." she interrupted herself to swallow, "Grimsley always got it right."

"You don't have to continue if you're not ready to talk about his. When my daughter died, I didn't want to talk about it for years." Lucy's eyes dilated. I realized my mistake, and I chuckled. "No, no, it's okay. My daughter got better."

Lucy smiled wryly, "I suppose that's an optimistic way of looking at it."

I thought I should tell her that what I said wasn't an analogy and that Perioba actually did get better from being dead and is alive again, but I decided against it. It would've blown my cover and the cover of all Greek 'mythology' wide open.

Lucy continued, "About a year after we met, he went to New York City for school, and I moved to Trenton because it was cheaper to live there."

I nodded thoughtfully. New Jersey. Lucy was a brave soul.

Lucy continued, "We promised each other we would see each other again. He got his education degree two years later, and we moved up here together. We were stupid kids, finding our way in a cruel world." she paused, "Do you believe in soulmates, Porphyrion?"

That was a complicated question, and I didn't think there was a straightforward answer. Was there just one soulmate for a person? Or were there many?

I recounted a story I once heard in Tartarus, "I heard this from a myth in Greece. When Prometheus first created humanity, he had doubled everything about them. Two noses, two mouths, four arms. This freaked Zeus the fuck out, and he wound up splitting those creatures in half to make them look more like the gods. So that's why humanity has this sort of penchant for feeling lonely. They're missing that other half they used to have."

"I like that story," said Lucy.

I liked it, too. Epimetheus often told it on Tartarus poker nights when he would visit from the surface world. However, it doesn't necessarily explain why I felt so alone.

Epimetheus was one of the few immortals I've ever met that genuinely loved and the only Titan. Although, I guess Oceanus treated Tethys pretty well.

Epimetheus loved Pandora profoundly and truly. His brothers, Atlas and Prometheus, always gave him a tough time for it. However, Pandora was mortal, while Epimetheus was not. When she was dying, Zeus gave Epimetheus the choice to make her a goddess. However, Epimetheus took too long to decide, and Pandora perished before she could be made into a goddess. Epimetheus never got over his lapse in judgment and didn't do much for a few centuries. There's a reason there are no myths of Epimetheus beyond his relationship with Pandora. Once she died, he didn't do anything else.

"I heard it from my friends back home." I said, "He lost his wife a while back."

"Did he ever remarry?" asked Lucy. I shook my head.

Lucy sighed quietly, an expression on her face that was difficult to read. Disappointment? "I need a drink."

Back in Johnny's, a young woman stood behind the bar and was standing in Johnny's spot, changing one of the televisions behind her to some sort of race. The bartender was South Asian and tall, at last by mortal standards. Her hair was long, nearly reaching the base of her spine. She had a gold ring lodged in her nose and a tiger tattoo on her forearm. She had a puckish grin on her face.

Seeing a bunch of trucks race around in a language I didn't understand wound up drawing my mind to Atalanta. Atalanta was one of the few goddesses that didn't mind giving me the time of day. The fact that she was made into a goddess is somewhat overshadowed. Maybe because she started life as a mortal and became a goddess after her lion form died. Oh, also, yeah, she became a goddess. A lot of her exploits are well known even today. Beating suitors in foot races. Joining the hunt for that one super powerful boar, joining Jason and the Argonauts on the quest for the Golden Fleece.

Atalanta and Epimetheus were sorts of my two friends on Olympus. I think I've fallen out of favor with both of them since trying to take over New York City and San Francisco.

I added Atalanta and Epimetheus to the long list of people I owed an apology to.

"So, Skeeter," asked the woman behind the bar pointedly at a patron I didn't recognize. He, too, was very young, maybe mid-twenties at the oldest. He had a soda in front of him so that he may have been even younger than that, "Tell me what dumb shit we're looking at."

Skeeter had windswept blonde hair and tan skin, which was unusual for the people of Ogunquit. He was sitting down, so I couldn't get an accurate idea of how tall he was, but he was larger than the average human. His leg was bouncing up and down, and he had a playful smirk on his face.

Nursing a glass of some darker beer, Wyatt looked at the two younger people with mild amusement. Lucy looked, transfixed at the two. It occurred to me that Skeeter and this bartender would have sounded a lot like Lucy and Grimsley when they first met.

"I thought we were passed you pretending you didn't care about this, Krishna," said Skeeter. He spoke with a distinctive twang as if he were from a southern part of the United States.

"Absolutely not," said Krishna, a wide grin on her face. As Skeeter launched into a tirade about semi-trucks and speed limits, I patted Lucy on the back as she cried silently.