All rights belong to Rick Riordan

Chapter 17

Monotony

(Percy)

After several initially eventful months on Orthrys as everyone got used to their newfound freedom and their discovery of what the modern world had to offer. Soon to me however came the inevitable monotony of boredom caused by hanging around a bunch of time old Titans, who it turned out I had nothing in common with as I swiftly found out.

The only things I had in common with them was fighting and training but even that was limited with how many of them bothered. The only Titans who actually did any physical training were myself, Iapetus when he was actually on Orthrys and not hanging out with Hades in the underworld. My now somewhat rival Lelantos, as well unsurprisingly Atlas, once the Titan of Endurance and Strength was released. Now it was almost most surprisingly to myself I had struck up a semi-amiable relationship with those two after our obviously rocky starts of trying to kill one another.

Unfortunately, there were also times in this period when the reality of my situation felt so overbearing that I attempted some actions that I would regret later... but I don't want to talk about those dark times.

For the first few weeks after I arrived, I had been struggling with my flying. No matter how hard I tried or what I did, I just couldn't control all the wings at once. A pair would miss a synchronised flap and always collide with another set and I would end up on the floor or in a wall. In one unfortunately memorable occasion I ended up ploughing a trench through one of the Hesperides new flower beds using nothing but my face.

So it was much to my surprise, when the former Titan of the Air approached me and started to coach me on the finer points of their control. Despite his still wounded state, even considered it painful to watch me struggle after watching me extract half a dozen rose bushes out of my hair, clothes and feathers. After all, there was not much for him to do in the palace either now. He had lost his domains and so too had little to do other than feel sorry for himself, which made me feel regretful. Sure, it was not my fault he had instigated our duel. However, he had since profusely apologized for his rashness to me and his parents. Which was admittedly funny to watch as the four-thousand-year-old Titan was scorned like a child.

After a few weeks of his training regime, I was now able to fly somewhat gracefully and with little effort whereas before a few minutes of frantic flapping left me exhausted. Under his instruction I could now multi-task and once he was healed, we began to spar in mid-air using blunted weapons. Neither of us wanted to be in the state we were in before again.

Once I felt competent enough, I offered him a challenge of who was the faster and proposed a race to LA and back to the palace. If I won, he had to fly around the palace proclaiming my victory to everyone he met, if he won, I offered him the sky domain back as I didn't feel comfortable with it. Sure, the wings were nice and offered me another tactic advantage in a fight both as a means of mobility and even as an impromptu shield. I wish I had them during the battle of the skies above Olympus rather than taking pot-shots with a cannon. Perhaps it was maybe due my heritage, I was a child of the sea and not the sky so the domain felt like it was just not for me. The last thing I wanted was for a certain Olympian to think I was stepping on his toes.

Of course, the ex-Titan eagerly accepted the proposition as what did he have to lose, other than perhaps a little of what was left his broken pride.

Truthfully the statistics spoke on my behalf, I had a higher top speed in a straight line which would have been in my favour over a long distance but he was more agile as he had less bulky frame. As a result of having little to do, on top of this training I had begun spending a lot more time in my chamber working out and swimming. As a result, I was swiftly becoming bulking out in muscle to match my increased height.

However, despite this the race was rigged from the start. Once we set off from the palace roof in a neck and neck sprint for a few miles, I eventually disappeared from his view behind a cloud. For a few minutes I waited for him to carry on before I simply turned about and landed. Laying on the roof in the shade I waited for him to return, two hours later sweating and wheezing in exhaustion. It was clear that Lelantos had pulled out all the stops in an effort to beat me. Initially he seemed gloomy to see me already back despite his best efforts but I lied and said I got lost and came back as I knew I would not be able to catch up with him. As such I crowned him the winner and he was welcomed back as a proper Titan again once the council was made aware of the wager.

Despite the loss of the sky domain, I too retained the wings just like he had before and we continued to spar regularly. Although I had chosen not to offer up his other domain and his yet still unused bow.

The problem of Atlas's burden was also unexpectedly resolved one day, I was practicing spear fighting with Iapetus in the gardens when a familiar figure in a bedraggled suit walked through the mist barrier.

"Is that who I think it is?" I asked the older Titan lowering my spear as we both looked at him. The scarred figure took one look at the pair of us looking back at him before trying to back-pedal his way back out. But alas he was to slow as I flew over his head and cut him off with a spear to the throat and Iapetus roughly grabbed him by the collar of his shirt and pulled him onto his ass from where he looked up at the pair of us.

"Hello son, you don't ring, you don't write. Your mother and I were getting worried about you." Iapetus joked to the figure on the ground as Prometheus slowly regained his wits.

"I am here now father, I just thought I would come visit for a while, now that we are free after all" The scrawny Titan claimed, unfortunately for him he was incorrect about one thing. The others were free to do as they liked within reason. He wasn't.

"Now Iapetus, when I negotiated to have the Titans released. Were the words I used not 'all Titans that were not involved in the war' and those that swore an oath to not go against the interests of Olympus?" I said feigning ignorance as I looked down at Prometheus who gulped as I smiled viciously.

"For you see I am distinctly remembering your son here turning up in the middle of the Battle of Manhattan, demanding I surrender to Kronos's forces as we wouldn't stand a chance, before he seemingly did a vanishing act after he lost." I said looking across at the other Titan Lord who scratched his chin.

"Those were the conditions, which leaves us with a quandary, what should we do with him? I suppose we can take him to Olympus and they undoubtably will send him to Tartarus, or perhaps stick him back on his favourite cliff. Or alternatively we can punish him as members of this council after all as he is my son, I would not want to see him suffer that pain again." Iapetus stated dripping with sarcasm. I knew from conversations with him before that Prometheus was his least favourite son, at least out of the four he had with Clymene. The others were in his words simple despite their many flaws. Whereas Prometheus was a smug, self-serving asshole that liked to pick the winning side or run away when the going got tough.

"So, Prometheus what will it be? Your choice, Tartarus or you let me and your father punish you?" The Titan paled at my words before simply pointing at us.

"Good answer, you see I don't like you but there is one person who hates you more than I do and now were gonna talk to him. You see like you we are going to offer him a choice, which will affect your immediate future. Now as you are the Titan of forethought after all, I am sure you must know what I am talking about and what he will say. You may want to start stretching." I told him jokingly and he looked to his father who simply shrugged as I grabbed his neck and dragged him to his feet.

Now he was still taller than me by a few inches being one of the smaller Titans but he was small framed and easily restrained in a headlock by me. Allowing me to drag him across the gardens despite his struggling as we slowly closed in on the figure half bent over holding up the weight of the sky.

"Atlas today is your lucky day; your caring brother here has volunteered himself to take your burden from you as long as you swear not to plot against Olympus or act against its interests. In exchange you can join the rest of your family in the palace and explore the world below. So, what will it be?" I asked the Titan of Strength whose usual sneer at seeing me soon vanished. As he looked at his restrained brother before a smile graced his rough and tanned face.

"I told the others before; they should have made you take my burden and look where it got them. Now my former enemy comes offering to do just that and because you yourself have kindly volunteered brother. At long last, I can put this burden behind me at the simple price of an oath. I Atlas, son of Iapetus and Clymene Titan of Strength and Endurance, hereby swear on the Styx to never attack Olympus or go against its interests." As he finished thunder boomed overhead as I thrust the figure in my grasp alongside him. Prometheus stumbled on his feet for a few seconds, only to be flattened to the ground. As Atlas, Iapetus and I suddenly hit the dirt at his feet, the weight of the sky falling on the nearest available Titan, him.

"A suggestion for you brother lift with your legs, not your back. You don't want to pull a muscle this early on, it could take you centuries for it to heal." The now freed Titan joked climbing to his knees and looking down at his recently incarcerated brother who was struggling to his push and arm under him for support. We could all see the golden tears appearing in his eyes from the weight on his back but none of us really cared for his newfound struggle. Hades, I held it longer when I was fourteen without crying.

Atlas meanwhile found this sight hysterical and keeled over laughing deeply before stopping to rub his back.

"Father, Perseus thank you for freeing me despite our previous transgressions against one another, I regret what happened to my daughter now. For two thousand years, I was forced to hear tales of her journeys with the Hunt and I remained bitter. All I could remember was the day she betrayed me for the son of Zeus not the little joy she and her sisters brought me as they helped me through my struggles. Oath or not if he comes near me again, he will feel my spear." Atlas declared summoning his spear to his hand and using it to pull himself up.

"I wouldn't worry about Heracles last time I saw him; he tried to attack me and was left two inches shorter as a result after I whacked him over the head. And you are right about Zoe she may have left the garden and joined the hunt but she will always be remembered by those she met in it, even if you had dealt the final blow, she was unfortunately dying anyway due to Ladon's venom. She fought you already knowing this. Now she is in the stars above us." I said pointing at the constellation that was beginning to appear above in the fall sky.

"If only her sisters were as adventurous, they are free to actually leave the garden once in a while, as long as they came back. Seriously though multiple millennia of imprisonment and not one back rub was offered" He joked before bending over backwards with a noticeable snap that should not have been healthy in any other situation before straightening out properly.

Eventually we decided to leave Prometheus to his new job and cries of pain. Iapetus and I resumed our duel whilst Atlas went in search of a heat pack or twelve inside the palace.

Over the following months since I had established a routine as such. With duels against either father or son in the morning, we had tried both at once but even I was unable to dodge that many spear thrusts at the same time. Even trying to slow them down to gain an advantage was exhausting because of their shear mass and strength. I could the opposite and try and speed myself up but risked overdoing it and injuring myself. So instead, I carried on as usual doing so I increased my own muscle mass and my endurance at the cost of more than a few large bruises and welts. It seems Styx had no issue with me getting hit with large sticks.

However, though I may have got stronger I wisely chose to turn down any and all offers to wrestle with Atlas. On top of the fact, I didn't want to get down and sweaty with him, I had no doubts the Titan could probably fold me like a pretzel. I had once seen him toss the loaded weight rack I was using off the mountain and clean into the pacific just so I would train with him instead.

Following that I would continue to practice flying and aerial combat with Lelantos. Before eventually retiring to my chamber and taking a long swim. I had initially thought that swimming with wings would be a problem but I found that if I submerged myself, they all folded downwards on top of each other facing downwards and remaining dry just like the rest of me.

I learned to do the same thing subconsciously as well if I wanted to enter the mortal world by wearing a long black duster jacket over them. I had wisely used Lelantos's name when I ordered a whole range of clothing from one of Aphrodite's catalogues so that the goddess herself was none the wiser.

The only time I actually relaxed on my own was when I felt like playing videogames. However, with no one else to play them with and the lack of internet in the palace this drastically reduced the fun I could have had with them. I had wondered if there was some way of getting a mortal company to bring internet cables to Orthrys using the mist but that would possibly incur the wrath of the Hesperides. A group that was both the least powerful of all the denizens of the mountain and yet equally the most terrifying when angered. Even Atlas did not argue with those girls after accidentally backstepping through a hedge during one of our duels and he was their father.

However, the first real major test of being able to hide the evidence of my wings from mortals was when I heard my mother had gone into labour around the end of January. With only a few hours' notice I was forced to fly cross country, using the opportunity Blackjack decided to race me because he wanted to see his friends at Camp Half-Blood. Although he was not allowed to talk about me to anyone there, I asked him to find out what had been happening there in the last six months since I left.

I eventually arrived in New York just as the city turned to night, landing on the hospital roof and breaking in through the access point on the roof, before restoring the damage away with me on the other side. I was forced to duck my head in some doorways as I desperately searched for the maternity ward.

Eventually as a result of the fact that I still could not read sign properly in English, I was forced to ask a nurse for directions. Half scaring the crap out of the poor nurse who was on duty with my appearance. I was only seventeen but by this point I was pretty intimidating I suppose, six-eleven and heavily muscled from constant fitness wearing a knee length black leather coat and black pants and shoes. I looked like a body building goth. Once she got passed the shock, thankfully she pointed me in the right direction.

I arrived to find my mum in a bed cradling the figure of a little baby girl with Paul by her side. I ducked inside the doorway gaining their attention as my mum gasped and Paul looked ready to faint at my transformation.

"Hi mum, hi Paul sorry I am late. Though I see congratulations are in order." I said pulling a bunch of flowers out from behind me that I picked up at a shop I had found first in my hunt for the room.

"th-Thank you Percy, what happened to you? You are so much bigger now and why the jacket?" Paul stuttered looking at me.

"Less about me for the moment and more about my adorable baby sister, what's her name?" I suggested my story was not one for a public place.

"Andromeda Blofis, we thought we would keep with the theme. Hopefully your good luck will rub off on her." My mom said weakly evidently, she had clearly only given birth recently.

"Hopefully only my good luck, we will discuss my current situation when you get out of here." I said cutting off Paul who still looked confused about my changes. Looking at the flimsy looking plastic hospital chair I decided to keep on standing, just because my wings felt light to me. Did not mean they were in reality, some of my own furniture had found this out the hard way. In truth my actual body weight was now closer to half a tonne, most of it as a result of the mass of gold on my back.

I spent the rest of the evening listening to them, as they explained the redecoration of my room in their flat into a crèche for my new sibling, who was now asleep in a crib to my side. I would explain some minor stories and happenings such as my new place although I didn't mention the gold ornamentation that had inevitably turned up here and there in my chambers. We ended up staying the night with Paul sleeping across the hospital chairs. When people say it is uncomfortable to sleep in a cheap chair, they should try sleeping on a hard tiled floor with a dozen metal wings underneath them, slowly digging into your spine.

In the morning though after a final round of check-ups on mother and daughter, it was time to check-out with the new-born and go home. Paul had offered to give me a lift but I declined saying I would make my own way as it was more practical and not a problem for me to do so. Plus, after last night I wanted to be able to stretch my wings and not be cooped up in the backseat of a Toyota Prius next to a carry cot. Plus, I wasn't sure how the suspension would take to the sudden mass of me being in the back. So, after loading the now crying baby into my now sitting mother's arms and watching them drive off into traffic, I re-ascended the hospital's emergency stairs and flew of the roof towards my parent's apartment.

I landed in a deserted alleyway opposite before calmly strolling across the street and going into their place. I was standing facing the window in the lounge when they got back surprising them.

"How did you get back before us, did you catch a train and a taxi?" Paul asked in surprise even as he helped my mother to sit on the couch cradling the small girl to her chest.

"No, I made my own way back." I said simply with a grin.

"Well unless you grew wings, how could you have got passed the traf—." Paul was cut off when my now unfastened jacket slowly began to rise to my sides with no help from my clearly visible hands.

"You may want to sit down Paul before I begin." I suggested to which he complied nodding silently in shock, the pair of them watching as I removed the jacket and half unfurled my golden wings. I was prevented from doing completely so due to the ceiling and the width of the room besides I didn't want the sharp feather edges to damage anything.

Both of them looked at me in shock. "I suppose I should technically formally introduce my new self. I am now Perseus, Titan Lord of Time, Constellations and Light, Titan of the Hunt and formerly for a short period the Air." I finished indicating the wings behind me with a little flap.

"When you left last year, I did not think you would change much. You are almost unrecognisable from the little boy you were when I took you to camp the first time. Clearly this affected you more than I thought it was going to, I thought I was the only one who grew bigger in that time." My mum said regaining her senses and tightening her hold on the baby she had nearly dropped in her surprise.

"I don't exactly have much to do there, other than train regularly and attend council meetings. None of my domains are very proactive the main three are simple fundamentals Time and Light are constants and fundamentals and Constellations don't exactly go anywhere anytime soon. The only active one if you can call it that is the Hunt one and I am about as stealthy as Atlas or Ares." I told them of everything that had happened other than my near death by Lelantos, successfully playing down the danger I was actually in. Gradually they came to understand what had happened to me physically. Before Paul eventually plucked up the courage to approach my left-hand set of wings and try and touch them apprehensively.

"Careful, go with the feathers not against the quills, they are bladed and I am not sure how they will affect a mortal, they are technically imperial gold and shouldn't harm you but I don't want to test it." Paul listened before careful wiping his hand down the inside of the central wing tip, the sensation of which was ticklish to me.

"They are clearly metallic but they feel soft and warm like a real feather it's really strange." He said stepping back beside my mother and his daughter.

I absentmindedly pulled a stray feather out and handed it over to my mother, who carefully took it from me feeling down the spine of the feather. I folded my wings back in before simply sitting on the floor, it was more comfortable for me than sitting in a normal chair and without the risk of shredding it or crushing it.

I spent almost a week with them helping them get settled in with the new-born infant, moving furniture and doing other chores around the place before I was eventually forced to return to Orthrys. As much as I didn't want to leave the three of them, I also did not want to be accused of abandoning my responsibilities, as a council member.

So, with another tearful farewell from my mother and promises to come back, I began the long flight home on my own this time however.

So, with that major event out of the way, things once again returned to the monotony of before as the days, weeks and months began to pass swiftly without incident. I even attempted to learn how to cook, though with little success apart from a mean chilli dish using some peppers that I smuggled out of the garden outside. But after a few days of this I ended up just using the magically supplied food that I always did before.

Still as the months continued to pass by the only gods that were aware of my current state were Apollo, Hestia and Nico. Hestia had inadvertently found out when she visited her mother and I was lounging out next to her in the Throne Room. My wings on full display, as I sat plucking stray feathers that were askew here and there, I already had a sizeable collection of these in my room along with the one my mom previously kept as a memento.

The goddess had simply stared silently for a while at me before resuming her conversation with the Queen of the Titans. The occasion was strange to me too as one of the few occasions that she chose to appear as an adult and not a little girl. Still, I was grateful when she swore not to tell the others about what she had learned until after I visited on the solstice this coming summer.

Few of the other gods however visited Orthrys or vice-versa, only Apollo stopped by regularly to see Leto. Making me suggest to him that just maybe he was a mommy's boy, earning me a volley of arrows that struck my wings as I raised them in a cocoon around me. It turned out Artemis had also visited while I was away at my mom's.

I was disheartened that my dad still never visited but he was still likely rebuilding Atlantis, or at least as far as I was aware he was if my rare calls to Tyson were any hint.

The only god with whom I regularly met was Nico, I would occasionally tag along with Iapetus on his visits to the Underworld to talk with Hades. While he was there, I would go visit Nico's new place, the palace was almost like a smaller version of his dads. Solid obsidian walls and black marble floors with green flames glowing here and there providing light. If it was a fantasy game or world you would immediately think the bad guy lives here.

Still the halls were far from empty as souls were constantly coming and going, Nico liked to listen to the stories of fallen heroes and I had several times seen the now almost familiar ghost of Achilles inside. The Ghost King it seemed wanted to recreate the actual siege of Troy at some point, outside on the plains of Asphodel, using the actual souls of those who were there fighting it. Still, it was strange but I suppose at least he had a hobby when he wasn't at the camps with the others fulfilling that domain they shared.

According to my cousin, only Hazel ever volunteered to come down here to visit him or his dad but I had never actually run into her, despite my sometimes-extended trips down here. I was semi-thankful for this as wherever she was Arion was not generally not far behind and apparently, he was out for my blood now that word had got out. Apparently, my half-brother the original Pegasus had taken great delight in the story and then told the hippocampi and every other horse-based creature on the planet. Now he had been the laughing stock of the equestrian world for a few months, to make matter worse he had taken to declaring it while flying just over his brother's head, safely out of harm's way all the while laughing his head off or so I was told.

Other than planning mock wars with the dead and listening to their stories Nico had taken to his new domain as the official King of Ghosts with open arms. He would often introduce me to some legendary fallen hero or another. Although, I was forbidden from meeting anyone I actually knew in life due to the ancient laws. I did try to ask about Annabeth of course, but the younger god was generally tight lipped about her. Saying he was not supposed to talk about her, just that she was doing better now and working with his father in planning improvements for the Underworld.

Whilst I almost asked him what he meant by better as it implied, she was doing badly before, I realised that considering my thoughts and worse actions it was likely I knew what he meant. So, for the time being I decided not to press the matter any further.

The only problem he had down here was he had to deal with Melinoe occasionally, as she was in charge of those ghosts that roamed the earth. So, she would come over and commandeer some ghost he was using. Almost like an older sibling taking the youngers toys much to his annoyance.

Still, he also listened to me as I explained my newfound situation and that of my mum who he knew. He offered them his congratulations and his blessing to not have to see any of them anytime soon.

The other reason I visited, was to visit Mrs. O'Leary who was now living down here full-time with Cerberus. Nico had explained that she had escaped New Rome after the debacle had started and soon found herself down here, where she had got awfully friendly with the larger guardian hound.

Now there was a litter of various headed puppies playing around the back of Nico's palace. There was currently half a dozen of them in total; two three-headed mastiff hellhounds, three two-headed ones with both a Rottweiler and a mastiff's head and what was considered the runt of the litter a standard supersized Rottweiler hellhound. All of them were constantly ripping apart the supply of toys provided to them or attacking each other or in the case of the multi-headed ones even themselves albeit playfully. All the while my original massive pet would corral them together to stop them wandering off and ending up in the nearby Lethe.

According to Nico his father already had plans for the pups to serve as guardians for the New Olympus palace that he was having built. Ready to keep unwanted sales-gods away, the ones that came offering discount sub-standard Ambrosia and Nectar.

I was glad to be honest that she had remained down here and was happy. I had enough problems with an overgrown lioness that was constantly hungry, the only thing I had learned how to do with my hunting powers was to summon wild game that I was sure I was supposed to personally hunt but in reality, the lion simply ate them practically whole. The giant cat also seemed to find great pleasure in taunting Ladon slowly crawling towards the dragon before pouncing and playfully batting a head or two with her paw before leaping out the way as they all reacted angrily hissing at her, only to be stopped when it distanced itself too far from the tree.

This kept the Hesperides on my case as his trampling would flatten their new flower beds and I would be moaned at about it. The only punishment I could give the lioness was to revert her age but my constant manipulations of that had started to develop a side effect, in that after a while she was seemingly able to counteract it as she was building up a resistance to the spell.

By the time June had eventually arrived, I was so bored it was almost excruciating. I found myself almost wishing I could accelerate time for the whole world to get it over with, were it not for the massive amount of energy that the act would have required probably killing me after moving less than a second.

I found myself looking forward to the solstice, so much I began planning my entrance half-heartedly. At least when it was over, I would be able to do whatever I wanted. Perhaps hang out with my friends now they were gods or even visit the demi-gods at camp.

The one thing I heard from Nico was that the camps were trying something new in that during this summer all training would be carried out at Camp Half-Blood while afterwards the Romans and year-round campers would return to New Rome to carry on there. That was unless they wanted to stay at the Greek Camp if they had family nearby. The Greeks too had the option of undergoing Legion training and vice-versa although it was decided only the Romans could join the cohorts; however, the Greeks would be arranged into their own Auxilia when it came to war games but this was still a theoretical proposition.

My own training was now more arranged towards keeping my level of skill in each of my weapons. I had briefly attempted to learn archery from Lelantos only for the first show to ricochet the arrow of a wall, against one of his wings and finally imbedded in the ground under an inch in front of Nemea's nose. The disgruntled lioness had kindly responded to that by pouncing on me and pinning me to the floor by my wings. She refused to let me up no matter how I asked until eventually I summoned a wild boar for her to chase and eat. Once I was finally back on my feet Lelantos then swiftly took a simple bow and shot the target I was aiming for dead in the bull's-eye whilst barely looking at it all the while looking at me smugly.

By this point I could match Atlas and Iapetus in spear fighting, despite the obvious difference in height and strength. The issue was I had to inflict twice as many wounds to them as they would to me if Styx was not feeling generous that day. Finally, the result of my combined training was I could now hit a moving target with a spear all the while flying in a barrel roll.

The only person who was as miserable and bored as me was Prometheus and it was easy and obvious to see what his problem was. I occasionally watched him from the garden me and Atlas asked the Hesperides and Calypso to design to commemorate their fallen sister. For the most part it was dominated by the silver flower moonlace. The Queen of Ogygia however was rarely about, instead choosing to explore the outside world I had told her about during my short stay on her island. Though she would occasionally return and tell her sisters of some amazing thing she had seen, not that the Hesperides showed any intention of joining her in leaving their sanctuary.

The final council meeting before the solstice was truly a depressing thing as I was forced to listen to some millennia old argument about who was truly the fairest Titaness or some such crap when I lost it and simply walked out. Which had the benefit for the remaining male Titans in the room of stopping the argument as they all looked at my back as I left. Eventually though as I leaned against a wall in an empty passageway, I heard the unmistakeable sound of armoured footsteps as Iapetus approached me.

"I understand you are frustrated but you must not act so rashly, unfortunately for you, you too are a member of this council and have to listen to the others petty arguments even if you do not want to hear it. I too would like nothing better than to not have to listen, but it is the way it needs to be. Koios and I have simply learned to as you say tune them out after all this time." He said looking down at me with concern.

"With respect It is not just the council meetings, it is being stuck here doing nothing productive. I mean no offence to you by that as without your help I would have gone mad or worse. It is just that all my life I have spent in both new places and doing new things. Reacting to new problems that have arisen that want me dead. But right now, here I am supposedly for all of time and yet I am bored after a few months. Sure, training is all very nice and well but I am doing it for what? What threat is coming? Nothing! I have beaten everything already, even whilst I was just a demi-god. I have never had any care for power or titles, they are simply something I collect without meaning to. Things that a mortal would put on a business card. The one person I truly cared for and loved was killed and now I am all alone, surrounded by those who don't understand anything beyond themselves. That's why I like you and Atlas you are both honest at least and do what you say you will do." I said ramblingly my wings shifting in agitation behind me.

"What you need is a hobby or an active domain one that will require your constant attention; unfortunately, there is nothing I or the rest of the council can do for you in that regard. Why do you think I go to visit the Underworld so often? It clears my head and allows me to forget the wearying things in life, not just because Hades is an ungracious loser at games and I like to gloat at his misfortune." He said jokingly trying to make light of it, but his point about getting a hobby stuck. Maybe more than a hobby, a job was what I needed I thought optimistically to myself and if the Titans were unable to help me perhaps another council could.

"What if I asked the Olympians for a task or job to do constantly, how would our council react?" I asked suddenly optimistically. Hell at this point I would probably have taken a job in a fish packing cannery if it kept me entertained for nine hours a day.

"To be honest, we don't have much of a precedent to go on. All I can suggest is I don't see a problem if they do have something. As long as you come back here every so often and attend the major meetings when summoned, there is not much the others can say." He advised and I knew he meant it.

"Well then, I suppose we better go back and see if they found out who won the contest for today, I may not be coming back to hear the next round for a while." I joked hopingly.

"Unlikely though, you will still have to come back no matter what and inform us of any decisions the Olympians make. Besides the answer to today's meeting is obviously Clymene." Iapetus stated bluntly before walking back towards the council chamber his answer clearly not biased at all. Meanwhile following on behind I struggled to keep up with his long strides even as I deliberated on his words. There were only a few days to go until the solstice after all.