All the gods felt like they could finally relax for just a while now before they started the next book. This book had been intense and knowing that it would just get worse, they just wanted a break.

Ares decided to take all the younger gods shopping for cars or bikes, whichever they wanted. He sighed as he went to talk to the god of fire who's showroom they'd be visiting. He doubted that the younger gods would be able to pay as much as it costed to buy Hephaestus' modified sports cars.

"Hey, Hephaestus. Is it possible for you to let the younger gods take a few cars from your showroom or do they have to buy it?" Ares asked his brother. Hephaestus stared at him.

"I'd give free cars to anybody as long as its not you." He replied. Ares sighed as he grimaced internally.

"So I can take them?" Ares asked, not wanting to get into it with Hephaestus.

"Only they take the cars, Ares. Not you. And that's very clear." Hephaestus said, looking Ares dead in the eye and the god of war nodded.

"Each one of them gets one." Hephaestus said and Ares nodded.

"Some might want bikes." He said

"That's upto them." Said the god of fire.

Ares walked to all the young gods who were relaxing in the garden with their parents and each other.

"Guys, whose up for car shopping?" he smirked. The younger gods looked at him, open mouthed.

"You're bullshitting us, man." Nico said, disbelief coloring his voice. Persephone turned her head at the profanity but said nothing.

"You should be glad that I'm not." Ares winked with a grin. "Hephaestus is giving free cars to you guys." He said. The House of Heroes cheered loudly for Hephaestus and Ares.

"Shittt." Percy grinned and whistled. Poseidon grinned at him.

"Which car are you planning on buying?" he asked. Percy looked at him with a suspenseful smile.|

"Surprise." He said. Poseidon laughed.

"What about you?" Percy asked. "Which one do you have?" he raised an eyebrow. Poseidon returned the same smile.

"Surprise." He said and Percy laughed. He got up in one swift movement and joined the rest of the younger gods and Ares as they went to Hephaestus' showroom called the Asterisk.

"I'm so excited." Travis grinned widely.

"Oh you're going to love it once we reach." Ares told him. Once they reached, the younger gods' mouths fell open and their jaws hit the ground. Ares grinned at their surprise and chuckled.

"Knock yourselves out." He said, spreading his arms. The younger gods divided into their groups as they surveyed the cars with bright eyes. Ares smiled at that.

"Which car are you thinking about?" Nico asked Percy as they were walking through the cars.

"Hmm. I was thinking about a SSC Tuatara." He mused. Thalia whistled.

"That's one hot car." She said. Percy grinned at her and nodded in agreement.

"I'm just gonna take a Bugatti." Nico grinned.

"Oh dammm." Percy sucked in a breath through his teeth.

"I'm sticking with a bike." Thalia shook her head. Percy and Nico looked at each other and snickered, remembering the last time that Thalia had tried to drive. Thalia hit them both upside the head and they groaned dramatically.

The younger gods were practically jumping with excitement as they stood with Ares as he talked over all the cars with the dealer. He'd known that they were coming and had arranged an area for them to sign to the purchase of their cars. As Ares talked to the dealer, the younger gods discussed their choices among themselves.

"Lambo." Lee grinned.

"Ferrari." Will winked.

"Bentley." The Hermes kids shrugged.

"Nissan Skyline." Jason said.

"Honda. Not that into supercars." Frank said with a smile.

"Lambo too." Grover grinned.

"Aston Martin Valkyrie." Annabeth said and Percy grinned at her and gave her a wink.

After they were done, everybody whooped with joy and a few of them even ended up hugging Ares and on returning, they gave a hug to Hephaestus and the god of fire smiled, knowing that he'd done the right thing and nodded to Ares.

"I cannot believe that I have my own car." Travis jumped excitedly. Hermes laughed lightly.

"Its so amazing, isn't it?" he grinned at his son who nodded vigorously.

"All right, what car did you buy?" Poseidon asked Percy and the younger god grinned.

"SSC Tuatara." He said. Poseidon grinned.

"DAM." He said and Percy snickered.

"Which ones do you have?" he asked.

"I have quite a few but the one I usually use is a Ford GT." The sea god answered. Percy whistled.

"Shitt." He laughed and grinned. "Those are good." He said

All the gods were honestly just as excited as their kids about the cars that they got and especially Nico and Hades and Jason and Zeus who'd ended up getting the same cars which were Bugatti Chirons and Nissan Skylines.

"Who's up for a game night today?" Percy asked loudly. Everybody's hands shot up and he laughed.

"Come over at our place. We'll combine it." Hermes said, gesturing to him, Apollo, Ares and Dionysus and everybody grinned. Honestly, the four of their quarters combined was just brilliant. They all then continued chatting with each other.

Percy was eating and was talking about his birthday with the Poseidon gang and Underworld gang and Thalia when somebody came and put their hands over his eyes lightly and the son of Poseidon chuckled deeply.

"Wise girl." He said. Annabeth grinned and the others chuckled as Percy grabbed her hand and lightly pulled her towards him, making her face him as he kissed her.

"Get a room!" Nico groaned. Percy flipped him off.

"Pull a chair, wise girl." He said. Annabeth chuckled and did just that and blushed to the roots of her hair when Percy whispered something in her ear. Nico and Thalia looked at each other and imitated gagging sounds.

"Oh shut up." Percy told them.

"I cannot believe that you're turning 18 in just a few days." Poseidon smiled widely at Percy who grinned back.

"I know right. I can't believe that I made it this far." He joked. Poseidon raised an eyebrow and Percy grinned at him.

"Two prophecies." He reminded his father and the others nodded in agreement.

"I'm still 15." Thalia snickered.

"I'm elder than you. I'm elder than you." Percy chanted and Thalia faux glared at him.

"Even I'm elder than her." Nico laughed and Percy and him high fived.

"Les go, buddy." They grinned at each other.

"Honestly, fuck you guys." Thalia grumbled and everybody laughed.

"I have a feeling that I should ask you to not bully her so much but its too fun to do that." Annabeth snickered. Thalia pouted at her.

"Thanks, Annie."

Poseidon was just glad that his son had come out of everything that he had ever gone through and could still smile and was still happy despite what happened to him and that he had made it to 18 which was a feat that not many demigods managed. One of the things that he was most grateful to the fates was for making Percy immortal when he and the others gods weren't able to.

"Percy." Jason said and slid into a chair beside Percy. Percy gave him a glance and continued digging into his waffle.

"Jason." He said. Everybody sitting there except Thalia and Nico looked highly surprised and taken aback by Percy's tone. Even Jason noticed it as he ran a hand through his hair and sighed.

"Look, I know that you're mad-" he started. Percy gave a dry chuckle but said nothing.

"But I really am sorry." Jason continued. Percy nodded.

"Cool." He said as he continued eating. Nobody sitting at the table said a word, sensing the tension.

"Percy-" Jason sighed. "Please try to understand my side." He said. It was then when Percy finally looked at Jason and the son of Jupiter swallowed.

"I should try to understand your side?" Percy said quietly "I understand it very well, Jason. I get that Hera isn't the best person to have as your stepmother. I get that you want to bond with her. And I also get that isn't child's play either. But none of this gave you the right to speak to me about my brother that way. And I thought that you had the common sense that you wouldn't defend somebody about saying things that they had no right to say." Percy told him, his tone awfully and scarily calm. Jason started to say something but Percy held up a hand to stop him.

"I'm mad at you right? Yeah, I am and I have the right to be. Hera attacked my family. And you defended her, knowing that she was wrong. What she did to me was totally different and neither of you have the right to tell me to stop or to control any of my family members just because they went against you. I don't receive such attacks in the best way, Jason and you're aware of that. But I'm trying really hard here to not say something to her that will hurt her or anybody else. So yes, Jason, I get your side so if you're going to sit here and tell me that I don't then I'd suggest that you don't waste your time. It's a precious thing, you know?" Percy told him.

Jason looked taken aback and he wasn't the only one. None of the gods except Thalia and Nico sitting at the table had ever expected that Jason and Percy would have such arguments. Of course, it wasn't unreasonable but it was something that they had not expected to see seeing as they got along so well. The sea gang stared at Percy who was now back to eating his waffle as his cousin looked at him, misery written in his eyes. Triton looked at his father who gave him a small smile. None of them would have expected Percy to stand up for Triton in such a way that it would cause a fight between him and Jason.

Jason sighed as he drank a glass of water. He knew that he probably shouldn't have done what he did but it hurt him to not be able to bond with his patron and step mother especially since everybody else were now on such good terms with everybody in the family while he lacked an important one. He'd hoped that at one point, he and Hera would be able to bond as mother-son. He knew it was far-fetched but it was the only hope that he had for even a slight mother figure. But he now knew that while he wanted that, he didn't want it at the cost of his brother who'd helped him every time that he could.

"I really am sorry, Percy." Jason tried.

"You did me no wrong, Jason." Percy told him with the hint of a smile. Jason then looked at the rest of the sea gang but especially at Triton.

"I'm very sorry. While I wanted to defend Hera, it was not my place to talk to you like that. Heck, it isn't anybody's place to talk to you like that. I get that you were defending your brother and I'd probably have done the same thing if I'd been in your place." Jason told him sincerely. Triton smiled at the son of Jupiter.

"All's forgiven, god of respect." Triton told him and Jason smiled. Percy nodded at him with a small smile.

"Thank you, brother." He said.

"That's nothing that you have to thank me for." Jason smiled back and the two exchanged a hug, surprising most of the people further who were not expecting such a quick patch up either. Jason got up and walked back to Zeus and Hera with Thalia in tow.

"Well, that was quick." Nico commented, voicing out what everybody was thinking. Percy chuckled.

"That's how it is." He said.

A day passed with everybody engaging in their own activities and the next day, Zeus came up to Percy, Thalia, Jason, Hazel and Nico, all of whom were at the moment, eating ice cream.

"Oh hey, dad." Thalia greeted. Zeus smiled.

"I believe that I had made a promise to take you all skydiving." He said. A few eyes widened at that.

"Today?" Jason grinned and Zeus nodded.

"Brilliant. Let us just finish this real quick." Percy grinned.

"Also, Percy, you need to fill in your right hand and second in command. I know that you're not going to fill the queen part or commander and stuff like that but the right hand and second in command is important." Zeus told him. Percy blushed at the queen part but nodded.

"Take your time." Zeus said.

"I don't need to. Thalia and Nico." The king of the second council replied.

"You sure?" Zeus asked and Percy nodded and got a small smile from the god of the sky. Hazel smiled and gave Percy a side hug. Jason gave a small smile as well but he wasn't going to lie to himself that he wasn't slightly upset about Percy's decision. Zeus looked at his son with furrowed eyebrows, getting an idea about what he was thinking.

"Well, we're done." Hazel said, as she threw her empty ice cream cup.

"Lets get going then." Zeus said. Thalia paled but nodded.

"Its going to be all right." Zeus told her quietly and the younger goddess gave him a small, nervous smile.

Nico looked paler than usual as they were boarding the plane while Hazel looked relatively calm. She got seasick but wasn't scared of heights. Percy swallowed as he took his place, still not too fond of planes. Jason looked excited while Thalia looked green already. But the thing that was common was that all of them wanted to face this. Zeus calmly sat down as he analyzed the faces of all the younger gods and chuckled to himself.

When the time to jump came, Jason grinned widely and dived while Percy stared at the ground but jumped and whooped once he felt the wind in his hair and Jason grinned at him. Hazel took a deep breath and took the jump while Nico mumbled something in Italian and jumped. Thalia, first thought about closing her eyes and then jumping but decided against it. She took a step backward but Zeus put a gentle hand on her back.

"You can do it." He said encouragingly. Thalia looked at him and Zeus gave her a small smile.

"I'll be right behind you." He said. "Not that you're going to need any support once you do jump." He said gently. Thalia swallowed and nodded and took a step forward and jumped. Zeus smiled and dropped from the plane as well.

"Hey, Thals! Its going to be all right!" Percy shouted loudly with the widest grin on his face and Nico was chuckling as well while Hazel was flat out whooping. Thalia couldn't help but laugh at her cousins. Zeus smiled at all of them, glad that he was able to help vanquish at least some of their fear of heights and planes, some of which was instilled by him.

Once they all touched the ground, Percy fell on his knees and whooped loudly with Nico and Thalia joining in as well. Zeus, Jason and Hazel laughed lightly. The next second, Zeus' eyes widened in shock and surprise as Thalia wrapped her arms around him.

"Thank you." She said. Zeus returned the hug and smiled at her once they pulled back.

"You did it. Don't thank me." He told her and Thalia grinned. Thalia then went and clapped Percy on the shoulder.

"Guess you're qualified to drive safely now." Percy joked. Thalia punched him on the arm and Percy groaned dramatically.

"Good job." Nico applauded Thalia and Percy pouted at him.

"Come on, you guys. We have to get going. We're starting the next book today." Zeus said as he looked at them amusedly.

"Fun." Nico grumbled.

They all walked to their next location of reading which, funnily enough was the beach because Poseidon wanted to stay at the beach and everybody knew that once the sea god was at the beach then it was impossible to make him go anywhere for at least a few hours and if they wanted to start reading then it might as well be there.

"I'll read first." Hephaestus volunteered.