An Unusual Proposal

The Council

Olympus - The Throne Room

The Parthenon of the gods was once again slowly filling up for the upcoming council meeting. Inside the marble and gold walls you could find numerous gods already lounging in their thrones waiting for the last few stragglers to catch up. At the head of the council table sat the king and queen of the gods, the former leaning forward in his platinum throne using the master bolt to pick a piece of steak out of his teeth while the later sat up straight sorting through a file of unknown contents with a wide grin on her face which unnerved the rest of the occupants slightly, not that that would be noticed from observing their positions.

Around the U shaped table there was most of the council waiting for the final few members to arrive. The table itself was a new concept introduced by Athena as a way to organise documents as well as look more intimidating when demigods were present, not that it was being used for either purposes at current acting more as an oversized footrest than anything else. To Zeus's right, Poseidon was leaning precariously back in his old fishing chair throne balancing on the back two legs with his sandals resting on the edge of the table. Besides him the empty throne of Apollo followed by the crouching figure of Ares who was absentmindedly sharpening his spear out of boredom. Next to him Hephaestus sat tinkering away with a small metallic bird releasing it briefly before summoning it back to his hand for him to tinker with once more. Then came Hermes who was lying parallel to the edgy of the table, legs dangling over the armrest of his throne looking at his phone scrolling through social media posts. It was obvious the throne was stolen due to the emblems that clearly show it used to belong to the British royal family, but who were they to complain? On the very end of the male side Hades sat on his stone guest seat looking through what appeared to be tax records but were actually those marking where each soul was in the underworld, being the god of the dead had a lot of paperwork.

On the other side of the table besides Hera sat Demeter who was glaring at Hades while sharpening her scythe, still not over persephone. To her left was Artemis who was leaning back into her throne with boots on top of the table resting her injured leg while absent munching on the apple Percy had given her upon exiting the arena supersized to accompany her godly form. Her throne unlike her brothers was not made of a solid precious metal but instead was made out of the roots of a mountain which had been trapped in the heart of an oak tree, while it sounded uncomfortable the goddess was rather fond of her unique design. Besides her Athena sat straight up in a business suit much like her fathers reading through a few phd papers she had to mark from her class at Harvard, however unlike her fathers her throne was not nearly as impressive being nothing more than a scaled up office chair, functional but dull. Next to her was the much more flamboyant Aphrodite who was doing her makeup in a rather revealing carnival dress, obviously having been celebrating a festival of some sort prior to the sudden non emergency meeting. And on the last remaining throne made of solid vines sat Dionysus reading a grape magazine looking like he wanted to be anywhere but here. In the centre sat Hestia within the hearth which was burning steadily as she telepathically communicated to bessy. This was about as formal as pre council meetings got.

Finally the sun god decided to grace the council with his presence, his previous occupation clear by the state he was in. Shirt untucked with buttons done up in the wrong order, jeans on back to front and with lipstick smeared all over the gods face, it was clear he had been getting lucky before being called back to his job by his stepmother. Rolling their eyes at the gods antics the rest of the gods put away their respective distractions as the council meeting began. Slamming the master bolt down on his reinforced armrest causing thunder to boom overhead signaling the start of another council meeting. Everyone turned to Zeus expecting him to begin a rant only for him to turn to his wife waiting for an explanation.

"Thank you all for coming here on such short notice," the queen of the heavens began only for a collective eye roll from the Olypians and a hurry up gesture from her husband who clearly hated these meetings as much as everyone else. "Well as you all clearly don't want to be here I'll get straight to the point. Can someone get Perseus Jackson here?"