The demigods are now gods. Sweet. But, as the fates are evil and unable to give us a happy ending, there's a whole new problem to deal with. Namely, a flaming Neville Longbottom falling out of the sky and nearly squashing the new goddess of magic.
N...
The streets had thinned since the rush of busy wizards earlier that day, leaving a few stragglers wandering about the cobblestone in the late afternoon heat. A certain peace had fallen over the strange little street, a pointlessness of movement that was somehow calming, despite the strangeness of our situation.
We sat around a heavy wood table outside the ice cream parlour Neville had suggested, sundae glasses scattered over the circular tabletop, bags a mess of plastic woven around our feet. The conversation had sputtered out a while ago, all of us comfortable to enjoy the near-quiet of Diagon Alley at dusk now that our little shopping trip was done. Neville, after hearing our action plan to deal with this new problem, had been kind enough to supply us all with lists of required materials, as well as directions to Diagon Alley, before we'd sent him back to Hogwarts.
I lifted my arm up to my eyes for what felt like the hundredth time today, watching the rippling, golden sheen that signified my newfound godhood dance across my skin. Our lack of time to process was becoming more noticeable by the minute, a looming panic attack over my shoulder. I promised myself that I would set aside some time to sit and think, work out where I stood with myself and make sure I was comfortable in my own body, power-ups and all.
A familiar holler kicked me out of my reverie in time to see Percy strolling down the path towards us, hand entwined with Annabeth's. Warmth filled my heart at the sight of the pair of them, tinged with the slight green of envy. As far as I knew, their relationship had been smooth sailing since they found each other again at Camp Jupiter, despite the trials thrown their way by the Giant war. Even the stress of becoming the technical high rulers on the planet seemed to have had no effect on their bond. It was difficult not to feel a little jealous of how perfect they seemed for each other.
The pair tossed their heavy bags to the floor and slumped into the wire-wrought chairs, as physically exhausted as the rest of us. A waiter approached to take their orders, and I almost felt the need to gag when Percy announced the sundae he was set on having.
'Mint chocolate chip? Are you actually insane?' I practically exploded, once the waiter had wandered off to pass forward the orders. 'Why the hell would you want the taste of toothpaste in your mouth while you're having ice cream? It's ridiculous! It's inhumane! It's - It's barbaric!' Leo and Frank nodded emphatically as I finished my little speech, while Percy and Annabeth stared at me like I'd lost my mind. Which, maybe I had. Just a little. But come on, mint? As an ice cream flavour? What kind of self-hating, tasteless idiot would sentence themselves to that kind of torture?
'Ok, first off-' Percy started, leaning forward, his posture settling into that which he took on when in battle, 'Mint Chocolate chip is the best ice cream flavour. It's the perfect combination of sweet and sharp, so as to truly cleanse the palette and not be overly cloying, but not so sharp as to be unenjoyable. Also, it's green, which is as close to blue as you can get in an ice cream other than blue raspberry, which is unreasonably sweet, completely artificial and tastes like candy floss or something blended into an ice cream form! And I don't know why you think you can talk, seeing that monstrosity you have in front of you-'
Annabeth, obviously sensing how long this argument could last if unmoderated, reached out a hand to steady her food-focused boyfriend. 'Ok, Percy, we get it, you like mint choc chip, can we leave it there please darling?'
'But Annabeth,' Percy whined, obviously not done with the ice cream topic just yet, 'she insulted my taste in ice cream, and I can't just let that-'
Whatever he was planning to say next was muffled by Annabeth's hand. She turned to look at me pointedly, and I sighed.
'Percy, I'm sorry for insulting your favourite ice cream flavour. You are well within your rights to eat... that,' I wrinkled my nose as the waiter came back, setting down lemon sorbet in front of Annabeth and a green and brown monstrosity in front of Percy, 'without me commenting on it. I shouldn't have said anything. I'm sorry.'
Annabeth nodded, pleased, and she and a now placated Percy tucked happily into their desserts of choice. I conveniently forgot to mention that my hands were crossed securely behind my back as I spoke. They didn't need to know.
That was a longer hiatus than I was planning on taking, I'll be honest. Not a whole lot of plot in this chapter either, just ice cream arguments (I'm firmly on team Percy for this one, by the way, like it or not.) I briefly considered using pineapple pizza instead, but that's probably a little too much discourse to invite a comment war.
What's more important to you in terms of updates, quantity or frequency? I'm considering updating scene-by-scene, in little 400-500 word bursts, and then collecting two or three of them into a chapter later, but that might be jarring or break the story's flow too much. Give me your thoughts.
Updating is going to be erratic for the next few months in general, as I'm coming up to a pretty heavy exam season. It should even out come summer, depending on how much interest I still have in the fic. If I'm still invested enough, I'm even considering a rewrite to better reflect my current writing style, but nothing is set in stone.
Finally, are there other sites you would like to see this fic uploaded to, to make it more convenient to read? AO3, for example? Let me know.
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