Forgotten memories

The city that never sleeps.

The lobby felt strangely quiet when we stepped inside, the sound of our armor clanking against the marble floor echoing like distant thunder. The security guard behind the desk barely looked up at first—he was lost in a thick black book with a single white flower etched on the cover. When he finally glanced at us, his pale blue eyes flickered with something I couldn't quite place. His head was completely bald, and there was this unsettling calm about him. I couldn't tell if he was human or something else pretending to be, but the way his gaze lingered on our weapons told me the Mist wasn't fooling him.

"School group?" he asked flatly, like he'd been programmed to say the line. "We're about to close up."

Percy didn't miss a beat. "No. Six-hundredth floor."

The guard's expression didn't change, but there was a tiny twitch in his jaw, like he wanted to roll his eyes. "There is no six-hundredth floor, kid." He said it like he didn't believe his own words—like he was just following a script. "Move along."

I stepped forward, leaning just slightly across the desk so he could see the edge of my celestial bronze armor. "You really want forty demigods hanging around in your lobby?" My tone was casual, but my words weren't. "Because, uh, that attracts an awful lot of monsters."

That made him pause. His pale eyes flicked over the group behind me—kids in armor, weapons glinting under the lights. He thought about it for a long second, then finally let out a slow breath and pressed a buzzer. The security gate clicked open.

"Make it quick," he muttered.

"You don't want us going through the metal detectors," Percy added with a shrug.

The guy gave a humorless chuckle. "Um, no. Elevator on the right. I guess you know the way."

Percy tossed him a golden drachma, and we marched through the gate in two neat lines, boots thudding softly against the polished floor. The elevator was going to take at least two trips to get everyone up, so I volunteered for the first ride.

Inside, the elevator music kicked in—of all things, it was "Stayin' Alive." The Bee Gees. I swear I almost laughed out loud, but then this mental image slammed into me: Apollo in bell-bottom pants and a silk shirt, doing disco finger guns. That was... horrifying. I shook it off, staring at the glowing floor numbers as we shot upward.

When the elevator finally dinged open, it was like stepping into another world. A bridge of floating stones stretched out in front of us, leading through soft, wispy clouds toward the snow-capped peak of Mount Olympus, which hovered like a jewel two thousand meters above Manhattan.

Even though I'd seen Olympus before, the sight still punched the air out of my lungs. Gold and white mansions glittered along the mountain's slopes like shards of sunlight. Gardens spilled across terraces, flowers blooming in impossible colors. Braziers lined the streets, sending fragrant smoke curling into the twilight. At the very top, crowned in snow and glory, rose the palace of the gods.

It should've felt alive—grand, overwhelming, full of divine power. But something was... wrong. It was too quiet. No music. No laughter. Just this heavy, uneasy silence hanging over everything like a storm cloud that hadn't broken yet.

Annabeth stood beside Percy, studying him with sharp gray eyes. "You look... different," she said carefully, like she was trying to figure out what changed. "Where exactly did you go?"

Before he could answer, the elevator dinged again and the second group poured out, boots clattering against the marble. Percy just shook his head. "Tell you guys later. Come on."

We crossed the sky bridge and entered the streets of Olympus, but the city was a ghost town. Shops shuttered. Parks empty. The only sound was the occasional flicker of fire in a brazier or the faint pluck of a lyre. I spotted two muses sitting on a bench, strumming at their instruments without any real heart. A lone Cyclops swept the road with what looked like an uprooted oak tree, his single eye dull with worry. From a balcony above, a minor godling peeked at us, then slammed his shutters shut like he wanted no part of this.