Death of Olympus

Chapter 5

I stood before the broken window of my old apartment; the one I'd lived in with my dad before all of the craziness started. I sighed, turning to the mostly empty living room and hefted the final box from the floor. Insurance had assured me that they'd take care of any damage to the apartment, so all I had to do was move out. The state had tried to put me in a group home for the two or three months I had till I turned eighteen, but I refused; I had other plans. I slowly made my way down the winding stairs of my old building, closing my eyes for a moment to say goodbye as I did so. When I reached the moving truck, I gently placed the box inside before locking the back and climbing into the driver's cab. As I pulled away, I took one last look at my old home, and it finally started to hit me that this was the last time I'd have any semblance of a normal life for a long time.

I pulled out of the parking lot, meandering the truck slowly down an old, crumbling road towards a storage unit. Most of the old stuff from our house had been sold or auctioned off at the beginning of the year, but there were a few things I'd kept for when I could find an affordable place to live. For now I was staying in my 'lair,' which Hephaestus had helped me set up. He turned out to be a pretty good guy, beaten into submission by Zeus and Hera and forced to create tech and gadgets for them to fool the mortals. I'd freed him a week ago, and he helped me make some fancy new toys to help me bring the Olympians down to earth. I slowly pulled the truck up to an inconspicuous house just downtown of my old apartment, hopping out  of the cab and unlatching the back. I opened up the door, hopping up to start grabbing things as Hephaestus strolled out to help. "So?" he asked. "You make your peace?" I turned to face the tall, muscular man who looked oddly like a lumberjack in his flannel shirt and denim jeans. I nodded. "Yeah. Yeah, I made my peace." I grabbed a box and handed it to him. He smiled heartily, his face newly un-deformed and shining like new. When he started explaining the Olympian tech to me, I caught interest in the exo-biological synthetic organism fabrication machines, and suggested we whip one of those up and get him a new exo-body, his old one being in the state it was. I helped him build it, and it turns out I'm pretty handy with Olympian technology. I followed him into the building with a box on my shoulder. As I stepped inside, the drab industrial square of concrete seemed to transform into a well-decorated lounge, with plush sofas and furniture mingling with complex gadgets, computers and machines in different shades of bronze and gold. "Home sweet home." Hephaestus nodded, setting the box down on a table. I did the same, then pressed a button on a bronze rod sticking out of the floor. A holographic control panel appeared above the rod, and I punched in a few commands. Suddenly the boxes that had previously been in the back of the truck were teleported into the lounge in front of me and Hephaestus. "I'll port 'em into my room after I take the truck back," I said, waving as I stepped out the door and climbed into the truck.