When Things Fall Apart

Chapter Nineteen

"Percy!" "Yo Perce, come here!" As soon as Zeus commenced the party, things went nuts. Percy was immediately swarmed by the ones he had met over the years.

"He's my son, I get to talk to him first," Poseidon growled, walking past all of the others. He looked at Percy and smiled fondly towards him. The laugh crinkles on his cheeks were visible.

He embraced him in a hug. "My boy," he told him.

Percy returned the hug. "It's great seeing you again dad," he replied. They started to walk down the streets of Olympus, away from the crowd.

"You have no idea how much I missed you, Percy," he told him. It looked like he could have cried in that moment, but he prevented himself from doing so. "I remember the day you went missing. You remember don't you? You made the seas rage and earth shake like never before. Not even I could stop your wrath," he recalled.

"I'm sorry about-"

"No, don't apologize Percy. Did I enjoy being unable to stop a puny demigod from controlling my domains? No. But this puny demigod was also my son, the Hero of Olympus, and that equalized my emotions with great pride. In that moment, you could have competed with any Olympian." He leaned towards Percy and whispered, "Even Zeus." He nudged his son with his elbow.

Percy just smiled. "I didn't even know I was doing that," he recalled. "I guess my emotions were just mirrored by the damage I caused."

Poseidon scratched his beard. Percy noticed that he hadn't changed at all. He was wearing a pink and white Hawaiian shirt with the top few buttons open. He matched that with khaki shorts and leather sandals. He smelled like the Atlantic.

"But Percy, your power was never the thing that impressed me the most about you," he spoke. "No, it was your loyalty. Although it is your fatal flaw, which Athena constantly reminded me of," he remembered annoyingly, "you always did the best with it. And that's because you invested yourself in the right people. You always know who to associate yourself with. You are good at deciding who is a good person and who is not. Because of that, all of your acts of loyalty and sacrifice always end up occurring for a good cause, even if you are destroyed in the process. Now, I may not enjoy hearing that you have done something life threatening for someone else, because you're my son, but boy, do I look up to you in those moments," he told him. He put his hand on Percy's shoulder.

"You are the best son I could have ever asked for, Percy." By now, a single tear had fallen from his eye and landed somewhere in his beard.

"I'm proud to be your son," he reciprocated. "It's great seeing you again, dad." The two of them walked back to the party, and Poseidon patted him on the back and encouraged him to mingle with the other people who wanted to see him.

And that's what Percy did for the next couple of hours. Of course, he had to dance with Apollo again on stage, which he actually enjoyed this time. Aphrodite tried to seduce him a hundred times, but Percy declined every single time.

And then Hestia came up to him. "Care to dance," she asked him with a small smile.

Percy returned the smile and stuck out his hand. "It would be my honor, Hestia," he replied. They danced once again, like many years ago. Although this time, Percy wasn't sad over the things he thought he could have done differently. He wasn't sad that everything that happened was part of some larger form of Fate. In this moment, he was happy. This level of happiness made every year in Tartarus and solitude worth while.

"You know I wouldn't be back on the council if it weren't for you?" she told him. Percy shook his head.

"If it wasn't for your life advice that I continually looked back on, who knows if I would be here today," he replied.