CHAPTER LXX:Aftermath

Draco had woken me up in the morning across the country. I sat up on a couch and l looked around. Math books, science journals, architectural blueprints, history books, protractors, a periodic table, and pencils were all over the floor. It looked like someone had started a dozen projects, but their ADHD hyper focus wore off before they could complete their work. Around the room there was statues of gods and goddesses, paintings of beautiful landscapes and cities, and a few mechanical pieces belonging to automatons on the wall.

"Morning mortal." A woman's voice said walking past me.

I looked towards the origin of the voice to see Athena walking past my couch. She had an owl following her the whole way to the kitchen. Suddenly Penny saying her mom brought her to school made a lot more sense. I stood up and was immediately forced back down. I was startled and was looking around for whatever forced me down.

"What the hell?" I asked looking around.

"Language Mary, and your ankle isn't healed just yet. You may have accelerated healing but your bone was shattered. The ambrosia is piecing it back together as we speak." Athena explained "In fact you may need more now."

"Thank you Lady Athena." I said looking up.

"Just Athena is fine here. By the way today is Tuesday, January the twenty-sixth. Kindly tell my daughter that when she wakes up." Athena said as she walked over setting two cups of coffee down in front of me. "The one with creamer is my daughter's, the one that's just black is yours. Do NOT get them mixed up."

"I understand Athena, thank you." I said kindly.

Athena smiled and walked out of the room, my guess was that she wanted to take the stairs down instead of the elevator. I didn't know what floor we were on, but my guess was that Athena wanted the exercise. Or that Athena didn't trust elevators. I picked up one of the black coffee mugs and took a sip. I was expecting the bitterness of black coffee, but instead I was met with French vanilla flavoring. I double checked the coffee inside the mug to make sure I didn't mix them up.

"You're too used to combat ambrosia." Penny called out walking downstairs.

I looked at the clock and saw that the time was exactly 5:15 in the morning. I looked over at Penny who was wearing all white pajamas with a blue owl of Athens stitched on the shirt sleeve. And she wanted to call me a princess.

"I can tell, combat ambrosia is tasteless. Also today is Tuesday, January twenty-sixth." I answered, as Penny walked down a small flight of stairs.

Penny grabbed her cup of coffee and picked up a math text book off the floor. She sat down and read through it as I finished my coffee. My ankle started to feel better, but I didn't want to try walking on it. It wasn't until then that I realized my clothes were gone and I was in pitch black pajamas with a skull stitched on the sleeve.

I looked around for my stuff. "Where is-"

"Your clothes are being washed and your weapons are in my room. All five of them that is. Heal first, shower next, gear up later. We resume our quest tomorrow." Penny cut me off without glancing up from the textbook.

"Can we continue it the day after actually?" I asked.

"You mean overmorrow? And why?" Penny asked back.

"Tomorrow is mine and Seth's seventeenth birthday." I said.

Penny looked at me, "Are you serious?" She asked happily.

I nodded a bit. Hardly anyone knew my birthday besides Seth, plus my mom and Hades of course, it was one of my secrets. I didn't plan on fighting for my life on my birthday, and I wasn't gonna make Seth do that either. Penny stood up and walked back upstairs, when I looked at the time I saw it was 5:35 in the morning.

I sat alone in silence once more. I reached on the floor and grabbed a history book. While I was crippled for a brief moment, that didn't mean I couldn't read. I flipped through the pages trying to find something that interested me. I finally settled on World War One and read through the section.

The time flew by, and I hadn't learned anything new. Before I knew it the time was 5:45 in the morning. Penny came down the steps In a light blue shirt and black jeans instead of her Athens pajamas. Penny was putting a watch on as she walked into the living room.

"Wanna watch television with me? My mom gave me the week off and I have nothing else to do." Penny asked sitting next to me.

"The television isn't just for show?" I asked back looking at Penny.

Penny nodded, missing my sarcasm, and grabbed a remote. She opened Netflix on her TV and started up season one, episode one of Criminal Minds. Penny told me she liked this show when I first met her, it was fun for her to watch and try to figure out why the person committed the crime or how they were gonna catch them. I watched the show with her and eventually caught her mumbling.

I listened to Penny carefully and realized she was repeating the lines of the show plus adding stage directions. Penny was talking to fast to make any sense of it, but I could tell it was definitely lines for the show. Especially since she would say the name of the character before saying the line. It wasn't long before I diverted my attention to Penny and was listening to her say line by line and stage direction by stage direction. That was until an alert went off on the tablet next to her. Penny picked it up and laughed to herself.

"What is it?" I asked.

"Massive storm in San Francisco tears up buildings and brings traffic to a standstill for three days. Spike in electrical fires also reported." Penny answered.

"Iris really did her best to help us make San Francisco seem like a natural disaster. The world will never know what happened there." I said.

Penny set the tablet down and we went back to watching the show. I enjoyed the show, it was great. Demigods faced evil on a daily basis, and it was a nice change of pace against a different evil. I sat up as Penny leaned against me.

"How's your ankle?" Penny asked, she looked up at me.

"It's better Owl Eyes, thanks for asking." I said smiling.

"Wanna go take that shower now?" Penny continued.

"Maybe one more episode, Princess of Athens." I joked.

Penny turned away a bit and started the next episode. The more I thought about it, the more I realized that I couldn't wait to retire from being a demigod and an Oracle. I loved peaceful days where my life wasn't being threatened constantly. I pulled Penny closer as she began mumbling lines and stage directions. I listened to her as the show continued on, and I finally got to enjoy my day.