KAI

Timmy, Alexander, and I got off the couches and exited the cave from the back, which was similarly draped in leaves from the outside.

We entered the forest behind Epimetheus' den. I was not at all surprised to find that it looked the exact same as the rest of the island, with big trees, scattered logs, and wood across the floor, and zero wildlife, at least from what I was seeing.

"So, where exactly are we going to find a set of bananas here?" I asked.

"You mean ripe bananas?" Alexander said.

Timmy snorted. "Yeah, we're not going to find ripe bananas, at least on this island. I don't even think Epimetheus knows what a ripe banana is."

"Or deodorant for that matter," I muttered.

The three of us chuckled as we scoured the trees for bananas. I don't know how long we were searching for bananas exactly, but I can confidently say it was long enough for us to become extremely tired and a fair bit crazy.

"No way have we been searching for bananas for five hours," Timmy groaned.

"As the old saying goes, time really flies when you're not having fun," Alexander said.

I narrowed my eyes. "I'm pretty sure it's the other way around."

"Well, disagree to agree," he replied.

"You've also got that backwards - nevermind," Timmy said.

After another minute of searching the trees for bananas, I heard a sound behind me, one that sounded rather suspiciously like one of movement.

"Did you guys hear that?" I asked.

Timmy nodded. "Yeah. Let's check it out."

We heard the noise once again, this time the sound coming from the trees. We waited patiently for another noise, and this time saw whatever was making the sound.

It was a brown-furred monkey, carrying a banana in its hand.

"Woah! You think we could adopt that thing?!" Alexander asked hopefully.

"Yeah, whatever," I said. "Right after we beat it down for its banana. I'll pursue it in the air, you two flank from below."

Using my fire, I boosted myself up into a sustained flight and followed after the monkey. My flying style was akin to that of Iron Man, though without the cool technology.

I followed the monkey through many stretches of the forest, the animal continually going tree to tree using vines. The speed I was going at, I couldn't make out where Timmy and Alexander were - meaning I well and truly might be on my own and had to be careful.

I eventually got within closing distance of the monkey and stretched out my right hand to grab it, my left hand still propelling me upwards. The monkey took a look back, seeing me behind it, and jumped to the side.

Unable to control my momentum and my left hand failing to keep me upwards, I smacked into the branch and fell down, bumping my back on multiple branches and getting leaves all over my body.

When I landed on the ground, I was met with a large group of brown-furred monkeys, a stash of bananas just piled on top. Upon my landing, the monkeys jumped back in fear.

I realized they were looking at my sword, which had landed a few feet ahead of me when I fell. I tried reaching for it, wanting to use it to scare off the monkeys, but a duo of the creatures took it within their paws and hauled it off to the side.

Then one of the monkeys, wearing a green leaf on its head as if it had just graduated high school, walked towards me and started speaking monkey, or whatever language they speak. Was it speaking in Banana or Red-Butt? I had no clue the difference between them, just that there was one, according to Alexander.

It went back to its other friends, and within time, the whole group was around me. The high-school graduate monkey growled something, and all the monkeys attacked me at once. I closed my eyes as multiple parts of my body were scratched maliciously.

Then someone called, "Hey, Banana Lovers!"

I reopened my eyes as I saw Timmy and Alexander standing behind the monkeys, the majority of the stash in their hands.

"Go fetch!" Alexander yelled.

Timmy and Alexander began throwing their bananas into the forest, the monkeys scampering to get them back.

"Why did you do that?" I asked. "We need those!"

"I know," Timmy said, grinning. He pulled out a set of fresh-looking bananas from his backpack.

"I took it while they were attacking you," Timmy explained.

"Dang, you Hermes kids really like stealing stuff, don't you?" I asked.

Timmy shrugged. "Yeah, it's kind of a habit."

Alexander gasped. "Oh my gods, did you get trampled by a cat or something? You have cuts everywhere!"

I looked down at my body to assess the damage. I had a huge cut on my leg, and then a variety of little scratches all over my body. Blood dripped off my body from every seeable crevice and the amount of pain I endured as I got to my feet was frankly awful.

"That's bad," I muttered.

Timmy pulled a potion out of his pocket and handed it to me. "Here, drink this. It'll help heal the cuts."

"Are you absolutely sure that's not one of your poison potions?" I asked.

Timmy nodded. "Yes, Kai. I think I would know my own potions."

As I took it from his hands, he reached for it and snatched it. "Oh, wait. That is a poison potion."

I scoffed. "Wow, you were really about to kill me, huh?"

"Wait, no it's not," Timmy said, handing it back to me.

I furrowed my brows as I snatched the potion and drank it down. With that, the three of us headed back to Epimetheus' den. Thankfully, the potion Timmy handed me seemed to be the correct one, as my legs didn't bother me the whole walk back to the den and my cuts were mostly closed up.

We pushed aside the leaves and entered. Epimetheus was curled up on his bed, snoring loudly. Kivan was next to him, also taking a nap.

Upon entering, Epimetheus jumped up from his bed and started sniffing around. "Ooh, what is that smell?"

"You're telling me you just noticed how bad you smell?" Alexander asked.

"No, not that, silly," Epimetheus said. He went over to Timmy and snatched his backpack. He then dug through it and found the set of bananas we had gotten.

He popped one in his mouth, making no effort to take off the peel. "Ah, so good. You have completed your first task. Where were they?"

"With some monkey civilization in your forest," I answered.

"Monkey civilization?" Epimetheus asked.

We went ahead and explained the story to him.

"Oh, very crafty, Timmy," Epimetheus said. "Those monkeys seem to have learned the ways of Passalos and Akmon."

"The two really funny monkeys that Hercules let go?" I asked. "And the really infamous thief monkeys?"

Epimetheus nodded. "The exact same. Gah! I'm wasting your time. Your second task: give me a pedicure. One equivalent to that of a resort."

"How do you expect us to do that?" Timmy asked.

Epimetheus shrugged. "Figure it out. Can't be solving all your problems for you."

Epimetheus hopped on the couch, threw off his sandals, and wiggled his toes around. "It's time for my pedicure!"

"Gods," Timmy muttered. "Okay, let's, uh, get some water and put it beneath his feet."

Alexander walked over to Epimetheus' sink and tried turning the knob, but the knob fell off and zero water came out.

"Uh, go and get some water from the beach," I said.

Alexander nodded and made his way out of the den, breaking into a sprint from what it looked like.

I racked my brain for activities related to pedicures, massages, and the like. The first thing that came to my mind was an air blower or other object that created air, and went to the entrance. From there, I ripped a leaf off, went back to the couch, and began to flap it up and down to air Epimetheus's face.

"Ah, much better!" Epimetheus said woozily.

Alexander then reentered the den with a bowl of water in his hands, sweating like crazy. He set the bowl beneath Epimetheus' feet, and the Titan dipped his feet into the bowl.

"Gah! It's too cold! Get me some hot water!" Epimetheus said.

Alexander raised his eyebrow. "Where am I supposed to get hot water from?"

"Figure it out!" Epimetheus shouted.

I offered Alexander the leaf. "I have an idea. Go ahead and fan his face for me."

He nodded and we exchanged roles, Alexander fanning Epimetheus' face while I placed my hand beneath the water bowl and conjured a light fire to heat it up.

"That's the stuff right there," Epimetheus said. "Eh Timmy! Use that oil to massage between my toes!"

"Uh, what?" Timmy asked.

"Well, don't just stand there! It's in the kitchen!"

Timmy walked over to Epimetheus', grabbed some can of oil after a few seconds of searching, and walked back. He dabbed his finger into the can, oil getting on his index finger. He then started rubbing his finger between Epimetheus' toes, which I could barely muster the effort to look at.

"Ah," Epimetheus said woozily. "This is one heck of a massage."

After about thirty seconds of this, I went ahead and asked, "So are we done now?"

Epimetheus shrugged. "Sure. I feel better already."

Alexander, Timmy and I all dropped our stuff and sighed in relief. Timmy rushed to go wash his hands while Alexander and I put the leaf and bowl aside and took a seat.

"So, what's this last challenge that we need to do?" I asked.

"And why did you wait to tell us?" Alexander asked.

"Oh, just to add suspense," Epimetheus answered. "The last thing I need you guys to do is venture up to the cave nearby my den and figure out what's been making those weird sounds at night."

"Weird sounds?" Timmy asked, returning back to the couch.

Epimetheus nodded. "Whenever I try to sleep, I get this weird feeling that I'm being watched and keep hearing this drone sound. I tried investigating once, but I found nothing."

"Horror film 101: don't go to weird caves and investigate strange sounds. There's a 99% chance that you're going to get murdered," Alexander said.

"So, now you want us to go find what it is?" I asked.

"Yeah," Epimetheus answered.

"Well then, I guess we have a cave to investigate," I said. "Let's head out, guys."

We exited the den once again, this time setting our sights for that weird cave he was talking about. I didn't know what exactly was in there, but if it scared the heck out of a Titan, I didn't like the general sounds of it. We did have to keep in mind that Epimetheus isn't exactly in the best state of mind and this very well could require the simplest of solutions, but I strangely doubted that.

We had seen the cave earlier when we were searching for the bananas, but opted not to go there because it looked shady as hell. It still did, especially because it was night and my natural paranoia kicked in.

Within a minute or so of walking through the forest, the three of us made it to the cave. From the outside, the cave was somewhat large with a high domed roof and wide in width. It was quite dark inside the cave as I couldn't make out a single detail of what was inside. The entrance was covered in vines and the cave was surrounded by bushes.

"This seems like a place where you would hide the body of your murder victim," Alexander observed.

"Agreed," I said.

"Let's make this quick," Timmy said. "We already spent five hours looking for bananas."

The three of us cut past the vines of the cave and entered inside. I summoned fire to my free hand, illuminating the cave.

The inside of the cave was mostly barren and empty, about as wide as a playground. There were a few puddles spread out across the cave and some rock collecting on the ground, but other than that, there wasn't really much inside.

"Y'know, I would've much preferred it if the cave was filled with a bunch of deadly war weapons," I said. "At least I wouldn't feel so creeped out."

"Welcome," a voice boomed.

"Ah!" All three of us screamed. We jumped backwards and surveyed our surroundings. The person who had just spoken was nowhere to be seen.

"Who are you and what do you want?" I demanded, trying to put on as confident a voice I could. I don't know what it was, but my fear levels were crazy high. My teeth were chattering, my heart rate was increasing quickly, and my voice was shaky.

"Ah, so you don't know who I am?" the voice asked. "Well, when you look back on your life, you'll see that as your biggest regret."

"That or watching The Last Airbender," Alexander muttered.

"Alexander, not right now!" Timmy scolded.

A sudden blast emerged and hit the roof, rocks raining down to the ground. The three of us rolled to the side to evade the attack, but we weren't the targets.

The exit was now completely blocked by rocks. We were trapped.

"What are you doing here on this island?" I asked.

"It's simple; serving my father and killing you three," the voice said.

Serving my father?

That's when it hit me.

"You're Dolos, aren't you? The son of Erebos and Nyx and the spirit of deception and guile," I guessed. "Servant of Prometheus?"

The voice laughed. "You are much smarter than I made you out to be, Kai Birchwood."

I remembered reading about him when I was doing research with Amethyst about Erebos a month ago. When Prometheus was trying to help mankind - after Epimetheus basically screwed them over - he had to leave his workshop due to some complications and left Dolos in charge of it. I didn't recall the rest of his tale, but ever since he was put in charge of the workshop, he had been loyal to Prometheus and the Titans. It was no surprise that he was now working for Erebos and against us.

A spider dropped from the ceiling, landing right in front of me. Then, in the same boomy, hollow voice of Dolos, it said, "Kai Birchwood, who do you care for most?"

Before I could answer, the spider morphed into Amethyst. I had been midway through my strike before stopping at the sight of Amethyst.

I knew it wasn't her, but something stopped me from continuing my attack.

Timmy was thankfully less taken aback and quickly jumped in to save me by throwing a potion at Dolos/Amethyst and hitting them to the ground. Dolos then became covered in goo.

Dolos morphed once again, becoming a rat and slipping out of the goo. Then he changed into Alexander.

"Woah, that's me!" Alexander shouted. "Hey, why didn't anyone tell me I had gum in my hair?"

Dolos dashed at Timmy and smacked him to the side with a quick attack. Timmy crashed into the rock wall of the cave.

I snapped into action, trying not to be distracted by the fact I was attacking a person who looked exactly like my friend. I lunged at Dolos with my sword, but he suddenly dissipated in the shadows. Then he popped up behind Alexander and kicked him, now in the form of Geneva.

"Stop your games, Dolos!" I yelled.

I ignited Scorcher and ran at an unprepared Dolos, getting a good strike across his chest and then hitting him backwards with a fire blast, his back colliding with the wall of the cave. He then slumped over on his arm.

I walked over to him with my sword toward his neck. As I was about to stab him with my sword, he morphed into Rose. My eyes widened as my sword plunged into the side of Dolos, black oil dripping off his skin like blood.

Dolos/Rose gasped in pain. "Kai, how could you do this to me?"

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to!" I yelled, dropping my sword down on the floor.

I had just hurt my friend. How was I ever going to fix that?

Dolos/Rose got up from the ground and kicked me in the chest. Dolos then turned toward Alexander and hit him in the chest with a dark energy ball.

Just as Dolos was about to hit me and Alexander again, Timmy rose from the wall and repelled Dolos back with a Greek fire potion.

"Stop already!" Timmy yelled. "Stop playing this game! You may be able to get them in your illusions, but you can't get me."

Dolos laughed. "You absolutely sure, Timmy Dale?"

Dolos shapeshifted into a lean, tall woman with elbow length chestnut hair and warm amber eyes. He was now wearing a red sweater with jeans and white sneakers that complimented the overall look.

"Mom?" Timmy muttered, stood in place like a scarecrow and absolutely shell-shocked at what he was seeing.

Dolos thrusted his hand forward as a dark energy ball hit Timmy into the roof. Timmy tried getting up, only to buckle to his knees at the sight of Dolos.

"What did you do to him?" Alexander asked.

"Just a little bit of eye-opening," Dolos said, a smirk emerging from his face in the form of Timmy's mom.

Dolos morphed once again, this time into someone none of us knew. He had grey hair, deep black eyes, olive skin, and wore black robes with a hood over his head. This new form of his aligns most closely with how he's been described in typical mythology, leading me to believe this is his true form.

Dolos shot another blast of darkness at me, but I countered with a light blast of my own. The two attacks clashed against one another, but his was far more powerful as it overcame my blast and hit me in the chest.

Alexander deflected two of Dolos' blasts before clanging him in the chest with his shields. Then he changed his weapon into a long javelin and stabbed Dolos in the gut, more black oil dripping onto the floor.

Dolos roared in pain, and a wave of black energy sent Alexander flying back. I lunged forward to make another attempt on Dolos, but was merely flicked aside by another wave of black energy.

I didn't know how we were going to win this. The cave had completely collapsed behind us, Alexander was knocked into a wall, and Timmy was motionless and paralyzed. I also wasn't in amazing shape, as one of my scratch wounds from the monkeys had just started bleeding from when I collided with the ground.

I got up once again and mustered as much power as I could into a singular blast. Just as I shot it, Dolos disappeared into the shadow of the ceiling. Then he came up behind me and hit me with a shadowy arm.

So he could also shadow travel. What couldn't this guy do? He even had better impressions than me, and let me tell you, my Gordon Ramsay is perfect.

I resisted the urge to start laughing about this as I took in the severity of the situation and racked my brain for some kind of strategy. I was essentially all on my own, with both Alexander and Timmy being incapacitated, and Dolos seemed to only be stronger in the cave. The wound he had gotten earlier when I had stabbed him had magically healed itself over the course of the fight, meaning he also had some kind of regenerative ability that only amplified the difficulty of the task.

The best I could do was hold him off, maybe until Epimetheus decided to get off his butt or my friends came in and saved the day.

I shot a few quick fire projectiles at Dolos, but he melted into the shadows of the cave wall and dodged all my attacks. Then he came out from atop of me, and I was narrowly able to dodge as he slammed into the floor with immense force. I picked up Scorcher from the ground and slashed through a few of his blasts, but then he snapped and a group of shadows came from the walls of the cave and hit me.

I got up again, determined to keep fighting. But just as I stood once more, I collapsed once again, my eyes seemingly playing tricks on me. The world around me turned into a blindingly confusing montage. What seemed like thousands of colors began flashing in my eyes and I was twisting and turning every second. There was disturbing music all around me and in the background, I could hear maniacal laughter that sounded like Dolos'.

What. Was. Happening?

When my vision cleared up, Dolos was standing over my body, shouting some incomprehensible crap about serving his father. Then he raised his hands up, and darkness and shadows began forming together into one large energy ball.

Before he could fire, Dolos was hit to the side by a gust of wind. The rocks that had been blocking the cave were blasted to the side, as a familiar stench returned.

"Epimetheus," Dolos groaned, clutching his side. "So you finally decided to show up, huh? Took you long enough."

"Dolos, what business do you have here?" Epimetheus ventured.

"What do you think, O' wise one?" Dolos asked mockingly.

"You're on a quest for my brother, right? You're here to punish me for my betrayal of the Titans and lack of service to Erebos?" Epimetheus guessed.

"A competent answer," Dolos said. "Surprisingly so."

"Begone, Dolos," Epimetheus said.

Epimetheus flicked his hand, and Dolos flew out the entrance of the cave and off the island.

"Man, those Titans are really riding you hard for not joining them all those years ago, huh?" I asked.

Epimetheus nodded. "Considering how angry they can get, I'm not surprised. At least you guys are okay. You have passed your test."

"Yay!" Alexander shouted, pushing himself out under a pile of rubble. "Man, that must be the first test I've passed in a while."

Alexander seemed okay, but Timmy was still muttering incoherently and looking at the earth of the cave like a man on a mission. He looked like he had seen a ghost. Pun not-intended.

I walked over to Timmy and tried waving my hand in front of his face. He didn't budge. Alexander tried yelling very loudly in his ears, but that didn't work either. As a Hail Mary, we slapped Timmy across the face, and he suddenly woke up from his little trance.

"Hey, buddy, are you good?" I asked.

Timmy rubbed his eyes, which I now realized were red. "Uh, I don't really know."

"What did you see?" Alexander asked gently.

"It was the day… the day that my mother died," Timmy said, seemingly not even realizing he had said it.

"I had come back from school, scars all over my face," Timmy explained, in soulless, disjointed words. "Got pretty banged up from a fight with some of my classmates."

"When I came home, my mom cleaned up the scars and we put on a movie," he went on, taking a big gulp between sentences. "I told her what happened at school and to make me feel better, she ordered us a pizza while we watched a movie. Things were good."

His face then fell, his eyes beginning to water.

"After we ate, we heard strange growling from outside. My mom immediately knew what was going on, and yelled at me to leave the house. And like the dumb and naïve kid I was, I-I ran away, only turning back when I smelt the smoke."

"The hellhound that had invaded the house… killed her."

Tears then steamed down his face uncontrollably as his weeps emanated throughout the now empty cavern.

"Oh, I'm so sorry, Timmy," I said with solemnity, patting him on the back. "That's awful."

"Yeah, I'm really sorry man," Alexander said. "Your mother seemed like a real nice lady."

Timmy nodded, wiping the tears off his face with his shirt sleeve. "She always tried to make me happy. I never got to see her early in the morning, as she had multiple shifts at different jobs, but when I came home from school and saw her... those were the best times of the day."

The sad reality is that many demigods experience similar tragedies early on in life. A majority of the campers at Camp Half-Blood came because of these terrible incidents, and most if not all of them have become better off than they were before. Take Rose, who lost her father and was homeless for ten years with a now dead half-sister who didn't seem to care for her. Now she's a quest leader and has friends that care for her.

Once this quest is done, I hope Timmy can undergo something similar at camp.

After we were finished embracing Timmy, I turned to Epimetheus and said, "So, since we passed the test, have we gained your wisdom?"

"Indeed you have," Epimetheus said. "The next place you need to go on your journey is Paris. A certain beauty goddess should be able to give you some helpful information there."

"France? What about Athens? Isn't that our final goal?" Alexander asked.

Epimetheus shook his head. "Athens, while it may be your final location, is not your next goal. If you go now, you will not only be faced with the Ourae that serve Erebos, but also the entirety of that GHOSTs faction you've been fighting with. They are expecting your arrival there, so going there would be unwise, at least at this time."

"Then when is the right time to go?" Timmy inquired.

"All I can say is that a certain signal, a certain event must occur, and when that happens, that's when you go," Epimetheus said, glancing at Timmy.

"On that day, with that signal, Erebos' defense should be at its weakest, and that will be the moment to strike," he continued. "Think supply raids. That's all I can give you, I'm afraid."

"Thanks for the info," I said. "Seriously. We probably wouldn't know where to go next without you. But we should probably go and head out. We have a pretty long trek to get back to the ship."

"Oh, let me help with that," Epimetheus said, walking away from us a few inches.

Then he flicked his hand forward with immense strength, and Timmy, Alexander and I were all thrown forward, landing in the water in front of our ship. From there, we just waded through the water and walked onto the ship.

Amethyst and Rose were on the top deck, cleaning the rails when they saw us walk aboard.

"Hey, so did you guys get your information?" Rose asked.

Timmy nodded. "We did. Our next destination is France. We need to talk to Aphrodite."

"Woah, Kai, why's he not wearing handcuffs?" Amethyst asked, reaching for her bow.

I waved my hands. "No, don't shoot! Look, over the course of the seven hours we spent on that dreaded island, Timmy really proved himself. He helped us many times, and he even refused the GHOSTs when they tried to convince him to join them. He's good now."

"Look, I know you may not trust me fully, but I wanna try and gain your trust," Timmy said. "I wanna take down Erebos with you guys, whatever I have to do to get there."

Rose looked over at Amethyst. "I think we should try trusting Timmy, just give him a chance."

Amethyst paused for a moment. She slowly lowered her hands down from her quiver.

"Thanks, guys," Timmy said. "Does this mean I don't have to sleep in a cell anymore?"

"Hey, don't push it," Amethyst said. "You stay in the cell for one more night. If you prove to be truly good, you can sleep in the training ground."

"What about that sixth room that none of you guys are using?" Timmy asked.

"Uh, yeah we're not really sure we can do that," I said. "Geneva would get pretty mad, and that room looks like it hasn't been used or cleaned in ages."

Timmy shrugged. "Whatever. Just glad you guys aren't going to throw me off the ship."

Alexander and Timmy headed to the bottom deck, Rose, Amethyst, and I following behind them. It had been one long day, filled with rigorous banana searching, a big fight with the GHOSTS and Dolos, and a fight to not die to Epimetheus' stench, so we headed to sleep.

The agenda for tomorrow? Find a beauty goddess and force info out of them. This would either be really fun, or really suck.