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She was not supposed to be here. But she was.

By Kalos' estimation, this was exactly the same as the chocolate powder that Chase had shared with her. The adults might not like them eating it straight out of the container, but that just meant they would do it while none of them were looking. And the best time to escape their watchful eyes was at night. Kalos' days and nights had almost completely reversed. At night, there were fewer people to see her and fewer people to watch how she did everything wrong. They cooed and they smiled and they were just so nice that she could hardly stand it sometimes. She liked the nice. She wanted to be nice. She didn't always feel nice inside. The contrast was just, sometimes, too much.

So she stayed up late. She found leftovers from the cold box. She explored the Mansion while no one was watching. On one of her late night excursions, she'd found the underground pool. It was water! A lot of water! She missed water. No one was there to stop her so she stepped in, clothes and all. The people here got angry with her for being naked. Landers were strange about the bodies they walked around in and even stranger about other people's bodies when it was really none of their business.

Kalos swam like a frog. She paddled around. She left her finger and toe covers at the side of the pool and then dove down and touched the smooth ground of the pool and tried to pull the slatted cover off the hole at the bottom. She was having a perfectly fun time until she heard a sound. A little scuffle of footsteps. Would she be in trouble? Would they make her go upstairs?

A boy walked in who seemed to be in the stage of his life where he had grown into being part man, but still had some boy left to him. How did she know? Because he started to take off his clothes until he was wearing little more than an Atlantean might. His body showed the care this demigod had taken of himself.

Kalos let her face dip down in the water until only her eyes and the top of her head showed above it. She watched him like a crocodile might, ready to snap if she showed himself to be more man than boy. Boys were okay. Men were very not. She smiled to herself beneath the surface once he began to stammer through what he was trying to say. Boy then. He was still safe to talk to.

So, what was she doing here?

"I am having a swim." She had to kick herself up a bit in order for her mouth to be out of the water. Once her shoulders were out of the water it was clear that she had gone swimming in a tshirt and not proper swimwear. She motioned with an arm that ended in blue tentacles to the ground near where he was standing. A whitish pile of 40 or so hardened bits of coral. "Do not step on my fingers. They take time to grow."

If any of this was odd, she did not act as if that were so.

At least hero Gawain got himself a sandwich as well. If he had only made a sandwich for Kalos and then asked her to sit at the table WITH him, she might have died of embarrassment. As it was, she was already flushing purple for her outburst about the milk.

"No. NO! Please sit. I can find a way to clean this and I will not waste what you provided."

If she scraped her fingers against the table, she could recover a few drops of this milk from a cow into her cup. From there she stood on her chair in order to use the rag of her clothing to wipe the little bit that was left. Kalos raised her glass and tried to show hero Gawain that she could drink this strange milk so she sat down in her chair and chugged until she had drunk every last drop.

See? No problem.

"Sweet is not bad. It's just... different. Everything is different. Your bread is squishy. Your meat is thin. Your ground is covered in threads. You have so much... air." After so much milk from a cow, Kalos wasn't the most hungry, but she did her best to not give offense. She was hoping to hide more sandwich away for later. They were generous with the food, but it would be foolish not to keep some just in case.

Hero Gawain did not promise her cake, Kalos noticed. She did not expect to receive cake, but they had asked for her favorite and that was it. Cake. Fluffy and sweet and with berries on top. She could almost remember how it tasted, or maybe she was making it up. Either way, cake had to be the best. It just had to be.

It was not a long walk from the healer's domain to a palatial kitchen. Kalos was somewhat familiar with kitchens. Many scraps came directly from them and they sometimes had to fetch the scraps which was good, really. Gorgon took better care of the little food they received when it came directly to one of them. The demigods had a tendency to dump it all out into the recycling heap, as if the gorgon would let food that wasn't yet touched by rot go to waste.

"More sandwich?" Fresh? Just for her? "Yes. More sandwich is alright. Thank you."

Kalos knew better than to touch anything. She found a little spot to stand what was out of the way, beside a large box that radiated coldness when the front doors were open and the many, many cabinets.

"Yes. I drink milk. Thank you, Hero Gawain. You should not have to wait on me." Where were the servants? How dare they let him do this for her?

She watched his every move and was amazed by the things she saw. Some things he opened had lights that turned on. There was more of that almost invisible film on the bread. That must be why it was so very soft. It was not long before Kalos had a fresh sandwich and a glass of the whitest milk. Just for her. She took a sip of the milk and immediately spat it back out. "I think your goats are sick! It's... sweet!"

He said he was responsible for her! A flush of satisfaction ran from her crown to her toes. Kalos would get to stay with Gawain. But... What was a tummy? She looked between Dogproff and Gawain, but neither was tripped up by the word. Was that short for something? Kalos' hero yawned. He must have been tired after being almost dead. She would have to tuck him in.

"I had a soft bread sandwich on thexjet. I-is that acceptable?"

Dogproff smiled at her by way of reply. It seemed that her sandwich would not kill her. That was good because she still had some tucked away on her person just in case there were no more sandwiches.

> "Do you eat like... normal food?"

"I prefer food, yes, but I can eat scraps too if that is all that is left." The demigods would all eat first, she was sure. "Fish is acceptable."

"Oh no. No no no. He's asking what foods you enjoy."

"I like to eat." She agreed. "I enjoy eating." Dogproff seemed upset, somehow. Was she answering wrongly?

"A preference? Is there one food you like better than others?"

At that, Kalos had to stop and think. The squishy bread had been like something from a memory. A celebration food. "Cake."

They had a healer? Those were most coveted by the mad king. Kalos had never seen one before. She had also never seen old before. Not that old, anyway. She stared for longer than was polite before she remembered her manners and abased herself with a bow down low with her face pressed onto the squishy ground. Oh. Huh. This close to it she was able to see that it was many strands of cloth, almost like moss grew, but a sort-of wine color. It certainly felt nicer than the muck she was used to bowing down atop of.

"This Kalos is not dying, most esteemed sir healer Dogproff." She reported with her knees and eyes on the ground. "Please attend my hero so he does not friggin die, as you say. I promise I will keep. He may not and I have no coins to close his eyes so that he can pay the ferryman."

There had been many, old (but not Dogproff old!) and young alike, that she closed their eyes with pretty shells or pieces of her coral. She liked to think that the ferryman took them across because those things had been valuable to her.

DocProf seemed amused. That was better than angry. "Get up, child. Let's bring both your hero and yourself in for a look, shall we?"

A bit of sandwich had fallen out of the folds of her makeshift covering. Kalos snatched the morsel back up and stood as the healer commanded. The last thing she wanted was for him to decide not to heal Gawain.

"Can I-?" the word help died on her lips as she saw the interior of the medical room. Everything was white and so smooth. White was uncommon enough. So was paper that was so thin like the paper she saw stretched over padded benches. Maybe Gawain would not die. Kalos was ready to bear witness to Dogproff's wonders.

The heroes all had different words to say to one another about the gorgon child, many of the words, Kalos did not understand. She decided they were made up or a part of a new language that everyone spoke now. Something about legal, so a legal language. No one bothered to ask Kalos much beyond the initial 'do you want to go back?'. They were adults. And demigods. Of course it wouldn't occur to them that she might have more to contribute to this conversation she only half understood.

She did, at least, get to assert that her parents were dead.

They hadn't had time to verify that Kalos' parents had moved on to the afterlife, but she insisted vehemently that she had seen it. If they weren't dead, it was something worse for them. So for their sake, she wished them a happier life beyond the veil.

After that it was a matter of trying to remain small and out of the way. These demigods were all upgraded to heroes or maybe even titans in her mind since they had worked together to bring down a god. She didn't want them to be gods. They were clearly better than the fallen god king.

On the trip away from Atlantis, Kalos scraped her palms across her face in order to get rid of the tear tracks. She would sob and cry and hit all day if she could, but these last moments of Gawain's life should be filled with something better. It was just so tragic that her hero would die too. He had tried to reassure her, but Kalos had seen too many gorgon die of similar wounds. The other heroes seemed rattled, but no one else seemed as worried as she was. Maybe they were distancing themselves so that it would hurt less when he passed.

And somehow it was Gawain who freed her from thexjet's clutches. They should teach their bird better manners. And these rest of the heroes were too... upset? She was glad that Gawain had remembered her despite her attempts to remain small and out of the way. It was why he would forever he her hero.

> "Are you doing okay, kid?"

She had followed Gawain out of necessity. No one else had remembered or stuck up for her. Gawain was her best, most safest option in this new place. If she could at least accompany him to his funeral pyre, then maybe she would bother to learn these people's ways. Until then, she would watch him to be sure his body was properly cared for so that he could move on to the afterlife.

"When you die... would you have a try to find my mother?"

She squished the ground beneath her feet. It was clean. But squishy. She would have to investigate after Gawain had moved on.

"First is "geneticelly engeeneered" now is "genetics"?" Kalos raised a single coral encrusted eyebrow at this Iggy. This handsome man might actually be a liar after all!

"Look at this missmatch I find in Iggy's own made up words." The coral girl folded her legs beneath her with care not to snag the upholstery on the outcroppings of coral growth on her legs. She managed to look as regal as her crown portrayed her.

"What have you to say, chico Iggy? Are you tricking me?"