Atlas was alone.

Atlas was alone.

Rivulets of sweat rolled down his skin, dripping onto the ground. His veins pulsated at the surface of his arms, like rivers ready to burst from their banks. The Titan was tired – this punishment was crueler than death.

Yet had he strained this long for naught? Had he held up the skies, only for the earth to collapse beneath him?

Atlas was no fool. Nor did he have a wanton thirst for destruction. Aeons of staring out onto the world from his prison had made him fall in love with it. He had watched empires rise and fall, mountains crumble, and buildings made. He had watched the experiment of mankind, a folly of his captors, and marveled at its ingenuity.

This is why we were pinned under skies and chained in hells, he’d thought to himself once.

It had started of as a burden. A…