August 18th, 2009
Manhattan, New York, USA
The Battle of Manhattan
It was all a silly problem, really. The entire world doomed because of a stupid chariot, but Clarisse's fatal flaw was hubris, and she always has to pay for it, that's the way of Nemesis.
It was painful just to sit back and watch as more of her friends got killed and she just sat there, but she would save her pride, if nothing else.
"Clarisse, I think you need to go. I mean, you're the daughter of Ares. God of war. And you're just sitting here doing absolutely nothing as a battle is ongoing," her boyfriend, Chris, advised her. "Silena is out there. She could get herself killed. Your best friend, who is a daughter of Aphrodite, mind you, if out there fighting for her life, possibly bleeding to death as we speak, and you are just sitting here. Doing nothing but letting your pride doom Olympus."
She sighed, knowing Chris was right. Clarisse LaRue, never sat still during a fight, but her big-headedness wouldn't let her. Still, she was worried about her friend. What Chris said about her really caught her attention.
"Do you think she's okay?" Clarisse asked, worry in the undertones of her voice.
"I don't know, Clarisse. Why don't you go check on her?" Chris suggested.
Her response was a roll of the eyes. The façade she kept up daily was instinct to her now. The tough, badass attitude was what was expected of her, and she didn't want to disappoint Dad. He scared the living shit out of her.
A knock cut through the pregnant silence. "Clarisse? You there?" Silena's muffled voice asked.
"Yeah."
She opened the door to pop her now brown hair framed face in. Her blue eyes caught Clarisse's brown ones. Clarisse could remember when she first saw Silena Beauregard. She'd been born blonde hair and blue eyes, but she was always changing their color, having ADHD and being a daughter of Aphrodite.
"Hey, Sil," Clarisse greeted.
Silena skipped her welcome and got straight to the point. "Fight with us. Please."
The charmspeak in her voice was so strong, Clarisse wanted so badly to join the fight, but she'd hung around Silena enough to be resistant to it. Thank Ares Silena sometimes accidentally used charmspeak in a conversation.
"We need reinforcements," Silena said. The influencing power of her words washed over Clarisse. "So many people are badly injured, or worse dead."
"Hey," Clarisse said, making light out of the situation. "at least they'll go to Elysium!"
Silena was not amused. She looked to Chris for help, but he knew by now it was hopeless. So, before she stormed out of the room, she hugged Clarisse tightly, and said, "Θα σας δούμε στην Elysium, φίλε μου. Μην ξεχνάτε ποτέ μου. Θα έχετε λαμπερό στιγμή σας μια μέρα, και μόνο λύπη μου είναι ότι δεν θα είναι σε θέση να το δείτε."
Clarisse was confused at what she meant, because in English it said, "See you in Elysium, my friend. Never forget me. You will have your shining moment one day, and my only regret is I will not be able to see it." What the Hades was that supposed to mean?
As she was walking away, Clarisse saw something silver glitter in the fading sunlight on Silena's wrist.
Clarisse ran towards the flying chariots, landing only once, near the impostor in her blood stained armor. She ran towards her, screaming words she didn't really mean. "NO! Curse you. Why!?"
Percy looked at her in confusion, and Annabeth and Clarisse's half-brothers and sisters tried to unfasten her helmet of of "Clarisse." A Lydian drakon snapped its jaws at Percy, but Clarisse was too grief-stricken to care about her now-friend.
"WHY!?" she demanded of the fraud, straddling the badly scorched body.
Clarisse heard Chris warn Percy about the drakon with a "Look out!" and she snapped back to reality when it roared in his direction.
Clarisse glared at the creature with absolute hate. He burned her. He snarled at her boyfriend. This. Is. WAR.
"YOU WANT DEATH!?" Clarisse screamed at it, anger and pure hate fueling her rage. "WELL, COME ON!"
She grabbed her electric spear from the fallen soldier and ran towards the drakon. Out of the corner of her eye, Clarisse saw Percy try to help her, but this drakon just got too personal.
The drakon tried to spew its deadly poison in her direction, but she jumped aside roughly, causing craters in the ground under her feet. Clarisse hurdled on its head and used all her strength to pulverize its last good eye, using all of the magic spear's power.
It electrocuted the drakon, its whole body shuddered. Clarisse tumbled to the ground like a professional gymnast. Behind her, the Lydian drakon collapsed. Dead.
Clarisse could feel dozens of sets of eyes on her, but she could care less. She could brag to Prissy later. It wasn't the time. She ran back to the wounded hero. Annabeth had finally managed to remove the helmet off the girl.
The girl was beautiful, though her face was marred with burns from the drakon's poison. No godly amount could save her. And she was Silena Beauregard.
Silena was dying. Clarisse knew it and she knew it. Clarisse cradled her head. It was the gentlest she'd ever been with her.
Silena tried to explain her story to Clarisse. "Your cabin…Wouldn't listen…Only follow you."
Clarisse's eyes were filled with disbelief. "So you stole my armor. You waited until Chris and I went on patrol and stole my armor. AND NONE OF YOU NOTICED?"
None of Clarisse's siblings answered her, they developed a sudden interest in combat boots.
Silena spoke in their defense. "Don't blame them. They wanted to….to believe I was you."
Tears fell freely down Clarisse's face. "You stupid, stupid Aphrodite girl. You charged a drakon. Why?"
A single tear marred Silena's beautiful features. "Because it was all my fault. The drakon attack. Charlie's death. The camp being endangered… It was all my–"
"Stop," Clarisse ordered. "That's not true Lena, you know that's not true."
In response, Silena only opened her hand, and in her palm lay a silver bracelet with Kronos's mark. A scythe charm.
"You were the spy," Percy said. Even though there was no accusation in his voice, Clarisse still wanted to punch him in the face. Saying it always makes it true.
Silena tried her best to nod. "Be-before I liked Charlie, Luke, Luke was always so nice to me. So charming and handsome. I wanted to stop helping him, but he threatened to expose and humiliate me. He promised me. He promised I was going to save lots of lives. Fewer people dead, fewer people hurt. He- he promised he wouldn't hurt Charlie. He lied." Malice laced her voice.
Clarisse turned to face her siblings. She scowled. "Go. Go and help the centaurs. Protect the doors." They looked a little hesitant. "GO!"
Silena took a painful breath. It was heavy. "Forgive me. Don't leave me here alone."
Clarisse shook her head. "You're not dying," she insisted. "I'll never let you go."
Silena's eyes looked everywhere and nowhere at once. "Charlie…See Charlie…"
Those were her last words. Silena Beauregard was dead.
Clarisse pulled her limp body closer and sobbed. Chris put a supportive hand on her shoulder. Annabeth closed Silena's eyes.
"We have to fight. She gave her life to help us. If we don't do anything we dishonor her and her name," Annabeth said. Her voice was brittle.
Clarisse wiped her nose with her arm. "She was a hero, understand? A hero." She looked at Annabeth and Percy with a glare that dared them to say otherwise.
They didn't.
"Come on, Clarisse," Percy said.
Clarisse picked up her sword from a dead Ares camper. "Kronos will pay."
Clarisse took her anger out on every single idiotic monster that dared to cross her path. She noticed the red aura she emanated, and smiled bittersweetly. Nemesis really hated her, didn't she? After all, she'd finally gotten her father' blessing, but at what cost? The death of her best friend? The only person that truly understood her in and out? Besides Chris, Silena was the only person Clarisse could be herself with. Annabeth was fine, but she was always with Percy or Grover or somebody else.
Clarisse paced back and forth, taunting monsters left and right. "I AM CLARISSE, DRAKON SLAYER! I will kill you ALL! Where is Kronos? Where is that bastard? Bring him out! Is he a coward?"
She heard Percy try to call her back. "Clarisse! Stop it. Know when to retreat."
Clarisse ignored him. "What's the matter, big, bad Titan lord? Scared of a seventeen-year old girl? BRING. IT. ON!"
Slowly, the enemy retreated, too scared to take her on.
Three years after the Titan War ended and Gaea was defeated, a fragile peace covered the camps. Clarisse walked across the camp in a camouflage tank, ripped skinny jeans, and combat boots to the camp store. The bell that signaled someone entered the building rang when she opened the door. Clarisse bought a bouquet of roses, a Hershey's chocolate bar, and a gold heart barrette. She walked to a building that wasn't really a building that faced the beach. It was a temple of sorts, but it was also a grave. Names were carved into the stone that stated where people were buried. Luke Castellan. Ethan Nakamura. Will Solace. Charles Beckendorf.
Finally, Clarisse stopped at a certain name. She knelt and weeped. Clarisse arranged the bouquet, chocolate bar, barrette, and a feather from her favorite pegasus neatly, the way she would have wanted.
Clarisse gingerly touched the name ingrained in the stone. "Happy birthday, Lena," she whispered.
Silena Beauregard.
August 18th, 2009
Mount Tamalpais, San Francisco, California, USA, (Current Site of Mt. Othrys)
The Battle of Mount Othrys
"Charge!" Reyna shouted as the Roman demigod soldiers slashed at Scythian Dracanae left and right, quickly eliminating most of Krios and Kronos's forces.
Adeleide Cartwright could have cared less about whether Krios was defeated (Actually, she could. If Krios wasn't defeated, the whole world would be destroyed. Addie Cartwright did not want to die at seventeen.), she just wanted to see her sister, Jasmine, alive and unscathed and healthy.
She sliced a really perky dracanae to dust, trying to get a better view of the battlefield. Adeleide saw the newbie, Jason Grace, son of Jupiter, battling Krios himself. He wasn't losing, either. Addie wasn't a horrible swords-woman, though it sucked that he was better than her.
"Addie!" an eerily familiar voice called. A voice in distress. "Addie, help!"
Jasmine.
Adeleide swung her sword at every creature that got in the way of her getting to her little sister. Her last piece of home, even if they were only half-sisters.
"ADDIE!"
The little 12-year-old was battling 5 dracanae at once, and wasn't doing too bad of a job, either. Still, Jasmine couldn't do it by herself. Adeleide rushed to her aid, and the monsters crumbled to the yellow, powdery essence of monsters. She turned around to look at Jasmine. There was a scarlet flower in her midsection from a sword penetrating her body. It apparently went all the way through. No daughter of Apollo could survive that, no matter how fast their body healed.
"JAZ!" Adeleide screamed, running to catch the falling body of Jasmine Cartwright.
Jasmine smiled at her older sister. "I know you're not an Apollo kid, but I've always loved your voice. Could you sing to me? Just one last time, and I'll never ask again."
Tears brimmed Addie's eyes. "But that'll be because you're–"
She couldn't say the word. If she said it, it would come true.
"Dead," Jasmine finished for her.
Damn you, Apollo, for giving Jasmine the gift of prophecy.
"Now will you sing, Addie?" Jasmine asked as she grabbed her sister's hand tightly.
She couldn't think of a song for her. Then one hit her, one that her mother once sang to her own dying sister. Oh, how history repeats itself cruelly.
"Don't you dare look out your window, darling, everything's on fire," she started. "The war outside keeps raging on. Hold on to this lullaby, even when the music's gone. Gone."
Adeleide's voice caught on the last word, as Jasmine's hand went limp in her own. She was dead. Adeleide closed Jasmine's eyes with the tips of her right pointer and middle gently.
"Just close your eyes," Adeleide's voice cracked as she finished the song. "The sun is going down. You'll be alright. No one can hurt you now. Come morning light, you and I'll be safe and sound."
It had been seven years. Seven years since Jasmine died. Adeleide had never really gotten over it, no matter how many things she did. She finished college, got an apartment in New Rome, and gotten married. What else could she do?
Finally, the dreaded day came. August 18th, 2016. The anniversary of the death of Jasmine Cartwright, sister to Adeleide Maywether.
Addie held her head high as she laid a single white rose on her sister's grave. A single tear trickled down her cheek. "Ave, ave, Jasmine. Filia Apollo martyr bellatores fortissimus heros." she murmured.
Hail, hail, Jasmine. Daughter of Apollo, martyr of war, hero of heroes.
Guys, I'm so sorry for any tears you guys shed while reading this, but I heard Safe and Sound by Taylor Swift on my friend's iPod, and thought of Clarisse and Silena, but I wanted something from Camp Jupiter on that day, so Adeleide and Jasmine Cartwright were born! Sorry again about the tragedies, guys.
~Alex
P.S. I looked up pretty much everything on the Clarisse/Silena thing, just reworded it, so I didn't plagiarize. Rick Riordan owns everything, guys. I'm not a middle aged man that writes bestsellers and is secretly the god of trolling. =)
