Happy 2014 everyone! This was a request from a guest. This might not be exactly what they had in mind, but the plot bunny struck and ran away with this story. For those reading WOD, I'm sorry to say that it is on hiatus due to lack of inspiration. But fear not! I will never abandon a story, it just may take a while to update.

Disclaimer: I received the rights to Percy Jackson for Christmas. Hear the sarcasm, it's there.

Enjoy!

"This story starts on a cool, clear, peaceful spring day in New Rome, with Octavian walking down the path to Temple Hill. Oh, who am I kidding, it's never peaceful when Octavian is around. In reality the children ran screaming and the women turned their heads as they cried when he walked past.

Ok, it wasn't like that either exactly, it was just an average day in New Rome, but I heard a quote once; something about the eye of the beholder? Well, whatever it was, it applies to this situation.

Anywho, back to my story. Octavian was walking to Temple Hill to slaughter more innocent stuffed animals. In my opinion this should qualify as animal cruelty, not that State Law enforcement could do anything about it; they didn't even know the New Rome existed. But if they did, this would qualify and Octavian would be in jail, but then this story wouldn't have taken place.

Sorry off topic, I blame the ADHD. So, Octavian is on his way to Temple Hill, and was yet unaware that there is a surprise waiting for him.

Now, word had gotten around that Octavian had ordered a huge shipment of jumbo stuffed animals. And I don't mean wimpy carnival jumbo stuffed animals; I mean huge people sized stuffed animals. I wonder if he was planning on taping his enemies pictures to them then the slaughtering them. Man, that would be creepy.

You're probably wondering what's the shipment have to do with this story, well young grasshopper; it has everything to do with this story.

So, naturally word got around to the best pranker ever, me! Immediately I knew what I was going to do. I had been planning something along the lines of what I planned to do for a long time, but I had no means of executing it without drawing suspicion. Now I had all the right ingredients.

I put my plan into action. Al it took was a little bit of charm and a lot of pleading with Reyna to hold the shipment one day before sending it to Octavian. So what if I had to muck out the unicorn stables for two weeks, the plan was in motion. I even managed to get Dakota in one the fun by bribing him with Kool-Aid, which he had been banned from after he streaked through the streets of New Rome. Don't ask.

I also had to gather a few smaller regular sized stuffed animals. And after a night to sewing and stitching, plus a lot of drunken singing, that was all Dakota, my masterpiece was finally finished. The only thing left was to put everything in place and wait.

Fast-forward back to Octavian walking to Temple Hill. I was hiding in the bushes with a video camera at the ready. Dakota would've been there, but he passed out and Gwen took him home, oh yeah, I forgot to mention Gwen helped too. She had to because neither Dakota nor I knew how to sew, plus she hates Octavian. Did you know that he killed her? It was never proven, but most believe it to be true. So, without her this plan would have never have been put into motion. You should thank her the next time you see her.

Right, off track again, sorry. Then Octavian walks into Zeus', sorry Jupiter's, temple, sees the crates that contain the stuffed animals, and is all like,

'They're here finally!'

And I was all like, in my head of course, 'With a few surprises thrown in for my enjoyment.' Queue cliché evil laugh. Mawahaha!

Naturally the next thing Octavian does is open the crates. As the auger the next thing he does is sacrifice one stuffed animal to the gods for allowing the shipment to arrive. I bet they would've been sooo happy with that sacrifice. As he is in the middle of whatever he was doing in his ritual thing he cut open the jumbo stuffed lion he was currently working on, he found a slightly smaller stuffed tiger.

He definitely looked confused for a moment but shrugged it off and settled for cutting open the tiger too. Once the tiger was opened, it reveled a large teddy bear. On top of the teddy bear was a note that I couldn't read from where I was hiding, but I knew that it said,

'Octavian this must stop. We are raising an army. You cannot escape.'

The confused look on his face was nothing compared to the look on his face when the teddy bear stood up. He looked like a terrified rabbit. Wait, that's an insult to terrified rabbits. Anyway he was freaked out. It only got better from there.

Out of the other crates came even more jumbo moving stuffed animals. You're most likely wondering how they are moving. One word, magic. Na, I'm kidding. The night before I had rounded up some of the more fun loving, Octavian hating, revenge seeking Romans, you'd be surprised by how many fall in to that group, and handed out teddy bear suits. They sat in the crates most of the morning and when I gave the signal via walkie-talkies to those at the top of the crates they all started to get up.

Explanation aside, you should have seen Octavian's face, white as a sheet and gaping like a fish. Then the terror set in. He tried to run, the coward, but it was too late. The Roman bears started to dog pile on him. I have to say his screams were the funniest things I'd heard in a while. And it was all on tape. I'll show you latter.

Of course, Octavian somehow found out that I was the one behind it and petitioned Reyna to punish me. She agreed, but the best part was that she actually didn't do anything to me, and passed of the whole mucking out the unicorn stables thing as my punishment. All I had to do was give her a DVD of the whole thing.

And that is how I scared the living daylights out of Octavian, and scared him for life all in one go. Oh and I'm not supposed to tell you this but a secret source from the First Cohort told me that Octavian has nightmares about it."

Leo sighed as he sat back. He was actually tired of talking for once. Leo had spent the last half an hour telling stories to his younger brother Harley to help him sleep.

The poor kid was having nightmares about the war with Gaea, so Leo's solution to the problem was to tell Harley about his greatest pranking escapades. He had finally fallen asleep sometime during the last story Leo had told. It was about the last time Leo had visited New Rome, and played an epic prank on Octavian.

Leo stood up and stretched, then he bent down and placed a soft kiss on Harley's forehead, the same way his mom used to when she tucked him in for the night.

"Sleep well, Harley."

He started to make his way back to his bunk, but was stopped by Nyssa's voice.

"That was a really nice thing you did, you know that right?"

He turned to face her.

"I know but what are big brothers for?"

She smiled. "Goodnight, Leo. Sleep well."

"You too." He said as he continued on his way to his bunk. He settled under the covers. He may not have had a family in a while, but he had one now, and he was going to do everything he could to keep them safe. Whether it is from hellhounds and monsters, or just simply bad dreams, he will always be, like it or not. Because now he had a family again and he was going to damn well keep it that way.

Yea, my longest one-shot to date! 1,310 words! Whoop, whoop! I just realized that Harley isn't listed as a character on fanfiction. :(

Peace,

Peeps