Author's Note: Not a Percy Jackson crossover. In fact, the Percy Jackson elements will be kept to a minimum, almost non-existent, after the first two chapters. Enjoy!
Origins 1.01: Field Trip Fiascos
I was going crazy. I had to be. There was no other explanation for these... delusions haunting me over the past thirty minutes since our class entered the museum. It was subtle at first. Portraits of ancient gods following me with their lifeless eyes, Greek symbols aligning to form coherent sentences, and the fountain we passed by started rippling for no reason.
Nothing too conspicuous. I almost dismissed them, until I saw the tour guide holding an "I Love Tokyo" mug and wearing a Nirvana shirt underneath a plaid jacket. She glared at me with demonic, red eyes; slitted and predatory.
At first I thought she had a transformation type quirk -which was fine- so I didn't thought much about her looks. She was kinda pretty, but a decade too old for me. No, what bothered me was no one else seemed to notice her. At one point, she stood in between two girls talking to each other, both giving no reaction to her presence, while staring at me in the eye with a hungry expression. Not the hot kind.
Maybe I was just making a big deal out of nothing. After all, my classmates had the attention span similar to my coked up stepfather -or a goldfish, if I wanted to insult an entire species of fish.
I looked around the group and tried searching for our english teacher, Mr. Brunner. Maybe he could do something. He was a brown haired, middle aged man who looked like he spent his free time drinking at a bar while worrying about losing his job. With the economic depression in Japan, the concern was more than understandable.
I raised my hand. Mr. Brunner walked towards me with a limp. The clopping of his prosthetic legs echoed in the wide circular room. He didn't notice the tour guide.
"Is there a problem, Midoriya?" He asked with a concerned tone, "You look a bit pale."
"I need to go to the washroom." I shifted, giving a subtle glance to the demon lady. She met my eyes and gave me a sadistic smile with her sharp fangs poking out her mouth. My skin crawled and I felt an ominous chill. I had to get away!
"Take your time. If you're not here in five minutes, we'll meet at the front entrance."
I nodded and broke into a half run, following the signs to the nearest washroom. I saw the tour guide weave her way out of the group. Shit! Something was definitely going on! Was this a practical joke? I wasn't bullied or anything -hell, most people just tend to ignore me so a prank would be out of the picture.
I made a sharp left to the hallway where the washrooms were. I opened the door to the men's room, but instead of going inside, I let the door close to create a thud and continued my way down the hall. Time was running out. I only had a few seconds left before she caught up with me, so I rushed to a hole on the wall and hid between the small space of the water fountain. It wasn't a good hiding place by any means, but the shadow covered my body well enough. This should do.
I closed my eyes, waiting. I heard footsteps walking down the hall, entering the washroom. Few seconds passed, she exited the washroom and walked to the next, confirming my suspicions. She was definitely searching for me.
Silence. I felt my breath hitch in my throat, amplifying my urge to heave. Still, I held my breath, clamping my mouth to prevent the air from escaping. Thud. thud. My heart pounded against my chest. I swear it was louder than a marching band, and I was afraid she would hear it across the halls.
The washroom door opened again and the lady came out. The pattering of her steps were getting fainter; diminishing into the background before completely disappearing. I released my breath with a cathartic sigh and my body relax as the tension seeped out. I sat there a few seconds to make sure she was gone.
"Found you."
My scream was cut off by talons wrapped around my neck. I felt her claws digging a cavity into my throat as she lifted me up into the air. I tried yelling profanities, but only gurgling noises came out with the blood pooling in my mouth.
She held me in front of her. Her face had transform into a weird abomination of a bat and an ugly librarian combined. She had aged too. The twenty year old lady was replaced by an old hag with loose, flaky skin and wrinkled features.
"Now, which naughty god broke The Pact? Apollo? No, you're hair's a bit too dark. Or Hades? He was always the romantic one," She leaned forward and sniffed, then clicked her tongue on the roof of her mouth with a tututut. Her mouth quirked up like she finally got the joke.
"Forgive me, son of Poseidon" she whispered with almost believable regret, "I'm just doing this to save the world from a premature end. Don't worry, once I'm done, you and I can be friends in the Underworld."
She slammed me into the metal nozzle of the water fountain. I felt the cold metal lodging itself into my forehead and the searing pain that followed a few seconds after. I was going to die. My vision became blurry and my body went cold. I lost control of my basic motor functions, my legs started to spasm and my fingers twitched.
I laughed. Tears welled in the corner of my eyes as I continued to cough up the blood in my futile attempts of laughter. Hilarious. I was on the verge of death, and the life flashing before my eyes was nothing but a reminder of how shitty it was. A life without friends. A life without a father. A life without fulfillment.
And most of all, it was a life that never amounted to anything.
My body went limp, feeling oddly relaxed despite the situation. It was not peace I felt. It was acceptance and surrender. I was simply tired of fighting a battle destined to end up in defeat. Dying doesn't sound too bad. Wasn't it like sleep? Sleep was nice. Comforting.
Are you gonna give up and do nothing again? I heard my voice echo in my head. When are you gonna stop pitying yourself and take responsibility for your life.
Those were the words I didn't want to acknowledge; the truth I didn't want to hear. I knew I could've fought back. Even when Bakugo bullied me or when my stepfather yelled at me, I could've done something instead of rolling over and taking the abuse. Instead, I did nothing. I ended up becoming a slave to fear and self pity. Thus, as my life faded to a mere cinder, I clung to that truth with desperation, hoping I would get another chance to live the way I wanted to and have some semblance of control.
I'm not going to die! Not yet!
With newfound strength, I pried the talons off my throat and let out a guttural scream. I felt a tug in my gut. I heard pipes creaking. The metal encasing of the water fountain crumpled and the concrete walls dribbled before forming web-like cracks. The demon's eyes widen. A cold geyser erupted from the wall, sending the both of us flying to the opposite side, about ten feet away.
The impact jarred me awake. The demon struggled to get up from the floor, spluttering and slipping on the wet marbled tiles. Before she managed to regain balance, I pinned her down to prevent her from escaping. I finally had the upper hand for once. It felt amazing. For a second, I understood how Bakugo felt.
I raised my fists and hammered her face with a two handed blow. I was stronger and reinvigorated; my previous wounds and aches were magically healed. I continued my assault, raining a flurry of fists into her leathery, disgrace of a face. My fists started to hurt, but I didn't care. Thick golden blood gushed from the gashes of her mouth, staining my black hoodie with golden streaks.
She wasn't human. People with quirks, no matter how monstrous they seemed, all bleed the same colour.
God, I hope this comes off.
"Saving the world, huh?" I punctuated my words with a punch, "That's some big talk from someone who can't even save themselves from a fucking, quirkless kid."
When I thought she about to surrender, she caught my fist and hurled me to the air. I landed about ten meters away from her and my knees slammed on the tiles. I tried standing up but the impact was worse than I expected. I grabbed the wall to balance myself and started limping away from the demon lady. Abort! I should've ran!
Unfortunately, the demon lady managed to get herself together. With a primal screech, she unfurled her draconic wings and flew to the air at my direction. Fast! She covered half the space between us in a blink.
"Midoriya!" I heard a deep, gravelly voice call to me. Mr. Brunner? "Catch!"
Before I got the chance to tell him to run away, I saw a small, narrow object fly towards me at a frightening speed. I caught it with my right hand and gave the object a quick glance. A pen?
No, it wasn't just a pen. I felt a roar inside, swirling eddies of monstrous energy, urging me to pull the cap off and unleash it from the confines of the pen. I even saw snippets of memories from its past wielders. Stories of love, betrayal, hardships, and glory.
The demon was right in front of me, claws lifted for the finishing blow. With my eyes close, I took the cap off and threw a blind swing at her direction. A hail mary unlike any other, relying on nothing but pure chance and instinct. I felt dust particles, almost like sand, caress my face. The shriek was cut off and was consumed by an eerie silence that seemed deafening in comparison to the transpired chaos.
When I opened my eyes, I saw no traces of the demon lady except for the pile of golden sand on the floor. I stared at my hand. Oh, it's a sword. Of course it is. What else could it be?
I shuddered and my knees gave out on me. I dropped the golden sword and the clatter resounded on the empty hall. My hands jittered and the tears of frustration welling inside me trickled down my face.
Clopping. Slowly approaching. They stopped behind me, casting an unnaturally large shadow on my probably pathetic figure sprawled on the floor.
"Midoriya, child."
I felt something cold -smooth like polished stone- touch my shoulder, but I ignored it given how numb I was. I almost died. Granting, it wouldn't be much of a tragedy to leave behind such a miserable life, but still... the reminder of my fragileness woke me up from my fifteen years of inaction. I was almost thankful for the demon lady.
I took a few, shaky breaths to regain my composure. I stood up, with my back straight, ignoring the weight of my insecurities and past failures. I was starting anew. No more self pity. No more running away from my issues.
And there was no better issue to start with than the large centaur in the room. Centaur, not elephant, I mused as I marvelled at the sight of Mr Brunner's equestrian glory.
The bus ride home left me in a daze. I just murdered someone in cold blood and what bothered me the most was not the act itself, but the lack of guilt I felt. Was I in shock? Maybe. But my mind was mostly preoccupied with my newfound quirk. The sensation was migraine-inducing, to say the least.
Imagine being suddenly aware of every water molecule within a hundred meter radius. When I closed my eyes and concentrated, I saw the world in binary: the positive space where water existed and the negative space signifying objects lacking water. This facet of my quirk allowed me to have unparalleled awareness of my surroundings. I was almost omniscient within my sphere.
I was sitting next to Mr. Brunner, under the pretense of 'misbehaviour.' Which was fair, since murdering a tour guide is probably up there on the naughty list. He was silent, ignoring my questions about the trip. I saw him tapping his foot with a frantic rhythm, exhaling through the nose with shaky breaths. He was scared.
Without anything to do, I decided to "observe" Mr. Brunner. Suffice to say, he was more... intricate than he let on. Using my patented watersense, I was able to see the inside of his prosthetic legs, which contained the bottom half of a horse folded into a compact flesh origami. Fascinating, albeit disturbing.
"Sooo..." I stretched my vowels while whispering. "about your legs."
"What's wrong?" He raised a casual eyebrow like I was asking him a dumb question.
"Everything! You have half a horse inside... whatever those are," I pointed to his prosthetics, "How the hell does that even work?"
"Ah." He realized my conundrum, "A friend of mine made it for me. He specialized in spacial magic, for lack of a better term."
"Magic? You mean, quirk?"
"No. Magic," He said wistfully, "I'll explain it to you later."
The silence between us grew. Mr. Brunner stared blankly at the buildings outside the window instead of continuing our conversation.
When we got back to Mustafu High School, the bearded teacher told me to follow him to his car. I was too tired to ask where we were going, so I plopped on the comfy leather seat without a complaint and watched him fumble his car keys while muttering curses in Latin. He was a fast driver; dangerously so. Buildings blurred by in a dull streak of grays and browns, progressively getting smaller and smaller as we got close to the borders of The Bubble.
Downtown Mustafu, a.k.a. The Bubble, was the only area salvageable from the battle between All Might and One for All. The rest of the city, about a good three quarters, was dying slowly. If not dead. To make things worse, the three major gangs occupied the mangled corpse of the city, letting it fester with crimes and lawlessness.
First, there was The League of Villains, the psychos and human trash of society. Their goal was to dissolve the government of Mustafu, but there was little to no info about them except for their sporadic attacks on The Bubble.
Then there was The Reformist, the immoral idealists. Formed by the Hero-Killer Stain, they amassed a large, cult-like following with the sole purpose of creating 'perfect' heroes while getting rid of the 'unfit' ones. They've had a kill count of twelve heroes.
Finally, there was the Villain Factory, the opportunists. They were subtle with their operations, but accounted for most of the city's drug trafficking after their merger with the Yakuza. Perhaps, out of the three, the Factory was the richest, the most politically influential, and-
Why the hell does he know where I live? My thoughts were interrupted as Mr. Brunner slowed down and parked his car in front of our shabby, apartment complex.
"Umm, Mr. Brunner." I shifted, uncomfortable.
"Call me Chiron, lad."
"Mr. Chiron, sir," I snarked, "Why are we at my house? Or better yet, why do you know where I live?" My voice carried a slight edge to it despite wanting to be respectful to him. He was my favorite teacher in school -always patient with me despite my dyslexia- thus, I valued our amicable relationship. Even so, I valued my privacy more.
"I visit your mother from time to time," his mouth quirked with mischief, "for academic purposes, of course."
"Haha, how mature of you," I rolled my eyes in exasperation while fishing for the house keys in my pocket. "Although, even if you have a terrible sense of humor and an even worse sense of fashion, I wouldn't mind having you as a stepdad."
"And why is that?"
I pondered on the question as we stepped outside the car and made our way to my house. I stopped in front of the door, reluctant to enter. I didn't want to see my stepdad this early.
"Because you're a decent person," I answered, inserting the key into the hole, "and that makes you better than most people I know."
The lock opened with a click and the rotting door swung open with a shrill squeak.
I was home.