I think I've done the impossible. I spent like the last three months of my life creating this, studying the BioShock Infinite timeline and then Percy Jackson's, and crafting something that makes sense. I've had to change the dates around - Columbia doesn't launch until 1895 for consistency issues, and a few other things were altered. So now, I give you... Vigorous Restitution.

ALSO: As I previously mentioned, I'll be putting music on my profile that can be used to enhance the atmosphere. From the time that Percy enters the lighthouse to when he gets to the top level, "Old Time Religion" plays in the background. If you want to listen to that, go ahead. Link's on my profile.

Percy's appearance and attire are on my profile page. You should take a look at it Before we get going.

ONE

Percy Jackson was a comet, hurtling towards the earth.

He'd overexerted his powers at Mount Saint Helens. The Washington coastline was craggy - he had no time to "aim for the bushes" on this one. He just had to hope it wouldn't hurt. He couldn't even shut his eyes out of curiosity.

Just before he impacted the ground, something... strange happened. The area where he would land turned black, white, and statically, as if he was watching an old television show. He fell right through the ground - the air was sucked from him, and his ears buzzed. The world was black. He wondered dimly if some titan had opened a portal to Tartarus.

And still... nothingness.

Sudden, fuzzy voices were heard in the background. Bring us the Girl... wipe away the debt. The debt. The Girl. The Girl. The Debt. Mister Jackson!

Bring us the Girl and wipe away the debt!

Some time had passed. It must've.

Percy's eyes slowly opened. He was in a rainstorm, somewhere. That much was clear. His water resistance powers weren't working - he was getting wetter and colder by the second. In a rowboat, it seemed. A man in the front of the boat was rowing furiously against the dark waves. His naturally sea bearings, he calculated 43 degrees 56 minutes north, and 67 degrees 34 minutes west. Somewhere near Maine.

"Are you going to just sit there?" The man asked impatiently. He had a slight British accent. Percy thought for a moment that the man was asking him.

"Excuse me, sir? What's going on?" Percy asked helplessly. As soon as the words left his mouth, he realized something was off. He sounded much gruffer, and older than he used to. A quick examination of his arms revealed thick hair. On his right hand seemed to be a brand: AJ. What was going on?!

"As opposed to what? Standing?" The woman shot back, ignoring Percy. She also had a high English voice.

"No, not standing. Rowing."

"Rowing? I hadn't planned on it." The woman turned to Percy and handed him a box. Percy took it curiously.

"What's this?"

"So you expect me to shoulder the burden?!" The man seemed to have ignored Percy yet again. The demigod looked down at the box. Percy Jackson, Seventh Cavalry, Wounded Knee. Percy had definitely never been in a cavalry, nor had he ever been near Wounded Knee. He remembered vaguely that it was over a hundred years ago.

"Excuse me, ma'am? I never -" Percy was once again cut off.

The woman scoffed. "No. But I do expect you to do all the rowing."

"And why's that?"

"Coming here was your idea."

"My idea?"

"Why, yes! I've made it very clear that I don't believe in the exercise."

"The rowing?"

"No. I imagine that's wonderful exercise."

"Then what?"

"The entire thought experiment."

Percy cleared his throat again. "What's going on? Where are we going?"

"One goes into an experiment knowing one could fail." Of course, they ignored him.

"But one does not go into an experiment knowing one HAS failed."

Percy looked down at the box again. He decided to open it. The two continued on with their nonsense. "Can we get back to the rowing?"

"I suggest you do, or we are never going to get there."

The box clicked open. A simple handgun sat in the bottom of the box - an old design, World War I era weapon. Percy had learned how to handle guns at Camp, but... "No, I mean I would greatly appreciate it if you would assist!"

A picture below the gun was of a young girl. On a hunch, Percy flipped it. Bring to New York unharmed. "Wait... Bring us the girl... wipe away the debt..." He muttered to himself. Also in the box was a couple of silver dollar coins, a picture of an angel statue, a key, and drawing of kind. "What's going on here?"

"You should ask him. I suppose he has a greater interest in getting there than I do." Now they were definitely talking about Percy.

"I suppose he does. But there's no point in asking."

"Why not?"

"Because he doesn't row."

"He doesn't row?"

"No. He doesn't row."

"Ah. I see what you mean."

The row boat pulled into a dock. A lighthouse was visible through the storm. "We've arrived." The woman confirmed.

"Am I in a dream? What's going on?" Percy demanded again.

"He hasn't moved." The two continued to rabbit on, pretending to ignore person.

"Ah. But he will."

"Yes. I suppose he does."

Percy glanced to his left, noticing a ladder leading onto the pier. "No help? Nothing?"

"He moves eventually. He already did, and will."

Percy just shook his head. He grabbed a hold of the ladder and hauled himself onto the pier. "Should we tell him when we'll be back?"

"It might give him some comfort."

"Well at least that's something we can agree."

The rowboat began to paddle away. "Am I meeting somewhere here? What's-"

"I'd certainly hope so."

"It does seem like a rather dreadful place to be stranded." The boat disappeared into the fog.

Percy huffed angrily. He looked up at the lighthouse. "I bet it's dry in there... it'd be a nice place to sort this out..."

He hurried up the steps to the lighthouse, shoving open the door. He was absolutely soaked, and he was relatively unused to the feeling. He glanced down at his clothing to see if it had been affected. He once again gasped.

He was wearing something completely foreign to him. His pants were long, pin-striped black dress pants. Polished black leather shoes were on his feet. He wore a black dress shirt on his torso, with a white undershirt underneath. A messy, dark green, unbuttoned vest was worn as well, with an old crimson corvat tied in a garbled knot and left in two. Percy felt ridiculous.

"Which god did this to me?!" He called out. He hadn't even given a thought to if someone was in the tower - at this point, he was fairly certain it was a dream. He looked around at the room he was in - a small, circular one. Everything was made of either wood or iron. In the center was a water basin. Above it was a framed quote:

OF THY
SINS

SHALL I
WASH
THEE

Percy approached the basin and looked down into it, and was taken aback. He was old. Well, fine, not terribly old, but late thirties, early forties at least. Unruly black hair (which had attempted to be a combover, unsuccessfully) and the green eyes were the same, but some thick scruff was present and he had some not-too-flattering wrinkles on his face. Yeah, this had to be a dream.

He glanced back up at the message. "Hmmph... don't think so."

He made for the stairs, looking at another message - FROM SODOM SHALL I LEAD THEE. "Is anyone here?! Hello?"

No answer. Percy shrugged. The next floor of the lighthouse seemed to be a living area - and recently lived in, too. Lights were on, the bed was messy, and even an old-timey radio was spewing some nearly unintelligible music. Percy made to continue up the staircase, but he noticed a few overturned pieces of furniture and blood stains on the carpets. Great. This is getting better by the minute.

He headed up the staircase, noting another piece of nonsense - TO THINE OWN LAND SHALL I TAKE THEE. These people seemed to be into their religion a bit too much. As he entered the next room, he gagged.

A dead body was propped up in a chair - kidnapped, head covered in a sack. A clean bullet hole went right through the sack. Looks like it came from a Mauser round. How had he known that? The thought popped into his head.

Percy shivered. "This really... really isn't right." He opened his little case. He pulled out the pistol left for him, and cocked it. It was loaded. He didn't have Riptide. He might have need of the thing. He noticed that his little costume had a holster. He stuck the Broadsider into it. Wait... okay, the pistol was a Broadsider. Thanks brain.

Percy continued to ascend. "IN NEW EDEN SOIL SHALL I PLANT THEE," He muttered to himself, passing another bit of scripture. What god would plop him in a dream with Christian messages? He tried not to dwell on that. Once he got to the roof, it would all be explained. Hopefully.

The light at the top of the tower spun around as was typically. The door to the room seemed to be some sort of puzzle - three bells were mounted on the door, one for a Scroll, one for a Key, one for a Sword. Percy again cracked open his Wounded Knee box, examining the drawing - the code for the door. "There we go," He muttered. He rang the Scroll once, the Key twice, and the Sword twice.

Nothing happened for a few seconds. "Huh. That's-"

A foghorn sounded, straining Percy's eardrums. The sky lit up with a blood red tone. "What the -" The horn beeped again.

As it died, a light flashed in the lamp room nine times, followed by three more foghorn blasts. It must have been the gods. The door finally clicked open, and the light had been replaced by a red chair. Percy wondered if it had been by magic or if he'd just missed the chair flip up from the ground or something.

As soon as he stepped into the chair room, the door clicked shut behind him. "Great... only one way out of this now." It seemed almost too obvious to be a trap. Percy looked around for a control panel, but could find no such thing. Sighing, he sank into the chair, even putting his arms on the rests. "So now wha-" Clasps had clenched his arms in place. "Oh no." This suddenly didn't feel like a dream anymore.

A voice recording snapped in noisily in the background. "Make yourself ready, pilgrim. The straps are there as a safeguard."

The chair rotated slowly. Pieces of metal began to rise out of the floor, locking him into a small metal cone. "This cannot be good... gah!" The chair jerked downwards downs the floor, but he saw none. Instead he saw rockets. The Broadsider fell out of his holster. "Dammit!" The engines for the rockets began to light up.

"ASCENSION... ascension in the count of five... count of four... three..."

"No no no no no no." Percy wondered briefly what his grave would look like - Percy Jackson. Died in a deathtrap mini-rocket wearing stupid clothes. And that was if Zeus was feeling generous and didn't zap him out of the sky the moment the rocket launched. His chair was jerked into place right in front of the window - so he could watch himself die, presumably.

"Two... One... ascension... ascension..."

The rocket took off. "No!" Percy vomited out of the bottomless rocket, his chair being connected to it by mere metal bars.

"Five thousand feet..."

"Stay calm. Stay calm. Stay calm..."

"Ten thousand feet..."

Percy's reflection flickered in the window - his aged face, something he barely recognized. That would be the last thing he'd see.

"Fifteen thousand feet..."

The rocket pushed through a thick black cloud until emerging into a light so blinding he couldn't see for several seconds.

"Hallelujah."

A city.

Built in the clouds.

A passive ballad of vaguely patriotic music came over the recording now. "Wha...?"

The place was beautiful. A collection of buildings and towers and bridges, all gently bobbing up and down using balloons or propellers or... by god, it was amazing. The different sections were all at different heights. It was... overwhelming, to say the least. It was so colorful, so... immortal.

A humongous floating tower in the shape of an angel dominated the view. Many smaller statues were also pure eye candy. How was this possible?

Percy felt a parachute deploy. He was too stunned by this amazing sight to notice it, until he began to descend. The rocket landed with a thud on a platform, and began to sink into a chute of some sort.