(Okay, so I wanted to make this story about tales and diaries-but I wanted to do both sooo why not just put both together. By the way there are 3 parts.)
(Part 1)
Clarisse wiped the sweat off her brow, her feet pounding the tarmac in the sweltering desert heat. Just because she was visiting her Mum didn't mean that she could take a break from her training. In fact, she preferred the camp: at least there, her training involved her beating other people up and improved her skill at beating people up. Here it was just running, weights, push-ups, sit-ups, running, jumping, pull-ups, running, running and running. Nothing to hit.
But she couldn't stop training. So if she didn't have the comfortable weather-controlled environment of the camp to run five klicks in, she would run five klicks in the Arizona desert.
At forty-nine degrees (A/N 120 Fahrenheit).
She was the daughter of Ares. She could take this.
"Mary! Mary, where are you?" someone suddenly shouted, from far off the road.
Something about that voice caught Clarisse off-guard. It sounded so familiar…
Pain stabbed at her heart as she realised whose voice it sounded like.
Chris…
She winced at the thought. Despite her ability to withstand physical injury, she still couldn't handle heartache.
She'd known him for so long. He'd been one of her closest friends, and…well, sometimes she'd feel like she wanted to be…more than friends. But she wasn't sure of her own feelings. She didn't want to take a chance. And so she wasn't able to work up the courage (a first) to tell him. And now he was gone. One of the enemy. She dreaded having to face him in the field of battle. Would he even hesitate? If he didn't, would she be able to fight him?
And even worse, she knew that, if she had told him, he may have said yes. And then he may not have switched sides. He may have stayed with the Olympians, with her.
She'd never imagined that there would come a day when something could be blamed on Clarisse La Rue's lack of courage.
But yet, she had just heard his voice calling from the desert, not far from the road. Part of her said it was probably one of those stupid monsters who mimicked voices (she couldn't be bothered to remember their names). But part of her told her that as long as there was a chance, she had to take it.
Clarisse sighed as the latter part got the better of her. She veered off the road, jogging over the sand, towards the source of the voice.
(Part 2)
"Mary! Mary, come back! I've found a way out!"
As she drew closer to the source of the voice, she spotted him in the distance.
Clarisse swallowed, attempting to still the swarm of butterflies in her stomach, as a smile broke out on her face against her will.
It was Chris.
She dashed towards him, barely able to contain her sudden uncharacteristic urge to throw her arms around him. Ugh, it made her feel so weak andgirly, but at the same time, it somehow felt so right.
"CHRIS!" she cried.
Now that she was up close, she could observe him in greater detail. He was dressed in full battle armour, and his shoulders sagged under the weight. He was covered in dust and smelt like a dark, dank cave flooded with sweat. His hair was unkempt and his armour and clothes in disarray. He gripped his spear loosely in his right hand. He looked like he'd just been through a long fight, and yet he didn't have a single wound on his body.
"Mary! MARY, ANSWER ME!" he shouted, facing away from Clarisse. Apparently, he hadn't even noticed her.
"Chris?" her smile disappeared.
For a second, jealousy stabbed at her heart. Who was this 'Mary'? Someone he had fallen for? But she immediately felt angry at herself for feeling jealous. There were more urgent things to take care of. She'd always made fun of Aphrodite's children for their lack of prioritisation, putting love and beauty before all else. And now she had committed the same sin that she so often accused them of.
"Chris, it's me, Clarisse!" she tried to get his attention.
Chris grabbed her by the shoulders, a wild, unhinged light in his eyes.
"WHERE IS SHE? WHERE'S MARY?" he shook her violently.
Clarisse' first thought was to push his hands off her and deck him for his audacity, but she couldn't bring herself to do it to Chris, especially not while he was in this state.
Something was wrong. Very, very wrong.
"Chris."
Her voice grew quiet and sad.
Chris turned away from her, and shouted towards the desert, "COME BACK, MARY! COME BACK!"
The boy's breath was ragged. His voice was hoarse.
"The son of Poseidon is gone! We don't need the string anymore! I found a way out! We're free! Free!"
Clarisse blinked.
Son of Poseidon?
Anger began to well inside her, as it tended to do in response to most stimuli.
If that punk Percy had anything to do with this…
But the rest of what he said didn't make any sense. Why was he talking about string? And what was he free from?
Clarisse looked around. They weren't very far from the city. If the mortals found him like this, they would institutionalise him. She needed to get him out of their sight, immediately.
But as she turned back to Chris, who was still raving madly at the desert, she was bombarded by all sorts of emotions she had never felt before. Emotions that children of Ares weren't supposed to have, like tenderness and pity. Gods, this boy drove her crazy. Instead of the sight of him filling her with an instinctive desire to punch him out, like the sight of most everybody did, she just wanted to sit beside him, to take care of him, and to nurse him back to health.
She pushed aside her confused feelings for the time being. Either way, Chris needed help.
"Come on, Chris," she said, as gently as she could, tugging at his arm.
Chris suddenly grabbed his head and wailed in pain.
"Mary…NO! Mary…dissolved…illusion…Luke…the red giant…" he moaned, still clutching his head.
Left with no choice, Clarisse could only drag Chris back to her house, while attempting to injure him as little as possible.
"The earth…cannot die…rises…again and again…" he continued mumbling, as he stumbled along, Clarisse pulling him towards her house by the hand.
If it had been anyone else who was in this pathetic state, Clarisse would simply have laughed with scornful contempt at his frailty. But now she only felt sorrow and sympathy for the broken son of Hermes.
What's wrong with me? What's going on?
She wanted to pulverise Chris for making her feel like this, but at the same time she wanted nothing more than to give him a big hug.
She imagined herself beating up Percy, which proved wonderfully cathartic and managed to suppress her emotional turmoil for the time being. She couldn't afford to waste time freaking out over her feelings. She had to get Chris out of the way of the mortals, or there would be trouble.
But then she wondered, was she really trying to bring him home to stop the mortals from discovering him, or was it actually because she wanted to take care of him?
She released an involuntary growl of frustration.
How the Hades do the Aphrodite kids handle all these stupid emotions?
She continued attacking the question for the rest of the way home, but without coming up with any answers.
(Part 3)
"I cut the string, Mary. I cut the string. But we didn't need it. I found a way out! Come here, Mary! I didn't even need the other string! It didn't even glow!"
Chris was smiling, but his smile was hollow. The light in his eyes was vacant. Clarisse couldn't explain it, but somehow, it hurt her to see him like this.
Clarisse's mother had left to buy groceries, so the two teenage demigods were alone at home. Clarisse led the madly babbling son of Hermes to the sofa, and lay him down on it.
"Come on, Mary! We're free! Free!" Chris continued, shouting to someone who wasn't there.
"Shh," Clarisse pressed a thick, clumsy finger to his lips. He was very feverish, and every bit of him that was exposed had been sunburnt. His lips were dry and cracked.
Chris seemed to relax as he sank into the sofa. His shoulders slackened, his muscles loosened up, and his eyes fell shut. He looked as though he hadn't slept for days.
She got to work, stripping his armour off (A/N Not like that). It was forty-nine degrees (A/N 120 Fahrenheit) out there. It was a miracle he hadn't died from a heat stroke yet. His clothes under his armour were soaked through with sweat. His feet were covered in blisters.
She remove the last piece of armour and cut off a piece of string that was, for some reason, tied in a tight knot around one of his fingers. His skin was cooler, and his face less flushed, but just barely.
"Stay here," she commanded him. Not that he was in much of a state to disobey.
"Mary…" he murmured, half-asleep.
Clarisse raced to her room to grab her flask of nectar, and dashed back to Chris's side. Fortunately, he hadn't gotten up and started wandering about while she was gone. She uncapped the flask and pressed its cool glass rim to his parched lips, pouring the godly liquid down his arid throat.
As she did this, she remembered another time, now seemingly so long ago and so far away, when he had been the one tending to her while she lay down, injured.
"Aaaargh!"
Clarisse stumbled as she felt the familiar sensation of metal parting her flesh. One of the Apollo campers' arrows had struck her in a gap in her armour.
Clarisse cursed. Pain radiated from deep inside her. She had no idea how the shot had managed to penetrate so much, but the entire shaft was buried in her flesh.
She screamed vulgarities in the general direction from which the arrow had come, and heard the trees rustling, presumably agitated by the archer's flight.
She winced as she felt the arrow moving around inside her.
"Stupid archers…" she grumbled, clutching the fletching of the arrow.
She walked on, being careful not to disturb the arrow, trying to find some spot where she could rest and recuperate, and possibly remove it without causing too much damage.
Then out of the shadows jumped a pack of those sneaky blonde monkeys from the Athena cabin.
Clarisse growled and swore. Another one of their stupid 'tactics'. Kick 'em while they're down. She'd have creamed them in seconds if this was a fair fight.
They attacked her all at once. Although she was handicapped by the arrow wound, she managed to fend them off with her spear. But they kept jumping around and dodging. She couldn't land a solid hit on any of them. And the arrow wasn't getting any better.
Then someone burst out of the trees behind one of her assailants, and thwacked him on the back of his head with a spear shaft.
The others turned towards him, surprised. One swung his sword at him, but he deflected it with the tip of his spear and used the blade as a fulcrum, swinging his spear shaft into his face, then smacking him in the head again to make sure.
The last one, seeing he had no chance against the two of them, 'wisely' turned tail and fled.
Clarisse glared murderously at the interloper. She didn't recognise his face, but then again, she had never been particularly good at remembering people.
"I didn't need your help," she growled.
The boy had the audacity to smirk.
"Sure you didn't."
She scowled, and instinctively swung her fist at him. But she was careless, and accidentally agitated the arrow. She winced in pain as it cut deeper into her flesh.
The light in his eyes turned to concern.
"Whoa, are you okay?"
"I'm fine," she grunted.
Chris moved around her, and saw the fletching of the arrow protruding from her skin
"You're not okay. There's an arrow stuck in you. It looks pretty bad."
She glared at him again, and tried to sock him in the face. But this time, when she moved her arm, the arrow must've sliced through something important, because pain suddenly shot from the wound and didn't go away when she moved her arm back.
"Ack!" she gasped, stumbling.
"Whoa!" Chris caught her.
She leaned on his shoulder, adjusting herself to minimise the pain caused by the arrow.
"Come on, let's get you to the Big House."
Ordinarily, she would've been enraged at herself for failing so miserably and needing to be bailed out by this random guy. But, taking a second look at him, she realised he was actually pretty good-looking. It was the first time a guy as handsome as him had paid this much attention to her. And, although she didn't want to admit it, it actually felt kinda good.
He helped her back to the Big House, and Argus laid her down in one of the rooms and removed the arrow, being careful not to damage anything else. Then Argus bandaged her up, and Chris got some ambrosia and spoon-fed her with it.
Finally, she swallowed her pride, and turned to him. He was smiling kindly at her.
"T…Thank you."
She'd expected him to make a barbed reply about how she had tried to refuse his help, but instead, his smile just widened a tad, as he fed her another spoonful of ambrosia.
He was nicer to her than any of the other campers ever had been, even her siblings. From that point on, he'd been the closest thing she had to a friend, outside of her own cabin.
Clarisse watched as the nectar took effect. The blisters on his feet and the cracks in his skin where he had been particularly badly sunburnt faded, as did the redness where the sunburn was less severe.
She squeezed his arm gently, trying to gauge his temperature. He was still warmer than he was supposed to be, but he was cooling down.
His grip loosened, and his spear, which Clarisse only just noticed he was still holding, clattered to the ground.
She was suddenly reminded of another time Chris had helped her.
"AAAAARGH! I'm going to KILL those punks!"
The Stolls had 'visited' the Ares cabin again. No doubt as payback for their ignominious defeat at Ares' hands during yesterday's capture-the-flag. The casualties this time: a whole bunch of things from everyone, and some of Clarisse' favourite rock CDs. Yeah, sure, she would've beaten up the punks even if they hadn't touched her stuff. But this made it personal.
She reached out to grab her spear…
…and an electric jolt shot up her arm.
She yelled some rather impolite things that will not be reproduced in this document. The Stolls had rewired the spear so that the shaft was electrified too.
She glared at the picture of the trickster duo pinned up on the wall, marred beyond recognition by all manner of throwing weapons hurled by angry Ares campers.
"STOLL!" she screamed.
She stomped out of the cabin only to run into Chris, who had that annoyingly good-looking smile of his on his face, as he normally did.
"Hey Clarisse, what's up?"
Not even Chris could temper her rage.
"WHAT'S UP!?" she roared.
"I'LL TELL YOU WHAT'S UP! YOUR IDIOT BROTHERS STOLE OUR STUFF, STOLE MY STUFF, AND MADE MY SPEAR ELECTROCUTE ME! THAT'S WHAT'S UP!"
And then he gave her the smile that was tied with his good-looking, everyday smile for 'Most Annoying Facial Expression' in Clarisse' book: the 'audacity-in-the-face-of-an-angry-Clarisse' smile.
"Well, I think I know how you can get them back."
She scowled.
"I'm gonna beat them into a pulp. If you've got any brains at all, you'll stay out of my way."
"No, I have a better idea. How 'bout we give them a taste of their own medicine?"
Suffice to say, the Stoll brothers were not amused to find themselves drifting in the ocean off the coast of Long Island on crudely-constructed wooden rafts tied together with old, rotting ropes at six-thirty in the morning the next day while Chris and Clarisse watched from the shore.
Travis awoke first.
"WHERE THE HADES ARE WE?" he screamed. But he was already so far out at sea that Chris and Clarisse could barely hear him.
The two of them stood on the beach, laughing their heads off.
"BON VOYAGE!" Chris shouted.
Connor's raft promptly disintegrated and sank.
Their laughter grew even more intense after that, as Travis struggled to rescue his brother and get them both back to land.
Clarisse turned to look at her companion, once again noticing how incredibly good-looking he was. And then, she realised that she wasn't entirely sure that she was only smiling because of the Stoll brothers' misfortune.
She actually liked being around him, she realised. He made her happy. And there weren't many people who could do that.
Clarisse found herself unconsciously reaching out to run her fingers through his hair. She hesitated when she realised what she was doing, but then a part of her told her to continue.
She took its advice.
Despite his exhaustion and unkempt appearance, Clarisse still thought Chris looked incredibly handsome. Almost as handsome as he looked that time when he…he…
Chris and Clarisse walked towards the canoe lake. It had been a hard fight. Athena's children pulled their same dirty tricks and Apollo campers kept shooting people from the trees, but in the end, Ares muscled through it all.
"Congrats, Clarisse!" Chris laughed, hugging her. He was one of the few people on Earth who could have gotten away with that.
"You did it!"
Once again, Clarisse found herself smiling for no apparent reason.
The two of them sat in silence by the moonlit lake.
"Clarisse, you know, the line-up for today's game…" Chris finally said.
"Yeah?"
They turned to meet each other's eyes.
"It was exactly the same as this other game some time back where I walked in on a girl with an arrow stuck in her fighting three Athena campers."
Had he been anyone else, she'd have broken his nose for making fun of her. But instead, she smiled.
"Chris…I…I wanted to say…thank you."
He blinked.
"For what?"
"For…for being my friend. None of the other campers are as nice to me as you are."
Clarisse wasn't sure what it was. Maybe the way the moonlight played in his eyes. Maybe the way his smile looked particularly bright and warm. Maybe the sudden surge when she realised how close he really was to her. But it was then that she decided to act on those feelings that had been buzzing around inside her for so long. She didn't know how to describe them, and she didn't know what to say, but she definitely knew what she had to do. She leaned in.
Chris was starting to say something in reply to her, but his voice died in his throat as he saw her closing in.
But before either could do anything, one of Clarisse' siblings burst out from the trees behind them.
"Clarisse! Where'd you go?"
The two of them turned away from each other, both blushing furiously.
But it was only now, with Chris lying in front of her, broken and tired, yet still handsome as ever, that she realised why she kept feeling like this around him. Why she had almost kissed him, back then. The Aphrodite campers would never shut up about it, but she never thought she'd ever feel it. And it was only now that she understood.
She ran her fingers through his hair, then trailed her hand down his face, gently stroking his cheek and chin.
"I love you, Chris Rodriguez," she whispered tenderly.
