Disclaimer: The Percy Jackson Series, sadly, isn't ours to own.
~Toryn~
"Hey," A soft voice said quietly. But, the room was so silent it seemed loud. Although if one could call the room silent, they would be wrong. The sound that penetrated the absolute silence was a sound that I hated, the sound of the machine giving my mom life support. It was a constant marching-like sound, always going up and down, kind of like a washing machine, but more depressing because it was someone's life. I turned to the voice.
"Hey," I said, wiping my eyes with my sleeve. It was Aleah. "What are you doing here?" She glanced at Mom, and then sat down in the chair next to mine. She chose the wrong time to come and visit me. My eyes were still stinging from tears of having to let my mom go. She had lung cancer, and had gotten to the state of death. She was living only by the annoying machine giving her air and helping her heart pump properly. She hadn't woken up for three weeks now, and according to the oncologist, the doctor for cancer, she was practically dead already.
They had come to me with the contract for me to sign. The contract would tell them that I had agreed to take her off of life support. The clipboard was still being held in my shaking hands. I felt like I was holding my Mom by holding that piece of paper. My hands were hot and sweaty from the stress. Aleah looked down at the contract, and then back up at me. Her eyes were deep blue, always moving like a tidal wave. She frowned.
"I'm sorry," were the only words she managed to say. I didn't say anything in reply. I looked down at the printed line where I had to sign my name. I had been staring at it for seemingly hours now, at least that's how much time it felt like. I managed to catch a tear on my hand before it stained the paper. I picked up the pen and signed my name. Toryn Cappella. My hands shook slightly, and I had to lace my fingers together to conceal it. Why had I done that? What if some sort of miracle happened and she would have lived? These thoughts swarmed in my mind, even though I knew that she couldn't have survived anyway.
I stood up and gestured for Aleah to follow me even though I was still having mixed feelings about this. I went to the front desk of the floor, and handed the lady the clipboard. Then we walked back into my mom's room. Eventually the nurses came in, and turned the machines off. The only sound was the sound of the heart monitor slowing down gradually. I looked at my mom's face once more, her red hair (or what was left of it), her always fair skin, and her eyelids covering her chocolate brown eyes. I looked down at the ground, and said nothing when the heart monitor stopped beeping, indicating that my mom no longer was. She was gone. Forever. I would never hear her voice again, or see the way her eyes twinkled when she laughed. My mother's soul had moved on, and all that was left was the hollow corpse.
I stood there in silence, Aleah by my side, saying nothing for a moment. After the people had came in and taken my mother's body away, I still had no words. I...was alone. I had no more family. I didn't know what to do or think. The fact that she was truly gone hit me in the face, knocking the wind out of me. She was never coming back.
"I-I j-just," I tried to say, but the words seemed to get clogged in my throat and unable to be said. Aleah placed her gentle hand on my shoulder. I couldn't help it anymore. I started sobbing. Not very mature of me, but I did just lose my mom. My sight was flooded with pain and agony.
"What can I do, Aleah?" I looked at her, and saw that her eyes were tearing up too. "What am I..." She wrapped her arms around me.
"I'm so sorry, Toryn," she whispered, "You don't deserve this." Slowly, I found myself embracing her in my arms. "I'm so sorry." She said to me soothingly, over and over again.
That was a long time ago.
A very long time ago. The events that followed were anything but ordinary and almost as bad.
~Aleah~
It's hard to forget when you best friend goes into a cave and never comes out. When he does come out, for necessities such as school and meals, you can tell that he's trying to stuff his negative feelings in a box… which in my opinion, isn't a very good way to do it. I tried to talk to him about it, but I realized negotiating doesn't work with Toryn. It's heart-breaking to watch him go through all this pain and misery. I wanted to help him climb out of the shell he shut himself into, but I didn't know how. It seemed that everything I did just made the situation worse.
I stood in front of Toryn's dorm room, ready to knock and try to coax him out of his misery again. I took a quick intake of breath in surprise when the door opened by itself. Toryn looked down at me warily, his green eyes looking as broken as ever.
"Hey, Toryn…" I said awkwardly, not used to him coming out of his room by his own free will. He looked so different, and he had bags under his eyes, as if he hadn't slept in days. "Are you okay?" I knew what the answer was.
Almost immediately, he replied. "Yes, of course." The answer sounded like it had been rehearsed, which it probably had been, seeing as though he said that every time I asked that question for a year now.
We stood facing each other in an awkward silence. His expression seemed to tell me that he wanted me to notice something. Something different. I searched his person, looking for a difference. I came up with nothing. After a few more seconds of standing there awkwardly, I heard a growling noise, out of nowhere. It sounded like a cow and a wolf mixed together.
I pushed Toryn aside and invited myself into his room. Something in the corner caught my eye, and I leaped back in fright - gracefully, I might add - and shrieked - not so gracefully. Toryn looked at me and smirked, a little bit of his old self back. I looked up hopefully, just to see his face falling back to before: gloomy, miserable, and broken. My hopeful feelings were replaced with heartache. I wanted the old, carefree, completely random Toryn back. Then a bell rang in my head, reminding me that there was a thing in his room.
"What is that… that thing?" I yelled, pointing a shaking finger at the creature.
He raised an eyebrow. "A little slow, aren't we? And that is not a thing. It's a…" He trailed off, and seemed hesitant to tell me.
"What? It's a what?" I asked, feeling a little bad for pressing him on, but wanting to know. Its red eyes were locked on mine, and I tried to look away from its glare but couldn't. It started growling at me. I backed up a little.
"It's okay Griffon, she's a friend," Toryn said getting in between me and what he called "Griffon".
"Oh, and that is a friend?" I said, still petrified by the thing. "What type of animal is that?" I yelled almost a little too loudly.
"You're gonna get us in trouble," he said in a more quiet tone. "He's harmless."
"He?" I asked, "Who is he?"
"I don't like her," Griffon growled. My jaw dropped. I was pretty sure that wolves, dogs, or whatever it was were not supposed to be able to communicate with humans. There was no way he had just talked. I had to have imagined the whole thing. It was just a normal wolf… thing.
"Um… Toryn are you sure that thing is friendly?
"Of course I am, Aleah."
"Then what is it?"
"Well I'll ask. Griffon what are you?". Toryn then looked at it. The thing smiled, revealing sharp teeth that looked like they wanted to cut deep into your skin at any moment.
"I am a hellhound trained for helping Hades and finding half-bloods," the… hellhound? said matter-of-factly, like it was something it did every day. Like, "Hi! My name is Bob. I go around helping Hades and finding half-bloods!" Right. Normal.
"Half-bloods?" I asked.
Toryn turned towards me, "Half-bloods are half human, half god."
"Yes, that is correct. I sniffed out your demigod scent." We both turned to Griffon.
"What?!" We said in unison. He sniffed out our scent?
I turned to Toryn. "You didn't know?"
Toryn raised his eyebrows, "He didn't tell me everything. Sheesh."
I turned back to Griffon. "What do you mean by… sniffed out our demigod scent?"
Griffon shrugged his shoulders indifferently, "You heard me. You guys are both half-bloods. By the way, with both of you guys going to the same school, your smell is intoxicating, and basically screams 'Demigod!'. It's a wonder why monsters haven't begun hunting you down yet."
This can't be real, half-bloods and demigods? They were just myths. "You believe the hellhound?" I asked incredulously.
Toryn just stared back at me, "Of course I do". And that was that. My best friend was insane. He had gone delusional. I had gone delusional. This whole situation was messed up.
"You believe the... the thing?" I said, raising my voice to make sure he understood what I was asking.
"Hellhound!" Griffon growled at me.
"Gesundheit!" I said randomly, but then went back to Toryn. "This isn't real!"
"Well, the hellhound is talking," Toryn pointed out.
"Toryn! Wake up! Please, I'm begging you."
"You know, maybe I'm tired of not having anyone there for me. Maybe I'm tired of all these blank answers!" I didn't have a response for that one. I was sick of not knowing the whole story too, but being a… a demigod! For crying out loud! It was out of the picture. And the worst part was I couldn't deny that I had hears the hell-whatever it was, thing talk. I couldn't handle this.
"No," I said. "You're going back to where you came from, where ever that is, and we are going to forget that any of this ever happened." I walked out the door, and didn't stop to hear what Toryn said.
~Toryn~
"Just wait a second..." I said, but my voice trailed off when Aleah left the room. The door slammed behind her causing a loud thud. I sighed, and sat down on my bed.
"She seems friendly," Griffon said. I smirked.
"She normally is. Maybe she just..." I stopped talking when my head started to hurt. Then the pain turned into torture, a torture I was familiar with. No, not again! I thought as my vision was suddenly blurred by a flashing white light. I could hear Griffon calling my name in the distance, but I was completely under the trance.
Aleah was walking to her room, and lied down on her bed. She was muttering to herself when a shadow started to lure over her. There was a flapping… of black leathery wings. She tried to run, but was unsuccessful. The creature started to attack her.
I gasped, waking up from the vision. I looked at Griffon, who looked confused at what had just happened, but then I ran out of my room.
"Where are you going?!" He yelled, chasing after me.
I tore through the hallway. I've got to warn Aleah. These visions happened a lot. They might've been happy, they might've been sad. They might've been exciting, they might've been dreadful. Whatever they were, they always came true. I kept running until I stopped in front of...
"AHHHHHHHH!" Aleah screamed and suddenly the door tore open and she ran out crashing into me.
Something black with leather-like wings was coming forward. "Little demigod, give me your power," it chanted. I had to act fast, so I pushed Aleah out of the way and stood in front of her by instinct.
A little distance away, I heard Griffon running down the hall. "Move out of the way!" He yelled while bounding towards me.
He growled, jumping onto the black thing with bat-like wings, snapping its jaws down. I winced, closed my eyes, waiting for the blood. Strangely, I felt like I was being covered in flour. I re-opened my eyes and saw myself, Aleah, and Griffon covered with this yellow powder dust.
"Gross…" Aleah tried to wipe herself clean.
"Awesome!" I yelled. Griffon snorted.
"Now, we gotta get outta here. There are definitely gonna be way more coming soon." The hellhound looked around, then bounded forward. "Here, I'll lead you guys to camp."
"Camp what?" I asked.
"Camp Half-Blood. You're safe there - mostly." I did not like the sound of that.
"How're we gonna get there?"
"Shadow travel. You two, get on my back. Now. I smell monster." He knelt down and we clambered on.
We barely climbed onto Griffon's back when a huge figure, disgusting and nasty and with one eye, roared, "OVER HERE! I SEE TASTY HALF-BLOODS!"
Before we could react, Griffon ran straight at a wall. We screamed as we hit pure shadow and dissolved.
~Aleah~
We held on for dear life as we went on what felt like the longest, scariest, fastest roller coaster ride in the world.
Eventually, we emerged into a tree's shadow. It left a strange feeling in one's stomach. A creature that looked like a human with elfish features, green skin, and looked like a girl looked at us and called, "Grover! They're here!"
Another person ran at us. Finally, another normal thing! I thought. Then, I realized that he had furry legs and hooves. Oh.
"Finally! Thanks, Griffon. No one else could get near them," the thing with goat legs and hooves panted.
"What… what are you guys?" I questioned. The goat-man huffed.
"I'm a satyr, part goat, part human. My name is Grover. My job is to protect the wild and find half-bloods around the world," he explained.
"He's very good at it," the elfish girl looked at him affectionately. Grover blushed.
"This is Juniper, my girlfriend," Grover introduced her. She raised a small hand and waved.
I looked up and noticed that a bunch of people had started crowding around us. The attention their eyes were producing was too much for me. I hated being in any sort of spotlight. The only person I was comfortable with was Toryn. It took me a couple of seconds for me to notice that they were looking above my head. I turned to Toryn and he too seemed surprised at whatever was above my head. I looked up, and was startled to see a blue glowing light. It had an image in it… a trident.
A girl with blond hair and striking gray eyes pushed through the crowd. She gasped, and said, "Chiron! Look!" Then I saw a man riding a white horse coming our way. Oh no, I thought, You have got to be kidding me. He wasn't riding a horse, he was the horse! Well sort of, his upper body was that of a man, and then the rest was a horse's body.
"Well this certainly is an interesting turn of events," the… what was it again? - oh, centaur - said. Still, I grew impatient.
"What?" I demanded. "Just what in the world is going on around here? Who are you people? Why are you all so strange? Am I dreaming?"
The girl with the gray eyes (it was easier to remember her eyes than her hair, for some reason - did she like it that way?) answered rapidly, "We'll explain later, we are all a group of half-bloods, we'll explain later, and no, you're not dreaming. Hey, Percy! You have a sister!"
"Oh, what else is new?" I mumbled to myself.
"What? Da-ad!" A guy's voice whined. He pushed his way through the crowd. I gasped when I saw him.
He had sea-green eyes, tousled black hair, and looked like a definite troublemaker. That didn't catch my attention. He literally was in my dreams. For some reason, whenever I had slept recently, I would see that face. I'd seen it before, but never in person. And now to actually see him was like...wow!
"Well, hello, little sis. Nice to meet you," he grinned at me. Then he looked around. Everyone was staring at me, stunned, except for Toryn. He didn't look very surprised.
"What? Aren't you gonna welcome her?" he asked the crowd.
Hastily, everyone knelt down, and the centaur said, "All hail Aleah Meriel, daughter of Poseidon, god of the sea and earthquakes."
I just stared at them.
"Hey, why don't you two come with us?" The guy - I mean, my brother - beckoned me to him and the girl. "It's always hard on the first day. I nearly had a mental breakdown from all of the names, places, things, you know."
Toryn hung back, looking awkward.
"You too, man," he called Toryn over.
A wave of relief washed over me. At least I wouldn't be completely alone, in a way. This was crazy. First I'm related to a god, then I'm kidnapped by a hellhound, I meet a man -NOPE- its a centaur, and then I meet my long lost brother! This was just weird, but still I figured I didn't have a choice but to follow Percy.
As we walked around, we stared at the things that we saw. Houses, people, food, places, a forest that had noises coming out of it, yet I wasn't scared. It almost felt natural.
Finally, we came to the cabins. First, we went into the Zeus and Hera cabins. Of course, since they ruled the gods, they wouldn't be happy with us if they weren't first.
We got to the girl-with-the-gray-eyes' cabin. She opened the door for us. A guy, her sibling, probably, sat at a desk, working on some sort of document.
"Hey, Annabeth," he called.
So, her name was Annabeth. I noticed she stood next to that guy, Percy, and how he put his arm across her shoulder, he was probably her boyfriend. Also, their protectiveness of each other conveyed that they had been through a lot together.
I took a close look at Annabeth. She had an athletic figure and was slender. Her honey-blond hair was tied up in a messy ponytail, and she had an orange T-shirt that said "Camp Half-Blood" on it, just like the rest of the people. Her stormy grey eyes were the color of a tornado, and had a calculating gleam to them, as if she were evaluating my strengths and weaknesses. It was intimidating, to say the least. However, when Percy squeezed her hand, her eyes softened, and they reminded me of a kitten - soft, gray, and content. She looked around sixteen or seventeen, and stood at about five foot six, roughly estimating.
Percy looked the same age, but taller. His eyes had that same special sparkle when he stood close to her, and looked perfectly happy, too.
I looked at him, and realized how much we looked alike. We both had black hair, except my eyes were ocean blue rather than sea-green, but still they looked the same. Whenever I smiled, before Toryn's mother died, at least, I would have that same sparkle in my eyes.
"And this..." Percy said, grunting a little as he opened another cabin door, "...is Cabin Three. Our cabin." It was rather simple for the cabin of a major god, but when I looked back to what my dorm looked like, this was heaven. Simply perfect, and it somehow fit all of my preferences. The walls were a watery blue, with a hint of sea-green and silver tresses. There was one bed in the cabin, to the side, but the covers were blue and everything matched. Well, sort of. There was a salt water fountain in the corner. I knew it was salt water, for some reason. It made me feel stronger, more powerful, more at ease. On the windowsills, there were strange-looking plants - coral, I guessed, in water-filled vases. The windows themselves had a perfect view of the Long Island Sound.
"I'll let you two settle in, and have some alone time to get to know each other better." Annabeth said, walking out the door.
Percy stared at the door for a second, but then turned back to me. I didn't know what to say. What do you say to someone after you learn they're your half-brother? I thought about it for a moment and came up without an answer. Whatever. I shrugged to my thoughts.
"So, whatcha shruggin' about?" Percy asked me, raising an eyebrow in confusion. He seemed to be thinking hard about this. I giggled a little bit because of his efforts.
"Oh, nothing. Just to the voices inside my head," I shrugged again.
"Wait, what kind of voices?"
"Um, my conscience?" He let out a small sigh of relief. What was he so tense about? "You're acting weird."
"I get that a lot. I'm guessing you didn't bring anything with you?" He asked.
"I was kidnapped," I said in reply. He smirked.
"You mean by Griffon? He's alright," Percy grinned. Everyone here acted so… normal, but it wasn't normal. I started to get affected by the dust inside of the cabin, and a bad cough came up my throat. Well, at least that was normal."Are you okay?"
I nodded while covering my mouth to keep another cough from racing through, and took my inhaler out of my pocket. At least I hadn't left that. I could sense Percy watching me as I took in two sips of air. I've always had asthma, and now I had a general idea why. Zeus was mad at me for who knows what reason, so he made the air bring trouble for me. Great, I thought, I'm starting to believe in this stuff.
"Asthma?" He asked.
"Yeah," I said as I put my inhaler away. I looked and saw that there was only one bed in the cabin. I pointed at it, and said, "Um, is that gonna be rearranged?" Percy turned his attention to the bed, and his eyes grew.
"Uh, yeah. I'll let Chiron know," he said as he scratched the back of his head. He seemed to be having the same trouble I was. He sat down on the blue bed, and rolled his thumbs. He stared at the ground for a second, but then his eyes lit up
"Do you wanna see something cool?" Percy asked.
"Why not?" I said, sitting down next to him. He was my brother after all. Then he pulled out a pen. I furrowed my eyebrows. "It's a fountain pen." I said slowly.
"No! Well sure I use it for school sometimes, but it's much more than that. It's Riptide. Watch..." He said as he uncapped it. I flinched back a little when suddenly a glowing bronze sword appeared in his hand.
"What...? Where'd the pen go?" I asked, looking around the floor.
"This is the pen," he said holding the sword up, "Well, it transformed into a sword."
"How?"
"It's a magic item. Dad gave it to me," Percy said, staring at his reflection in the sword. How did he know that the god of the sea gave it to him? "You'll get one too. Most likely."
"A sword?" I asked, having trouble imaging myself using a weapon.
"No. Well, maybe..." He trailed off and thought about his word choice. "What I'm trying to say is that you'll get a magic item." A magic item? I never thought that magical items existed, let alone be able to own one.
"Yeah," he said. "You gotta own a magical item if you want to survive."
Well, that was brilliant. I was sure that there would be no magical item at all that would suit me. Most likely, I would die within a few minutes of a battle. I would rather just sit down in the corner to my own thoughts, reading a book alone with no one to disturb me.
"Don't worry, there'll be something," Percy added. "Besides, we have training here at camp. At night, we have a campfire and sing-along."
I brightened at that. "Can we see the rest of the camp now?" I begged, doing my best puppy-dog face.
He laughed. "You look exactly like me when I do that," he told me. "Fine, let's hurry."
-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-
The rest of the day went by in a flash. I barely got to see Toryn, though, and that sucked. Before we knew it, it was time for the campfire. Percy had showed me the entire camp, including the Oracle of Delphi's cave, and taught me how to control water. All I needed now was a magical weapon.
"Here is where most campers get claimed, at this time, because so many campers are here, and it'll be easier for word to get around," Percy explained.
I sat down, Percy on one side, Toryn on the other. Percy put his arm around Annabeth, and sang along. Suddenly, there was a flash of blinding light.
Toryn suddenly reappeared in the center of the campfire place. A glowing sign appeared above his head. His body started to glow gold. The sign was of a golden bow and arrow crossed with an eighth note.
"What's that?" I hissed to Percy.
"That's the sign of Apollo. Toryn's a son of Apollo," he whispered back to me.
Once again, the centaur, Chiron, knelt down, which I might add was interesting being half horse. Percy motioned for all of us to do the same.
"All hail Toryn Cappella, son of Apollo, god of medicine, music, and poetry, " he called.
After that was over with, Toryn reappeared back next to me. He looked extremely uncomfortable, but looked a lot more at ease. Strange that he was a son of Apollo - Percy said that they loved attention.
"At least I don't have to sleep in the Hermes cabin now," he whispered to me while the camp was singing "This Land is Minos' Land".
"What, was our presence unbearable? C'mon, we only pranked you twice…" The Stolls complained, plopping down next to us.
Toryn rolled his eyes and sarcastically said, "Yeah, I really enjoyed attempting to scrub the permanent marker graffiti off of my bed posts and having to scrape off the remains of my first Camp Half-Blood T-shirt because of the super glue you guys pasted onto the inside of it."
"You enjoyed doing that? Aww, thanks! We thought hard on those pranks. Glad to know you enjoyed being the victim! We'll have to remember to prank you more often!" Connor said sincerely, being the clueless guy he was.
"No, bro, he was being sarcastic. Duh. Wait… uh… er… yeah, I'm fairly sure that he was being sarcastic. You were being sarcastic, right?" Travis smartly asked.
"Ya think?" Toryn replied, hoping that they would take the hint.
"Yeah, I think so." Travis said, sounding distant as if he was contemplating the answer.
Toryn facepalmed and sighed. "No, duh!"
Connor wasn't following this at all. "So...you weren't being sarcastic?"
I was enjoying this quite a bit. The only thing missing was the popcorn and a camera. Toryn sensed my amusement and glared. After a few moments his glare melted into a helpless look. "A little help here?"
I shook my head. This was too much fun to watch.
Toryn frowned, "Some friend you are." I know they shouldn't have, but his words felt like they pierced my heart. Hurt must've shown on my face, because his eyes widened and he quickly said, "No, I didn't mean-"
I cut him off with a wave of my hand, and covered up my feelings with a light laugh. "S'okay." I then turned to the Stoll brothers and decided to help Toryn out a bit. "Guys, what Toryn is trying to say is that he was being sarcastic. Got that? He was being sarcastic. In other words, he doesn't want anymore pranks from you guys." Toryn flashed me a grateful and apologetic smile. I didn't smile back. I think I made the situation worse, because the Stoll brothers' expression screamed 'hurt'. Oops.
A few arguments and begs for forgiveness later, we were finally able to go to sleep. I showered and changed, and realized that Chiron had gotten the harpies to change the beds. My bed looked exactly like Percy's, but it was a bit smaller. Fits, he's seventeen while I'm fourteen.
As I curled up into a little ball (a habit of mine when I'm tired), I whispered to my brother, "G'night, Percy."
He murmured back, already half asleep, "G'night. Lights out."
At his word, the lights in the cabin turned off, enveloping us in a comfortable darkness. I sighed contently and surrendered my conscience to the world of dreams. First day at Camp Half-blood, done. I think I might actually be beginning to believe in this Greek mythological stuff. I'm crazy.
Platinum: This chappies finished! I didn't really do anything this chapter. I was trying to finish my ELA (Aqua: FYI, this is English/Language Arts :) You're welcome.) project, write a story/poem. It's like eleven pages long! Sorry for no updates. We've been caught up with school. Hopefully none tomorrow. Ice rain to the rescue! Thanks to Jack Frost!
Nike: Ikr! This was a collab with acts29forchrist, she did a lot of the writing, and collab was her idea. This is fun! I contributed a lot, including the Stoll brothers scene. Review, please! Cookie! (::)
Aqua: AHEM! HELLO? ME TOO! HI! Sorry, too much caps lock. But I did contribute a lot. acts29forchrist, wanna say anything? I say I think we all did pretty good.
Platinum: (::) (::) (::) Btw, I created a new story on The Aurum Writers account! Check it out! (Oneshot.)
Acts29: Hey! I get to close! Anyways yes, I am really enjoying how this turned out. I don't think this could have been as good as it is without you guys. I just wrote the storyline basically. You guys have the smart Percy Jackson technical skills. (Aqua: Thanks! But without your idea, it would've gone POOF! So, yeah, it's okay for you to take some credit :P) (I've been planning this fan fiction for two years now. I'm just glad to bring it to life.)
Aqua: I don't think you'll get to close! Anyways, bye! (::) *cannonballs off an airplane into a cookie-cano*
Acts29: -sticks tongue out- No! I'm closing! Laters! (::)
Nike: Wait! Aqua, CANO was a Canadian progressive rock band in the 1970s and 1980s, so… is it canoe you're trying to say? Huh, looks like I'm closing! Anyways, Bye! (::) Please review!
Acts29: I'M CLOSING! Bye! We'd love to hear your thoughts on this! REVIEW!
