Chapter 1 The broken boy
(Third Person)
Gabe Ugliano was as ugly as his last name suggests. But his soul was the worst thing about him. It was black enough to have come from the fields of punishments as a reborn spirit, but with his memories still intact. Unfortunately, this was not the case. He was just a hellish man. No matter how he treated people out side of his home, he was a son of a gun who despised his stepson. He had married Sally Jackson, a wealthy 20 year old who for some reason needed a husband. She had found Gabe at the local harware store and told her of the plight that he late husband had died, and she needed to find a husband quickly for some un-stated reason. Gabe didn't give a damn about her or her son. He wanted the money. The way she was found with a bullet in her head across town in the store she worked at? He knew noting about that. He had killed her so that he could get the money. Then he found that she truly had none. To say he had been mad would have been an understatement. A more acurate statement would have been that he exploded with the rage of the earth spliting and cracking his already unstable mindset, the result of many years of drinking. He had been routinely taking out his anger on his murdered wife's son. Her son, Perseus Jackson. Gabe had murdered his wife when Percy was 3, and had tortured him weekly with knive, whips, clubs, brands, fire, and even a few times with a gun. Percy knew nothing of the outside world. He had only seen other people on the T.V.
(Percy's point of view)
I am tired of the pain. I'm so tired of it. All of my life has only been pain for brekfast, pain for lunch, and pain for dinner. I'm fed 1 bowl of rice a day. I have no strength to fight my tormentor Gabe any more. My entire body consits of scars and some more scars. The down side of being with this hell of a man is that I don't know my Mother. Gabe says she got what she had coming to her. In the form of murder by a never caught asailant. Recently I've been seeing things in my dreams. One is of a summer camp with a weird horse guy thing that is teaching 10-20 year olds how to wield swords, axes, knives, bows and oddly enough a spear. But it looks so safe there, and I have a feeling that I am meant to live there. I've also had dreams of a Pit of pure malevolence taunting me. I'm really scared. It is so tiring to go through this hell over and over and over for 8 years. Sometimes I want to just die. But I won't give Gabe the satisfaction of knowing he broke me.
Council meeting under the seas/ Poseidon's living room
"Amphitrite, Triton, there is something you need to know. I broke my oath on the river Styx. I concieved a Child with a mortal" said Poseidon
"YOU DID WHAT" screamed Amphitrite.
Triton was a little more discreet. He immediately charged his father and put his triton to his neck.
Poseidon visibly gulped and said "can we please deal with all of this later? My son is stuck in an abusive house hold and I need to get him rescued from his less than humane treatment."
Amphitrite blew her already short fuse to nothing short of 10 hydrogen bombs " YOU SIRED A CHILD WITH AN ABUSIVE MOTHER? HOW COULD YOU DO THIS TO OUR FAMILY?" At this response from Amphitrite, Triton pricked his fathers skin with his trident, causing golden ichor, the blood of the imortals to flow down his throne and to pool at the base of the throne.
"TRITON REMOVE YOUR TRITON FROM MY NECK THIS INSTANCE!" Bellowed Poseidon. He was already worried for his sons safety and he was trying his best to get to the end of his reasoning what all really happened.
Triton figured if he wanted to stay in one piece at any point in this conversation, he should probably back away.
"Now Amphitrite, I understand that you are upset, but here me out. She embodied the best the sea has to offer, the brilliant sunsets, the strong will, and the calmness of the bays. It was her nature that attracted me to her. Her name was Sally Jackson, and she loved her child enough that she would go find the most disgusting mortal she could so that she couldDivided Soul protect her kid from the monsters and to hide his smell to the monsters. She told said man, named Gabe, that she was a rich widow who needed to find a husband. A few years later, Gabe killed her for asumed insurance money and for the bank account. This was a waste as she had no money or a insurance policy, so he was ridiculously pissed off, and he has been taking it out on Percy since he killed his mother. He has been tortured since the day he turned 3 years old 3 times a day. I am truly sorry, but I would like to send a quest from Chiron to save Percy, and I need you 2 to keep it quiet" He said with his head bowed low.
Poseidon looked up to see his wife glowering in such a towering rage that he had never seen her in. Amphitrite quickly said "This conversation is not over, but I give you my blessing to give Chiron a quest to save your son" This was rapidly followed by Triton voicing his agreement.
Camp Half Blood Chirons point of view
I was playing another round of Pinochle with Dionysus, the sarcastic god of wine and madness. To say that I was surprised when Poseidon, who teleported strait into camp with out warning, appearing into thin air, would be an understatment. Poseidon quickly said, Chrion, rec room, now. I was nervous, generally, when a Olympian is so terse, especially Poseidon, something bad is going on. Something very, very, very bad. So I was very scared to learn that Poseidon had a son, a child very possibly be meant to be the one who saved or razed olympus, and he had been abused for the past 6 years and he might hold a grudge against his father, and olympus. I was even more scared to learn that he wanted a quest to save him. Unfortunately, it was winter, and we had no demigods who would be able to deal with what would very possibly be one of the most emotionally scarring quests they would ever see.
"Lord Poseidon I regret to inform you that you that we couldn't send a quest after your son I said with regret in my eyes and voice" Poseidon seemed to stand there and debate whether or not to drown me, stab me, or freeze me, or a combination of there of. I saw a look of defeat cross his face when I made one last suggestion "Why don't you ask artemis? She could be more than willing to deal punishment to a male who shot a defensless woman and has abused a boy for 8 years."
"Thank you Chiron, that is an excellent idea"
Poseidon's point of view
After finally tracking down Artemis' troop of hunters (which took 5 days just to spite him) he requested entrance to the hunters camp. But he got no answer, and when that happened, he lost his temper. His son had been lashed 50 times with a bull whip, cut 30 to 40 times with a small knife in fleshy parts of percy's body, and a minor slash across his fore head. The huntress queen was refusing to meet with him just because of her petty hatred of men. He was the king of the seas, and she was refusing him while his son would have to survive a night in -15 degree tempratures, with no clothes minus his undergarments, like he had to do every month during the winter. He was furious. No, he was beyond furious. He roared out in the voice that called the kraken to heel, a huricane to stop, and struck fear into the hearts of his enemies, and called out "ARTEMIS, MASTER BOW WIELDER, GODDESS OF THE MOON, HUNT AND VIRGINS COME FORTH"
as soon as he finished his call, she flashed in front of him, sharpening her already razor sharp knives and looking as if she didn't give a damn if he was here or not, she said in a bored tone
"what do you want."
Poseidon just looked at her and said "Since when have you treated me with such disrespect?"
She replied "Since you showed up in my camp and basically said get yourself over here and answer me this instant"
Poseidon just said "Artemis, I am truly sorry for that, but I am not in the best mood right now. I have sired a son since Zues has, and my son has been severly tortured by his stepfather since he killed my sons mother. I was only just made aware of this fact, and the only reason the mortal is not dead is that I can not interfere, but your hunters could. Would you please get my son from his stepfather?"
"Since you have oppologised, and I believe the Stepfather to be guilty, I will save the child. Do not think that I opprove of what you have done, and that it should not have happened. But if the child attempts to flirt with any of my hunters then he will learn the true meaning of pain"
"Thank you Artemis, the seas will always watch your back and try to protect you for as long as my son lives. But be warned, what you see will turn your stomach."
"Thank you for the warning lord Poseidon. Please leave my camp now so my hunters don't get antsy and shoot you full of arrows"
"Leave you I shall then. But rescue my son as soon as possible for his safety" with these words Poseidon vanished into a puff of sea water.
Percy's point of view
I'm tired. So tired. And I hurt everywhere. And I'm cold. Really, really, really cold. I just wanna curl up and go to sleep for ever...
1 month later Zoes's point of view
Why on earth do we need to rescue some disgusting male from another disgusting male? Oh wait, because lord poseidon, another male, wanted us to. That is bullshit. We are hunters, not masked vigilante's in a city saving some gods blasted boy. And we certainly are not the solvers of boys problems, not now or ever. Even though milady was asked exactly one month ago to save the boy, she has waited a month to spite Poseidon. It truly cannot be as bad a Poseidon made it out to be. No male would do that to another male.
"What are you thinking about Zoe?" Asked Phoebe
"Just thinking how much of a waste of time this is. It is cold, I'm tired, and I'm using 1000's of years of experience to save a boy."
"It is a waste of time. Lets just get this over with so that we can go home and eat. I'm hungry" stated a very pissed off Phoebe.
"Right lets get him and leave."
third persons point of view
Both hunters burst into the house of Gabe Ugliano. And saw something that distrubed both of them. There was blood everywhere. It was dried blood, frech blood, several years old blood. There was no possible way that so much blood could have come from one person. Gabe Ugliano had stopped living in the house many years ago, and there was no sign of the child the hunters were sent to rescue. Where was he?
Percy's point of view
Gabes a meany. A few years ago he got a lot of money. With the money he went and bought a house for him self to beat me up outside of peoples notice. The night before I go outside I had a dream. It wasn't bad, which is good. But in this dream I saw 2 girls, I thought any ways, looking around our apartment and they had looks of horror on their faces. They then turned on the sink, made a rainbow, then said Oh Iris goddess of rain bows please except my offering, show me Artemis godess of the hunt, moon and virgins. Quickly a woman appeared in the mist and she looked at the background of the place and said "WHAT THE HADES HAPPENED?"
"We went to the apartment that you sent us to. This is what we saw. There are knives, whips, spears, brands lying around everywhere in here. We need to find him, and we need to find him now." said the girl.
"I will contact Poseidon right now. Iris, would you mind making this a three way call? And while your at it, Iris, would you be willing to show me Poseidon?"
The man named Poseidon, when he learned that the hunters were now in the house of his son, pretty died from happiness. What I thought, that couldn't be possible. It's me and Gabes house. And I don't have a daddy.
"Lord Poseidon" the girl who originally started this weird rainbow thing said, "your son is not here. We don't know where he is, and there is nothing to indicate where he would be. We hoped that you would know where he is?"
"Shit, he's probably in Vermont in the cabin that his stepfather has. That is the only other place I know of that he could be."
"The lady in the other message said, Zoe, go there as fast as you can. I know that place in vermont. It is full of monsters and other things. It is also brutally cold, and he might freeze there. So get there as fast as you can."
Then the dream ended
Seeing that dream gave me a little bit of hope. I knew it to be false, but there was hope there. And I have begun to live on hope and prayers to what ever higher beings there are.
12:00 at night in vermont, Zoe's point of view
THAT MALE TRASH. HOW DARE HE ABUSE SUCH A YOUNG CHILD. THE KID IS BARELY 6 DAMN IT. Roared Zoe in her mind. When she got her hands on that son of a bitch, there will be Hades to pay. Zoe was startled out of her thoughts when Phoebe came up behind her and said
"We're here. Whats the plan."
The cabin was a 3 roomed, normal sized house. It had a heavy oaken door, with iron arm bands reinforcing the door. There was bars covering all of the windows in the house, with steel.
"Phoebe, we're going to do this the fun way. We are breaking down the door, and going in shooting anything that moves, then"
"Wait, there's something moving out there" whispered Phoebe
"and then wait what?" I said getting way to deep into killing Gabe.
"There is something moving. And it's small" repeated Phoebe
"Let's go check it out." I whispered
When Zoe got there she was shocked. It was a brown lump. It wasn't moving. It looked like a rock. It acted like a rock, and then I noticed something. It had perfectly strait lines going from the back all the way to the side. It had a twisted ridge going all the way down the top of the rock thing to the bottom. I saw a few characters carved into the side of the rock thing. No rock had such things on it. Then I noticed something. It was shaking, ever so slightly, and the top was barely moving. I slowly sneaked to the other side of of the clearing. I saw something that made my blood run cold. There was frozen liquid coming from the rock. And it was red. That was when I realized that this was no rock. It was a human. Without clothes. In the middle of winter of vermont. When Phoebe noticed my expression, she came strait over. I was to horrifed to do anything but point. Phoebe then whispered
"What do we do?"
As soon as she said this, the boy started screaming.
"Please stop Gabe, I'll be a good boy. I won't fight back any more. PLEASE!"
Once this started, Gabe came out on his front porch holding a gun in his hand screaming
"SHUT UP YOU DAMNED NUISANCE. I GAVE YOU A HOME! I FED YOU. YOU HAVE NO RIGHT TO PLEAD FOR MERCY. One more peep outa you and your gonna meet mister gunsmoke."
After hearing this, the boy, who I was pretty sure was unconcious, quited down and started whimpering.
"THAT IS IT. HERE HE COMES!"
After that, Phoebe snapped. She drew an arrow, shot him in the both knees, his elbows, his hips and shoulders. He fell backwards, and Phoebe stomped up to him, glowing with an angry red and calming silver light. "The blessings of Artemis and Ares" I whispered in awe. Let me explain. Phoebe was the result of a affair between Ares and Nike. But Nike never gave her any power, so lord Ares made her twice as powerfull as his other children. To stop a war on olympus, Phoebe joined the hunters. Joining the hunters gave her the blessing of Artemis, and, combined, they were powerfull enough to probably challenge herucles in an arm wrestilng match and win. With that particular combination of blessings, her weapons could kill five or six monsters in one go, then go through 2-5 trees. I was amazed by the fact that he was still standing
Phoebe ran so fast that it was like she was teleporting. The boy had woken up and was looking on in a mixture of fear, and somemore fear., and horror.
Phoebe roared out her challenge, sounding more like a erymanthian boar in full battle rage than that of a 13 year old looking girl.
I PHOEBE, HUNTER OF ARTEMIS BRING YOU TO TRIAL BEFORE ARTEMIS! And with that she grabed Gabe and teleported to Artemis' camp. I sighed. Looks like it was my job to deal with the boy. Milliseconds later Phoebe reapeared with a look of tender love on her face, something I never thought I would see on the face of any hunter, much less Phoebe.
Perseus point of view.
I woke up to the sound of a gun hammer being clicked back. I whimpered. I was going to die tonight. I decided I would look up and meet my death at least on my knees, not on my face. As I pulled my self up I saw 8 arrows flying through the air. Only thought I had was 'not this again'. I've been shot by arrows before. Thankfully Gabe can't shoot to save his life. And they were coming from the opposite direction. I watched in a mixture of horror and fear as one of the girls in my dreams ran up to Gabe, who at this point had arrows in his shoulders, arms, hips and legs. The girl shouted something I couln't understand and she then vanished with my stepfather. I looked around and suddenly she was right next to me with an emotion I don't know. She looked like she actually cared about something that she liked a lot. I was sad because there was no way that I would be the object of anything similar to that feeling.
After about 2 seconds I said
"P-p-p-please don't hurt me"
She looked at me with a smile on her face as she said
"I would never do that, and neither will she, as long as you don't give her a huge reason to." she said glaring at the other girl.
"Who a-a-a-a-are you p-p-p-p-people" he chattered.
"Oh styx, we gotta get you outa here. I'm gonna take you to a nice lady who will help you ok?"
"O-o-o-ok"
Artemis point of view, while Phoebe is talking to Percy
Phoebe had just brought a vile man into my camp. I literally had to look at the last hour of his life to know that he was going to be killed by my hunters, and be tortured in the evilest part of Hades for the rest of eternity. This was saying something because no one had ever achieved such a thing, including pschopaths, serial killers, and other abominations. And that was based off of the last 1 hour of his life which was disturbing to say the least. My hunters were going to have a field day with him when I get them together.
Suddenly Phoebe teleported into the hunts group and she had Zoe touching her shoulder, and a boy gripped tightly in a fierce bear hug. The boy looked to be about 7, with nothing wrong with him in the harsh winter sun that Apollo had sent down to plague the east coast for one of his sons getting hurt, or so he said. But on second inspection of the boy, there was everything wrong with him. His eyes had a square carved into the whites of his eyes, he had two X's across his eye and across the eye lid. He had a permanent frown carved into his face. The top of his head had no hair, his naturally tan skin black with burn scars, he had a crescent moon of spikes for his ears. He had an L carved from his forehead all the way down to his lip where it then shot off to the left cheek. That was only his face. His arms were a criscross of scars, burns and disturbingly exposed, dry bone. His abs were what horrified me the most though. He had the words You are mine carved into his flesh, and he had a rail road of scars, with the 'ties' of the rail road being a series of slash marks, and the 'rails' being made of burns. His back had multiple arrow and stab wounds, some of them still bleeding. His spine wasn't strait, and he had ridge after ridge after ridge of whiping scars. He had bullet holes in his legs, some bleeding, and some scars. He had no fingers. I was horrified by what the man infront of me had done. I was devastated by what I saw. I turned to the man and roared. Prepare to meet hades as I drew my bow and shot him over 200 times in less than a second. He was dead by the time that I shot him a second time, but I poured all of my quiver into him, causing his sould as much pain as he had ever caused to the child.
Phoebe point of view
"Artemis, your scaring Perseus" I said. I was rather shocked that she was taking it this bad. I had never seen a person, much less a child, so horribly scarred, but Artems was taking it out on the man who tortured perseus with uncharachteristic anger and rage. Artemis took one look at Perseus hiding behind a bush and said
"Perseus come here. I'm gonna bring a friend here to help heal you ok?"
"Heal? What does that mean?" asked Percy. In a weird whisper hiss. (A/N this is his voice until said other wise)
"It means those things that hurt you/ they will go away and stop hurting." said Artemis
"Apollo, could you come down here please?" asked Artemis
"Hey sis, ladies, guy... HOLY STYX, HADES, POSEIDON, AND ZUES. What happened here little guy?" asked a horrified Apollo.
I noticed something as soon as Apollo said that. He only sort of flirted with us, and once he saw Perseus his joking, easy going manner disappeared. He became the healer, not the player that we all had come to hate. He even disregarded Artemis' respectfull aproach to him, not demanding how she normally does.
After Percy saw Apollo teleport in, start talking, he fainted. I immediately dashed forward and caught Perseus, put him on the ground and told Apollo "do what you can, now" in a steely tone that even Zues would have found commanding. Apollo, needless to say, went strait into his examination, then he shot healing energy into every scar on Perseus, which was all of him, and only the frozen over wounds that he had sustained were healed. Nothing else was. What were supposed to be his fingers stayed missing. His hair stayed burnt. His arms were still disfigured.
"Sis, I've done all I can. The weapons used to inflict this damage were either dipped in different poisons, or they were enchanted by a god or titan. Considering that the wounds aren't showing signs of festering, I have to say that some power being, titan or god, blessed these weapons. I don't know who or how or when, but I know that it was blessed by a titan. I'm sorry that this is all I could do." With that the god of the sun, plague, prophecy, and archery teleported out.
Once Apollo was gone, Perseus got up and said, with a massive smile gracing his face
"I DON'T HURT ANYMORE WAHOO!"
"Perseues, calm down, your not fully healed, your nerves are just healed" Artemis said in her normal business like tone.
As soon as Perseus heard Artemis, he immediately got scared and started to cringe. In my head I'm just going "what the hades? How long has he been tourtured?" so I decided to ask him.
"Percy, how long was Gabe mean to you?"
"I don't remember. All of my life I think?"
That would explain it then. All he knows is pain and torture. He doesn't know kindness from anyone, and if your not happy, in his brain you must be mad by default.
"Perseus, could you just hear Lady Artemis out please?"
"O-o-o-ok. But could you p-p-p-please not call me Perseus? That is what Gabe called me, and I don't like it" stated the now dubbed Percy.
"Well now Percy, I think I know someone who could help you with your specific problems." said Artemis
"What problems Lady Artemis"
"Well one of those could be your fingers. And on your arms you could get something to guard your arms. Plus if you get hit hard on any part of you, you will bleed, and we can't have that now can we"
"No mam we can't" said Percy worriedly
"Lady Artemis, If I may speak said a hunter. We have retrieved the boy. Why don't we send him to that wretched camp? We no longer are obligated to do anything to help him."
"That may be Kylee, but this boy has been abused, and the camp may very well break him. You know how the Ares cabin is. No more discussion. I'm taking him if he permits it, and he will be coming back with me. So Percy, do you want to go?"
After getting an encouraging nod from me, he said
"Ok I'll go."
Grab my hand Percy, and we'll be there in no time.
Artemis Point of view
Once we got to Hephaestus Palace, Percy just looked around, amazed. Hephaestus palace is effectively just a giant smithy. I knocked on the door and an automaton came up to me and said "You are not welcome here. Please leave." Percy was horrified by this giant, walking, talking brown man. He was hiding behind my leg. I internally sighed. This was going to take awhile. I said to the automaton "Let us in. I have an urgent need to see lord Hephaestus. Besides, I might have a good project for him."
"Fine, come this way lady Artemis."
Percy continued to grab onto my leg. I was disturbed. I had to really focus to even feel him on my leg. He at most weighed a whole 20lbs. For a six year old. I would have to make sure he ate, and that my hunters didn't hit him. While distracted by these thoughts, I arrived into the main chamber of the work shop. And I saw a pair of grizzled legs peeking out from under a 78' corolla.(A/n: this was a random number) I yelled over the din of the work shop "HEPHAESTUS! I THINK I HAVE A JOB FOR YOU!"
"What'dya want atremis. I'm busy and need to get this done" He grunted.
"Come out and see. I'm pretty sure what you would create to solve this particular problem could be one of your best inventions ever."
"Really" he said sliding out from under the ancient looking car.
"Yes. The problem is simple.. The boy who is gripping my leg is a very unfortunate son of poseidon, who was abused by a mortal man and-"
"How is this my problem?"
"This is not you problem, but, with the severity of the childs injuries, the only thing I can think of to help him is to either kill him, or bring him to you. Take a look."
"Could I not be killed please?" said a tiny voice that you had to struggle to hear over the din of the work shop. That was when I noticed something horrifying. He had slits over his throat so that it wouldn't kill him, but he had a large amount of small slashes across his throat that made his voice sound like a hiss.
"HOLY MUTHAFOOKING ZUES AND HERA. Yeah I'll help you." said Hephaestus. Little did I know that Hephaestus was deeply disturbed by the damage that had been done by Gabe. And that is after a healing by Apollo. Add in the fact that this was the god who was thrown off of Olympus for heavens sakes because he was to ugly. It was that bad.
"What do you need" I asked.
"Orthrytic silver, olympic silver, celestial bronze, imperial gold, stygian iron, stygian ice... You know what screw it. Bring me every precious metal on the planet to me as fast as possible, including all the metals known to Olympus."
"Thank you little brother." I said solemly. I was going to need some help getting all of that together.
3rd Person point of view.
After sending Percy to the hunters camp, as he had fallen asleep in the workshop, Artemis called a meeting between herself, Apollo, and Poseidon. Once all three got together, Artemis told them what to get and why. After hearing the explanations given, the three seperated to get the metals. Meanwhile at the camp of Artemis...
Phoebe's Point of view.
I had rounded up the rest of the huntreses, and had rather quickly explained what me and Phoebe saw in the apartment we had raided and what Percy had been doing when we rescued him. To say that they were pissed off would have been an understatement. More like nuclear bombs would be more accurate. After they all calmed down, one of them asked the million drachma question.
"Is the boy" she spat boy as if the worst insult, "going to be sticking around?"
"I honestly have no idea. But when he returns, you will be nice to him. He has been though the closest thing to the fields of punishment minus the for all eternity bit. I'm not going to ask you to like him, but treat him with respect. If I see any of you touch him any more than necessary, Lady Artemis won't even have a spirit left to send to the underworld, am I understood." Zoe was ominously cracking her knuckles while I was saying this.
There were a series of yes' coming from all over the room. I noticed 2 girls, Liz and Britney or brit for short, who didn't say anything. Judging by their faces I could tell that they weren't happy with my proclamation. In fact, I I looked close enough to see their eyes, I thought I could make out a look of fiery determination and anger deep in their eyes, but that wouldn't be possible, right? Then I noticed something else. Brit was the one who said that asked the question. A very close eye on them I was certainly going to have to keep. Then I heard a terrified scream come from one of the tents. All of the hunters were here, who could it be?
Percy's p.o.v(point of view)
The weird place that Miss Artemis told me would help me was very nice. It was chaotic, full of clanging metal, and it sounded so nice that I feel asleep to the pretty pretty noise. I suddenly woke up and when I did, it was very scary. I was in a weird place that smelled really foresty. And there were heads all over the place. There were bear heads, lion heads, monkey heads, puma heads, ferret heads, and allot of other heads that I didn't know what they were. I just started screaming my head off, thinking, is this where I'm going to die? Cause I really don't wanna. Just then the door to the room bust open and miss phoebe. And she said
"When'd you get here?"
Phoebe p.o.v
"When'd you get here?" I asked the cowering mass of scars.
"I just showed up here! This isn't my fault! PLEASE DON'T KILL ME PLEASE!" He screamed.
"Who said anything about killing? Because I certainly won't." I said
"THEN WHY IS EVERYTHING IN HERE DEAD! You your your going to kill me aren't you" he said breaking down and crying softly to himself.
"No, I would never do something like that to you. Can I come over Percy?"
"Y-y-y-yeah..."
"Thank you. How about you come over here and give me a hug? I promise it will make you feel better. Much better."
"What's a hug?" he asked.
"Here, let me show you."
Did I seriously just offer to hug any one? Much less a boy for god's sake. But I have to remember that this boy has seriously only seen the evils of one person, and that bastard that tortured percy is literally his entire experience with humanity. All of this flashed through my mind as I approached Percy. Apparently he had seen this before, and he pretty much freaked out and started crying. I discarded this and wrapped him up in my arms. He was shaking uncontrollably. I hesitantly put my hand on his back and started rubbing it soothingly. I also started whispering "it's Ok, It's ok, I got you, it's all alright" into his ear. Where did that come from? I'm a child of Ares, and raised by Artemis. I'm not supposed to be able to have a heart towards any one, especially towards a male. But here I sit, comforting a poor poor boy. I think I sat there for several hours just comforting him. After a while he calmed down and once he did he said
"I'm good can you let go of me please?"
"You sure?"
"yeah I'm sure." Suddenly the hunt brust into the tent and screamed
"PHOEBE! We're so glad that your safe and that there is nothing wrong with you. The weather was going beserk out here! There was a hurricane, and earthquake, and a thunderstorm going all at the same time! And why are you hugging the boy?" A snarling hunter snarled boy as it is litterally the worst thing she can think of.
"Anastasia I'm hugging the boy because he appeared here into the trophy room, here, and when he realized everything in here was dead he freaked out because he thought we were going to kill him. I think I know part of the reason that the weather was beserk though. I believe it is because that Percy, the son of Poseidon was so upset that he caused the hurricane and the earthquake. No idea about the electrical storm though. Maybe Zues is pissed off?" I said.
"Why are you hugging him. He's a male, he deserves all the pain in the world." She practically roared the last part."
At this proclamation Percy started crying and whimpering again. After I calmed him down and he fell asleep, I brought him to my personal tent and laid him to bed. After words I came out and saw the hunt sitting there and they looked royally pissed off. Except for Zoe, she looked like she got why she was doing what she was doing. One of the hunters stood up and said that they thought I should get kicked out of the hunt for the compassion I was showing a lowly male. Others argued back saying that I should stay and what I was doing was right. After about 10 minuets of this Zoe lost her cool and roared
"SHUT THE HADES UP. LADY ARTEMIS DECIDES ALL OF THE THINGS WE'RE ARGUING ABOUT. HOW ABOUT SHE PASSES JUDGEMENT!"
Artemis p.o.v.
After I gathered the metals I needed to get together, I teleported back onto Olympus hoping that Poseidon would be there with his metals, and that Apollo would soon be back. Surprisingly, Apollo and Poseidon where already there along with a mountain of metal ingots. I brought mine over and called hephaestus to come and look at what we gathered. I was quite happy when Hephaestus appeared immediately. He looked at the mountain of metal, and said
"Excellent. Now I have the Metal needed to help young Perseus. Now unfortunately I can only do four things for Perseus. I can only make him fingers and protect his ridiculously strong skin bones and organs from more damage, and fix his eyes to see much better than a normal mortals. Now I'm goi-"
"Wait a moment" I interupted. "How do you know that his bones organs and skin and muscle are rididculously strong?"
"Oh, I have a scanner that instantly scans any mortal that comes into my palace to make sure they can withstand the heat. It also checks up on their entire body structure, just to learn more about them and look at their design to see if I could add anything to my automatons. And I have to say, Perseus has possibly the strongest bones and pretty much anything I can measure that I've ever seen. Now back to what I can do for Perseus. I can build him fingers that will require some of his blood to function, but they will then be able to move as normal fingers. I'll make 5 sets of fingers. One of celestial bronze, one of mortal steel, one of olympic silver, one of atlantean steel, and one of imperial gold. They will be in the form of guantlets, and will allow Perseus to kill what ever the heck he wants to with his bare hands. I will also make another pair of guantlets that will be a combination of all of these metals. Those will be very dangerous and I will need to know that he is trust worthy enough to wield them, so I'll with hold them for now."
"Thank you so much Hephaestus. This is the most you've ever done for any of my sons. The seas will answer to your call whenever you need." Said Poseidon.
"Now, I can also do something else, but it will hurt like Tartarus. I'm thinking of giving the boy my blessing of withstanding heat, then pouring molten metal into the places where his bone is exposed. Even with my blessing, it will hurt, a ton."
"HADES NO. THAT IS NOT HAPPENING TO MY SON AFTER WHAT HAPPEND TO HIM." Roared a blistering angry king of the seas.
"Why don't we let Perseus decide whats to happen to him shall we?" I calmly said.
"Now if we're done with the interuptions, this is how I'll fix his eye's. Unless you haven't noticed, he has deeply messed up vison. I'm amazed he can walk strait. I'm going to make a pair of self healing eyes that can see twice as well as the eyes of an eagle. I'll also try to make them look normal, with sea green lights instead of the red ones seen in mortal movies. For the problem of his throat,I'm going to create a voice scanner about as large as the slash marks going up and down his throat. The scanner will replicate Perseus' voice from his age and for his emotions. That is all I can do. I can't think of a way of fixing his back or his visibly distrubing array of scars that will make Ares look pretty as a woman who has never frowned. I'm sorry."
"Thank you Hephaestus. I'm going to get Perseus and ask him what he wants you to fix on him first. I'm assuming that even you can't fix all of the damage done to Perseus in only one night?"
"Correct, I can probably finish his molten body thing in a few hours, I could most likely do the new eyes in 2 days, the voice in a week, and the voice patch, probably 3 days." Answered Hepaestus.
"Alright, then I will get Perseus."
Hunters camp, Artemis P.O.V
After I flashed into the camp, I was stunned. My hunters were sitting on two sides of the fire, glaring at each other. Some on the Left included Phoebe and Zoe, and on the Right were Anastasia and Jill.hours listening to this song
Ugh I thought. This probably has something to do with Perseus.
"Girls, what is the problem here." I said.
"THE PROBLEM HERE IS THAT PHOEBE IS GETTING CLOSE TO THE MALE." Roared Anastasia.
hours listening to this song
"And that is a problem because?" I asked.
"HE'S A MALE. THEY'RE ALL TERRIBLE BEINGS WHO SHOULD NOT EXIST. AND HE SHOULDN'T BE HERE. WE HAVE HIM, WE NEED TO TAKE HIM TO CAMP AND GET RID OF HIM" Answered Anastasia.
"Anastasia, do you know how we found Perseus?" Asked Zoe, one of my most level headed huntreses.
"No, but I doubt it matters, he's just a disgusting pig like the rest of men are."
"Me and Phoebe found him with fresh bullet wounds, outside, during winter, in the middle of the night with only a loin cloth. And as we came out, when we heard him wimpering, his torturer was standing there yelling something about Percy being a pain while he was about to shoot him some more. Percy has seen abuse that would make many people break, yet he's not broken, his mind is intact."
"Oh" was all Anastasia said at the end of Zoe's little rant.
"So if that's out of the way, then I'm going to take Perseus up to Olympus to see about removing some of his disabilities less of a disability."
"Milady, could I fetch perseus? I'm not sure how he'll take seeing you again after you flashed him to the trophy room, where he then proceeded to think that we were going to kill him. Could I just come with you to the tent?"
Yes, but bring Percy back out here pretty quickly.
Phoebe's tent, Phoebe P.O.V.
I really hope that percy doesn't freak out when I come in right now. As I opened the flap on the door, I saw Percy writhing in the bed in agony, but I was unable to do anything to stop him from doing looked like the boy was stuck in an endless nightmare of pain and torture. But he was silent the entire time. How is that possible? Then it struck me. Percy was abused for being to loud, so if he had an nightmare and if he cried out, he would be hurt even more. Deciding to not let the nightmare continue, I stepped in and started rubbing his back and one of his hands that was exposed from the ball that he was curled up in. After about two minuets, he got up and said.
"Where am I?" with that weird voice of his.
"Your in my tent, perfectly safe right now Percy" I whispered.
"Oh. Ok. What's safe mean?" he asked, very confused.
"It means that your not going to be hurt any more, while a condition is met. Now Lady Artemis wants to see you to help with getting rid of your scars."
"Okay, but you have to come. Because I don't know where I'm going with out you."
"I'll come Percy, don't worry."
I'll go with him? What am I thinking? I have never been this friendly to anyone in my 2 thousand years in the hunt besides Zoe. What is this boy? He seems to be hell bent on changing most anything he can. Artemis is showing compassion to someone out of her hunters, I'm showing and emotion besides anger, and Zoe is being nice to a boy. What is the world coming to? And all because of a boy in the hunt.
As we walked out side, I noticed that Percy's eyes were a little weird. Besides the amount of scars and spots of open bone around his face, the whites of his eyes had a series of red squares going around his irises. Maybe that is why he can't see very well.
"Thank you Phoebe for bringing Percy to me. Come over here Percy. We're going to go to Olympus and visit your cousin Hephaestus to see what he can do to help you." Artemis said in a business like tone.
Percy was cowering behind my leg when he said
"Only if Miss Phoebe comes lady Artemis. Cause I'm scared."
"Of course miss Phoebe can come" Artemis said with a smile of understanding.
With that Artemis flashed us all onto Olympus. I've been to Olympus multiple times, but I had only come here with Artemis and slept in her temple on a few scattered occasions. But right now we were outside of a giant smithy, which looked massive and horrifying. Percy seemed right at home with it all though. He was calmer than I had seen him, seemingly at home with the massive pieces of machinery. It was honestly kind of strange. The son of Poseidon, at home with the fires of the forge? Weird. Then Hephaestus flashed in right in front of Percy. That freaked Percy out pretty dang bad, while I was sorta PO'd. But all of my anger rapidly disappeared when Hephaestus, the god with the most obvious sociall problems started talking to Percy in tone I did not think the gruff god of the forge could use.
Hephaestus P.O.V.
I really like young Perseus I thought. He reminds me of myself when I was young and thrown off of olympus by father. It scared me and I didn't talk for some time afterwards, same as Persesus seems to do. In fact he reminds me of one of my sons that I had back in Greece, named tray. Tray suffered intense emotionall abuse and he was one of the most loyal children I've ever had. Breaking myself out of my thoughts of Tray, whom I still miss, I said to young Perseus.
"Perseus I would like t-"
"Don't call me perseus please mister? My name is Percy now."
"Okay Percy, I can do somethings to help you out a little bit alright? I can build you eyes so you can see better, I can help you talk normally again, I can cover your bones and other severly damaged parts of you with molten flowing metal. Now that will hurt rather allot, but I swear on the river styx that after you'll hurt far less after words than you do now. Or I could build you some gauntlets that will give you your fingers back, as well as the ability to hurt monsters like Gabe with your bare hands. Which would you like me to do first?"
"Could we do the molten metal thing first? That one sounds like the best one." said Percy.
I was majorly surprised. That was the one that I thought I would have to persuade Percy into doing. The huntress looked at Percy like she had never seen him before, which was strange because he was hanging onto her leg just a few seconds ago. She looked like she was going to say something about his apparently taking a bath in molten metal, but when she caught the glare that Artemis was giving her, she didn't say any thing.
"Percy, how about I give you my blessing? It will make you fire proof as well as the abilities of lighting metal on fire, and extreme forging skills." I decided to give him my almost full blessing, with out the being able to light himself on fire or throwing fire balls. What, he impressed me!
"That sounds weird. Why would I need to be able to light metal on fire as well as be fire resistant?"
"We live in a dangerous world Percy, very dangerous. Sometimes having a specific ability is the line between life and death." I said.
"Ok, that sounds good." He said happily.
"I Hephaestus, god of the forge, here by bless Perseus Achilles Jackson with being fire proof, the gift of flaming metal, and amazing forging skills to match my own. He will still need to learn the more advanced techiniques though. Since that is now out of the way, why don't we get down to pouring molten metal into your worst scars and into the exposed bone." With that me and Percy took our leave of the huntresses.
Artemis P.O.V.
I'm positively stunned. Hephaestus normally hates talking to any one, especially young children. But he seemed right at home with Percy, talking to him and blessing him. I certainly did not expect Hephaestus to bless Percy. Being a child of the big three made Percy unbelivably powerful. With the ability to control flames along metals, he was becoming powerful. If one were to get on his bad side when he was older.. I shudder to think of what would happen if someone else were to bless Percy. I see Percy as a favored nephew, but I don't know why. He just seems to be a happy child, even with all of the pain that he has had to go through. It reminds me of my desire to have children of my own who would look up to me. But that will never happen, seeing as I hate all men and that I would have to break my maiden vow. Maybe I could adopt... Phoebe quickly broke me out of my internal musings when she said
"Percy is certainly strange isn't he milady"
"He certainly is, isn't he. It feels like 20 minuets ago he was freaking out over coming with me without you, yet he is bringing out the good, talkative side of Hephaestus that hasn't been seen by the gods for over a millenia. Percy surely is different than any one I have ever met."
"What do you think makes Percy so comfortable around the god of the forge?" asked Phoebe, clearly agitated by something.
"I would have to say seeing someone who looks even similarly scarred as he does, along with the aura of just survive another day that the two seem to contiuously put out."
That didn't satisfy my second oldest huntress that joined about 200 years after Zoe did. She then asked me something that I thought to never hear from her.
"Milady, every time I see Percy, I just want to make him happy, to alleviate his sadness, to make him feel better. I want to be there when he does something well, to be there when everything is going wrong for him. I'm prepared to be there when he does something bad and he has to be corrected. Am I falling for a six year old milady?"
I had to say I was feelling pretty disturbed as I heard her say what she was saying, but when she said she wanted to be there to help correct him, I was relieved. I then told her what she was feeling.
"Phoebe, what your feeling is the need to take the mothership mantle in his life. I'm feeling the same way, and I'm 90% sure that Zoe is feeling the same thing. I think Percy is going to have 3 mothers in his life. And with the horrors that he's seen, it'll probably be for the best. He's going to have some explaining to do on why he choose the most painful possible 'modification' fot the first."
"Yes, yes he will muttered Phoebe."
4hrs later.
Percy walked into the front room of the workshop truly happy for the first time in his life. I was surprised. It appears that Percy, or a hopeful adopted son of mine, gets along very well with his cousin. And the change in Hephaestus. He looked young again, and his eyes held a smirk so reminiscent of Poseidon. It was pretty odd actually. I looked at Percy, and was stunned by the transformation. What had once been bleach white bone was now beams of celestial bronze, blueish atlantean steel, and Stygian iron. And I had to say, he looked like he could easily destroy allot of somethings using his bare wrists now that the scars no longer mutilated his arms and legs. Then Hephaestus told Percy to raise his shirt. It was amzing. His back was no longer ridge after ridge after ridge of scar tissue, but it looked like he had lines of flesh in between plates of an alloy of celestial bronze, stygian iron, and atlantean steel. He looked, whole, like that is what he was meant to be. I was happy for him, and I could see the same happiness that I had for Percy glittering in Phoebe's eyes. I guess we were going to talk about Percy's decision later then. I approached Percy but before I could Hephaestus aproached me and told me in detail what he'd done to Percy. With Percy's brain, which was unusually acute for a son of Poseidon, Hephaestus had managed to make the metals fuse with his blood, and they acted like faster moving, stronger, impenetrable muscles. They were also in a self healing, in case they did get cut or hurt. I must say I'm impressed. I then told Percy.
"It's time to go back to camp Percy. That sound good?"
"Ok Miss Artemis. By uncle Hepaestus." said Percy in his weird hiss of his voice.
I looked at Hephaestus and mouthed "Uncle?"
He mouthed back "Better than cousin"
As I reached out to touch Percy's shoulder, he reached up and stuck his stub of a wrist into my hand while he stuck his other wrist into Pheobe's. ( He doesn't have fingers yet.) I was surprised, but happy to say the least, he liked me enough to put one of his not so mangled stubs into me and Phoebe's hands. I can honestly say that I was pretty happy right now. But it was time to leave Hephaestus to what ever he had to do next. So I flashed me, Percy, and Phoebe into the hunters camp.
Hunters camp, Zoe P.O.V.
Milady has been gone for several hours. The hunters are getting along much better since she came in and settled the dispute. Suddenly there was a flash near the campfire, and I saw Percy, who looked like more metal than six year old, who was holding 'hands' with Phoebe and Artemis. I was so happy once I saw that. It meant Percy was slowly getting over his terror of any one besides Phoebe and me. It made really happy. Percy seemed like a perfect child, but he needed a mother or a big sister in his life. Artemis sat a small distance away from the hunters, and motioned over to me. She had just put Percy into a black tent that just appeared, I'm guessing to go to bed. Then Milady started the weirdest conversation I've ever had in my immortal life.
"Zoe, do you feel the need to mother Percy?"
"That's a good name for what I'm feeling, why?"
"Because me and Phoebe feel the same way, and we would like to give Percy 2 mothers in his life. We were wondering if you felt the same because he could probably use a third in his life."
"Yes, I'd be more than willing, when are we going to bring it up to Percy?" I said with a feeling of such incredible joy that I couldn't understand it.
"We were thinking tomorrow morning after breakfast when the hunters normally go to shoot arrows." Said Phoebe.
"Sounds good to me. Lets do it then."
With that determined, we all headed off to bed.
Percy P.O.V.
When I got up out of the weird box thingy with the bed, I went to find Phoebe. Or Zoe. Or Miss Artemis. I found them looking around really really fast for something. I said hi, and asked to look with them, but they aren't hearing me. They only noticed me when I jumped infront of Miss Artemis who then said.
"I found him!"
Oh, they were looking for me. I guess that makes sense.
I was then pulled into a big hug by all three nice big girls. I was surprised. Yesterday they only liked me, now they were pulling me into a massive hug? I thought hugs were for people you liked allot. That means that they all like me! Horray! Cause I really like them to. They pulled me onto a brown bar that looked like the anvils in Hephaestus work shop. Then Miss Artemis started to talk.
"Percy, me, Zoe and Pheobe want to talk to you about something. It's really important that you listen to me ok?" She said worriedly.
"Okay, I'll try to listen really really close."
She smiled when I said that. Then she said that the three really nice girls wanted to be my mommies. That really nice of them I was so happy that I pulled all three of them into a really big hug and started chanting.
"I have three mommies, I have three mommies, I have three mommies" Over and over and over again. They started laughing after I said that. They laugh really pretty.
Artemis P.O.V.
He said he has three mommies! And I'm one of them! That is awesome!. Now how to tell the hunters that a boy will be staying with them for all of eternity...