"It takes a great deal of bravery to stand up to your enemies, but a great deal more to stand up to your friends."
~Dumbledore, Harry Potter~
Then what's to be said about standing up to your brother?
They weren't the best brothers.
Travis and Connor Stoll were always the comedic relief, and it was a proud and noble tradition passed down from their father who was the jester amongst the gods and bla bla bla…
It actually sucked. Quite a bit in fact, and a large part of that was because they didn't need to be.
Hermes was more than the comedic relief; he was the messenger, the helper of heroes, benefactor to humanity. And yes, Percy Jackson, they did in fact understand the irony in the sons of the god of thieves being named Stoll. Like they never heard that before, dumbass… Whatever, it was a good life. Mostly, at any rate, it just could've been better at some points.
Sure, Connor deeply resented Travis for being taller, and always coming first, and for always being paired up with Katie Gardener. They BOTH annoyed her, how come he was ignored?! Not like he was looking for a threesome or anything. That would be weird… and stuff. He just wished he was more than his brother's shadow.
Oh, and Travis continually had the burden of the big brother, always taking the blame for his younger brother's individual mischief. Contrary to popular belief, they weren't joined at the hip. Except maybe that one time where the Aphrodite Cabin sewed them into a dress together. But that didn't count. He just wished he was more than an extension of his brother.
In the end though, they stuck together because that's what brothers do. Sure, it's acceptable for sisters to be at each other's throats until there's a bad breakup and then suddenly they're reunited in a war against all able bodied men because men are scum, just like Artemis' Hunters always said. And then they stitch you and your twin brother in a dress and you can't get out...
Not that the Stoll's were bitter, of course. No, they didn't get bitter. They were the comic relief of Camp Halfblood, and they got away with putting paint in the showers, leaving the Aphrodite cabin looking like mutants.
To this day they remember how Silena looked with orange coating or Drew Tanaka's hair lime-green with her face turning red.
Yeah, it wasn't a bad life, being the top pranksters at a Camp filled with adolescents with superpowers. That was pretty much a superpower itself, being able to pull just one over on the Athena cabin with their brains built for speed-chess, or sneaking into the Ares cabin when it was surrounded by landmines.
It was worth the payoff too, when you glued Clarisse la Rue's helmet onto Annabeth Chase and watched them try to yank it off in the middle of Arts & Crafts.
But they had a different problem, and worst still, it shouldn't have been a problem because it was a blessing and a sign that they could aspire to be something greater when they clearly were fine being ne'er-do-wells.
Now that didn't seem to make sense at first glance, so a bit more explanation was needed, thankfully a name would suffice.
Luke Castellan. Mr. Perfect. Absolutely impossible to live up to the expectations he set.
For one thing, he was handsome, and not in the plucky underdog sort of way that Connor and Travis were. If they were lazy Christmas elves who'd rather play with the toys instead of making them, Luke was the elf played by Orlando Bloom who had every tween girl reading some stuffy British author's old books. And when he came back from a quest, which no one else got to go on, he had a scar across his face. Not enough to be hideous, not enough to disfigure or handicap, just ultimate bad-boy appeal.
Then there was the fact he was the best swordsman at Camp. That was just unfair. It was said, over and over again, that Hermes was a jack-of-a-trades, never a master but capable with all things. How then was Luke so good at everything, including sword-fighting? It just wasn't fair at all. It wasn't like Connor or Travis wanted their siblings to all be clones of each other, and it wasn't like all the campers in Cabin Eleven were definitely related but it just wasn't fair that Luke had so many skills and they were just pranksters who everyone… tolerated.
Oh, but Luke everyone loved. If they didn't like him for his looks like Cabin Five, it was because he was smart, or because he was older, or because he was allowed to go on a quest, or because he wasn't as big a loser as the Stolls, who were sons of Hermes too, sorta, only they weren't dad's favorite.
Despite the stereotype of twin brothers getting along perfectly, Connor and Travis disagreed on a lot of things. They argued and fought, mostly behind closed doors when no one else was around, because if you let people know that you had any weak-points they'd strike back when they found out you glued five-thousand smile-faced stickers on the ceiling of the Apollo cabin.
They agreed on one thing though. Both wished they could be more than disappointments compared to their brother.
Luke was the best of them. That was a hard truth and they smiled when they accepted it. It gave them more freedom.
But when Luke betrayed the Camp they had to be responsible.
They weren't good at being responsible, good soldiers. It was a struggle, being disciplined, but they had each other. Mostly to keep track of the pranks they pulled after the war was over. And they'd need to prank a lot of people. They held grudges, kept logs of who needed to be taught a lesson for sneering at them or insinuating they might be the traitors in Camp.
They could never be the traitors. They wanted to be, sometimes. It was hard fighting in a war to make sure neither side killed each other. To keep the family they fought with and the family they fought against alive.
Because neither Connor nor Travis wanted Luke dead, however hard he disappointed them, and they thought he would come back, defeating Kronos and having pulled the greatest con in history.
Then Charles Beckendorf died and things got serious.
They were worse at being serious than they were at being responsible, and resentment against the formerly perfect brother came out harder than ever and when an angry Katie, who had comforted a grieving Silena, cursed Luke and wished him dead, Travis found himself unable to disagree.
Connor did, and they shouted at one another for an hour in Cabin Eleven, until serious punches were thrown, and then they went out again smiling, habitually joking about looting stores in Manhattan.
They weren't perfect brothers, but they had to keep up the appearance now.
It was their contribution to the war, keeping a united front, a solidifying bond between just two people that couldn't crack under tragedy and betrayal. The little thing like that showed that even if the family structure crumbled, at least the bricks held. They could fake that in public, and when the fighting started up again it wasn't pretending anymore.
They didn't want any brother to die.
But Luke did die, and the shroud was for a Son of Hermes.
He really was special Luke.
He really was the best of them.
He really did go and die a hero, in the end.
He really did make a great villain too, smarter than Kronos or any monster.
They took a break from watching the pyre, Connor smiling to Travis thinly while they watched new cabins being built.
"He did some good stuff at the end, didn't he?"
"Well, he was our brother. He had to surprise people somehow."
They weren't the best brothers. They just shared the same mother, the same father, and they made each other happier in the face of tragedy. Together they were heroes, in their own way.
True brothers are like that.
To the Stolls, who enjoy a great deal of popularity in the fandom, though not nearly enough thought.
Other stories will be posted and updated soon enough.