I'm reposting the story I posted on tumblr. Though there I posted it as "Waiting On Blue Skies".
Hope you all enjoy, please leave a review, and for those following my other stories nothing has been abandoned.
Disclaimer: I don't own "Percy Jackson the Olympians".
The Seeker
The road was long and there was no traffic.
Tristan found he missed traffic. That was hard to believe. But these long stretches of road devoid of any signs of human life except for the sad reminders of yesteryear whenever he saw a dilapidated billboard was the height of tragedy. After the third or so sign he passed, this time advertising fast food when the last one advertised shampoo and the one yesterday advertised sneakers and well… well he really was starting to resent those dystopian action flicks he got bit parts in. Turns out they never could do justice to the atmosphere of grief and hopelessness in a new world where humanity was bottom to middling on the food chain.
He couldn't think of any movie that would make him miss shampoo as much as half-a-year without showering did. Even without shampoo though, between the heat and dirt from the road he cut all his hair off leaving just a clumsy buzz-cut. First few days he kept touching his head, feeling soft fuzz above the scalp like he was mapping out the hairline. Like he was worried the hair wasn't going to grow back. How he thought maybe he was developing a widow's peak. It felt funny under the 'borrowed' motorcycle helmet too.
Honestly the motorcycle wasn't his first choice, even if it was supposed to be 'cool'. When this whole… mess started he resolved going cross-country in an RV stacked with enough provisions and weapons to provide for his own country, at the very least a fiefdom if not a kingdom. Certainly more than enough for two people to get by, and that was always his plan. Was still his plan, honest to goodness. But about thirty miles down Southern California he hit literal roadblocks. Miles of abandoned cars. Wrecked vehicles and what looked like remains of battles.
Or more likely, massacres.
To get through he had to abandon the RV and go for a truck that had power and all-terrain capability. After that, when the damage was too catastrophic and the way slow, gas being eaten up each mile, only then did he switch to an abandoned motorcycle and as much supplies that he could carry.
At first he was elated at the freedom that the bike offered him. Zigzagging through stagnant traffic, able to siphon gas whenever he was running low from one of the abandoned vehicles, with the sloosh sound of the petrol inside the plastic as rhythmic as his own heartbeat.
Feeling free and unstoppable for the first time since this whole mess began he immediately found upon road and went full out on the throttle. Seemed to make sense at the time. After all, what was the point of surviving the apocalypse if you didn't try to live a little between surviving? And besides, he still had a lot of country to cover. Wasn't like he was afraid of being pulled over by the police for speeding, or getting his name in the tabloids, or much anything else. That was a mistake.
Turns out there was always more to fear, as he figured out one clear day on the stretch of open highway too remote for anyone to have made it out in cars before they were picked off by… things, creatures, devils from the sky. Twice he had to pointedly avoid piles of bone that smelled like a burst septic tank, pieces of scrap metal torn asunder but with unmistakable additions of truck tires, license plates, and sometimes (most horribly) children's car-seats. Every night he had to hide his stolen (he insisted it was 'borrowed' at first but even internally he couldn't keep up that denial) bike under dried out weeds and a raggedy blanket while he slept in a tent (when he had time to set one up) or just in a camouflage poncho in the dark listening to the hungry cries of those same nightmarish lurking monsters polluting the new world.
Better not to think about it, he had told himself. Better not to think about the people who didn't make it. To just keep going on. Moving on. Moving on and not stopping to think about the things he missed out on, like a four-picture deal and a supporting role on an Amazon original, how much money he'd sell-out to play 'Tonto' when the rights to "The Lone Ranger" was bought back from Disney, or things like surfing in Fiji and the sound of his assistant Jane's head getting crunched by something that looked like one of those Peter Jackson movie trolls in a toga or… or… oh god the twisted plastic toys and booster seats stained brown with dried blood.
Of course he thought about it, all of it. Until he could fly on the road unobstructed, and scream his feelings out to an uncaring sun in a dismal gray sky. He never did manage to scream out all his feelings, not enough to feel better, only hoarse. And distracted.
It wasn't rancid piles of cattle and human bones or the monsters that left them scattered about that almost did him in on the road, but a goddamn oil slick. Didn't seem possible at the time, but later he'd realize that it was arrogant to think he was the only person who managed to get through the traffic graveyards and monsters attacking in the night.
His pilfered helmet saved his life. An extra t-shirt was sacrificed to wrap around his leg, which was scraped raw straight through his now ruined jeans. And despite everything at risk, everything that he knew could be happening, Tristan never worked up the courage to drive his bike with the ruined paint-job and single remaining mirror over twenty-miles per hour. He tried, honest he tried to dig deep back in that pit of anger and rage at the feeling of helplessness he loathed, that he continued to fight against but it never amounted to anything more than a twinge in his leg. That steady pain that reminded him there were no ambulances, no cell-towers, no one coming down the road to play 'Good Samaritan', and even if there weren't monsters in the night regular animals would make short work of him if he was concussed or paralyzed or bleeding out from a splintery compound fracture…
It would be another week of persistent fear, misery, and growing fear of an infection in his wounded knee before he met another person.
(it would be an additional four days before he met someone human but he didn't know that at the time)
End of that week there was a fork in the road, one heading southeast and the other heading east. The eastbound road was marked by more vile carcass piles and cracked asphalt, and unfortunately no cover would be provided. Southeast there were gnarled trees at a distance, some with yellow, brittle looking leaves and hills at the distance that might've promised more cover, maybe even water. It was still east, just a detour further south. Just a little further south was all, and then back a new road, better prepared and rested.
Just a short detour, which was still too much a chance to take. Tristan continued East.
Half-a-mile in, the front of the bike started rattling hard enough that he needed a white-knuckle grip on the handles to try to steer straight. Two miles down and it got so bad he slowed down to twenty miles per hour… fifteen… five hundred more feet at mere ten miles per hour and he felt the whole bike shaking like a wounded animal taking final breath.
Somebody was saying 'no, no,' in a hoarse voice and it took him a moment to realize it was him. With no one to talk to, along with not wanting to risk being torn apart by monsters above or below, well, he wasn't exactly conversing much on the road by himself.
But he had to stop now, and just be thankful it wasn't dark out yet.
"Great," he muttered, "just what's needed."
The front spokes were straining, maybe the axle… well actually he wasn't sure. Wasn't sure about anything except how next time he was going to stick to scavenging abandoned cars. He thought maybe he'd be able to learn about motorbikes from time on the road with this one, through vain hope in some sort of vehicular-wisdom osmosis. Instead he was looking at a bike that was all kinds of messed up in the tire, and what was connected to the tire, with no means or ideas how to change or fix it.
So he'd be walking the rest of the way. Certainly he'd be taking his chances. But what choice did he really have?
"Don't want any trouble-"
He whirled around absurdly fast at the voice, gun drawn.
Oh yes, he had become a gun person. That wasn't his favorite change but was certainly necessary, given the changing times. Given his former ins with the Hollywood crowd, soon as he saw released videos featuring kids in armor fighting police and soldiers, Tristan wasn't in the crowd that believed it was a hoax or guerrilla marketing for a new show or movie. Too many variables, special effects hadn't caught up to those levels of realism, not a single person in the business even tried to take credit for the captured carnage.
As soon as he saw the footage he had immediately worried for his and for his daughter's safety. Which seemed a little ridiculous at the time, but he had spent the next six "King of Sparta" royalty checks on a new home security system, looked into bodyguard agencies, and asked his assistant Jane if she could go about getting him a gun. Discreetly of course.
The house was half-burnt and fully looted by now, he had no money to have continued hiring a bodyguard with on the road, but Jane had gone above and beyond. Disturbingly so, come to think of it, judging by the speed she got him a handgun and how there weren't telltale serial numbers where he imagined there ought to be.
He knew less about guns than he did about motorcycles though, and never did have time to figure out what ammunition his did or didn't take. Wasn't even confident in what the name was, just that it was something S&W, and it kicked like a mule when fired. First time he shot it in desperation at a looter he damn near dropped it, his whole arm feeling numb (except his shoulder that felt like it took a hit with a hammer) and his ears ringing. After that he had to forget all the action movie cliches (which he had come to despise) and hold the gun two-handed, obsessively count remaining bullets (four in the clip) each morning and night where another man might've had prayer time.
And he had only shot it once when he entered into this wasteland, scaring off some sort of bird-like thing that he was sure he had winged (no pun intended). He had to leave quickly after that, he was sure that it would've come back with whole flock of hungry, angry friends.
Basically, he had a whole mess of reasons to really not like shooting this stupid gun, and was very glad to see the person he was pointing it at was unarmed and unthreatening. And then, after the relief finished washing over him, he felt properly ashamed.
She looked maybe his age, plus another twenty added on from hard living that either came a long time before or shortly after monsters all came out to play. It didn't make her unattractive, though the grime and ragged cape wrapped around her didn't help, but he wasn't one to judge with his own wardrobe being far from dystopian chic. Honestly, she even kinda looked like his first crush growing up before he got interested in theater, and she started deriding him for reading 'white people' books and magazines. 'Red-on-outside white-on-inside, a shiny red apple for teacher', yes she even had that same look of quiet contempt beneath the universal signal of surrender. Like, how dare he pull a gun when she had made it clear she didn't want trouble, the nerve of some vagrants.
He gratefully tucked the gun back away.
"I don't want any trouble either. Are we cool?"
"I'd argue I'm cooler," she muttered. "But no trouble."
Tristan nodded. "Sure. Good." After a moment to consider, maybe if he was really cool or not, he dug through his pack for some sort of show of good faith. He had maybe about two or one and a half bottles of water left. Didn't really seem worth the risk of dehydration but… he pointed a gun at the first (somewhat) friendly face he had seen. He offered her the one not quite full, and when she didn't reach for it he left it at her feet on the cracked ground. And he made to continue on his way.
"You know you've picked the harder path," she called after him. "You know that, don't you?"
"Certainly don't have a lot more choices," he admitted, not looking back.
"You always have a choice. They don't want that, and they chose to ignore it. Soon they'll change it, as much as they can think to change. Poor Janus… what has become of him now?" Weird thing was her voice didn't grow fainter the further he walked on. "You should know, the way you're going, things won't get easier."
Tristan gradually slowed down the more she talked, and when he turned she was still right behind him despite the twenty, thirty feet he had walked. He could tell because that half-full makeshift canteen was back on the ground where he had left it. "I'm sorry, I didn't get your name?"
"Aretê."
"That… I don't know that one," he admitted.
Her answer, this Aretê, was a wry, nearly mocking smile. "I wouldn't have told you it if I thought you had known my story. Would've felt like cheating."
"Uh huh… but you are one of them. Aren't you?" Tristan found himself reaching for the gun again, for all the good he suspected it'd do him. He had seen police officers with what looked like bazooka–rifle lovechild get torn apart by monsters and by children with sticks and knives.
"One of the Titans? No, they didn't bother with me or with my sister. Kronos, he does not bother with human choices, he underestimates the importance… for him there will only be the path to more power."
"Um… alright, cool then. And thanks I guess but I'm um, not sure how this is important to-" Tristan gestured vaguely to the ruinous world at large. "Everything. Or how much a choice I really have."
"You always have a choice."
"Not when it's…" He reconsidered, suspicious. "It's personal."
She raised an eyebrow in response. Partway incredulous, but mostly that same bordering on contempt disapproval.
"They've… been taking people. Children mostly," Tristan admitted.
Aretê nodded gravely. "They've repurposed several of the old guard. Harpies, some sirens, they started collecting any children who might be useful." And the she gave him a meaningful look. "Demigods mostly."
Despite knowing it probably was the smart thing to do, and that what seemed like a lifetime ago he might've sunk into comfortable denial rather than admit to anything, Tristan found himself nodding. Once, twice, in understanding.
"And they took someone you cared about." Aretê nodded, knowingly. "Care about," she corrected, and he found himself relaxing. "You will be able to find her if you go down this road, but it won't be easy."
Tristan found himself holding out a hand, halfway in askance and halfway in a belated greeting. "Tristan. Tristan McLean."
She took his hand once, shook it curtly. "I know your movies. Did not like the whitewashing."
"I can honestly say I did not contribute to that," Tristan assured. And then surprisingly defensive he had to ask, "Did you like them? I mean th-?"
"Yes you did very well," Aretê said quickly, but sincerely.
"They took my daughter," he admitted at last. "I have to find a way to get her back. You said I'd succeed if I went this way though?"
"I don't know about that, do you have any sort of plan?" Aretê frowned. "I know you'll see her again, succeeding is up to you. Your plan, your ability."
"Well then I'm doomed," Tristan admitted. And he turned to continue on, Aretê in front of him yet again. "Alright getting mixed signals here-"
"It won't be easy," Aretê stressed again. "You can turn back. If you want."
What wasn't said was that she maybe hoped that he did go back, any other path but her path. that plenty of good people had already walked the hard path, the heroic path, and paid the ultimate price in disgrace or the oblivion of anonymity in this new unjust world.
"I know this isn't going to be easy, but I still need you to get out of my way," Tristan said firmly, more brave and tired than he had felt since this whole nightmare started. "Please."
The pause stretched for maybe less than half a minute and still managed to feel like half an hour. After consideration or maybe something deeper and more mystical, Aretê stepped (or maybe floated with only that ragged cloak brushing the ground) aside to leave the wrecked path open for Tristan. The canteen he had offered her was now in front of him. When he picked it up, it was full and cool to the touch.
"These aren't movie stars," Aretê warned one more time. "You'll be doing your own stunts."
That got him to laugh for the first time in a while, since this whole thing started. "I always did my own stunts."
Of course she wasn't there to answer back to that, maybe she had already left after getting in the last cryptic word. He walked on, his knee feeling better (the word for that was 'miraculous') and more certain with each forward step.
Piper, I'm coming. I promise.
