Here is the first good chapter! Hope you like it!

Disclaimer: I do not own the PJO series or any related works.

It was finally Friday. Because I had woken up Saturday morning, I had just missed a sour defeat for Tess's team.

When I asked her about it, she had almost broken down into tears. I didn't think it was possible for someone to be that sore a loser, but in the back of my mind, something told me that losing wasn't what had upset her.

When the teams were called, I was surprised to hear Tess's name called when they were divvying out the undecideds.

I was one of the first undecided called. Apparently someone had told the red team captain about my exploits in the forest, and didn't want to miss out. Also, I was by far the oldest undecided, the oldest besides me being twelve.

I was shocked when Tess's name was called last for the red team, and everyone on the red team groaned. Tess simply stared at the ground, not looking up at any of her teammates. I decided it must have been a mistake. I would have to ask her about it later. Tess shuffled up next to me, and I could see that I was a solid foot taller than her. Everyone was told that we had fifteen minutes to prepare.

Tess and I, not being told what to do, shuffled off to somewhere in the forest. A few minutes before the conch blew, Tess glanced up at me. Her green eye was angry but her grey eye was worried.

"Where's your weapon, Ajax?" she asked me, slightly anxious.

"What weapon?" I asked, confused.

"Did you think this would be a normal game of capture the flag? We're demigods. Go get one from the armory! Hurry!" She seemed like she really wanted me to leave, which stung more than I'd like to admit. Did she think I would mess up?

Nonetheless, I sprinted off. towards the armory. The whole camp was deserted. Apparently everyone was involved in this game. Before I had made it to the armory, the conch sounded, signalling the start of the match. I cursed and ran faster.

When I reached the armory, I realized I had no idea whatsoever what weapon I should get. I briefly considered a shotgun, before deciding that that seemed like cheating. I tried to figure out what would best suit me, but I really had no idea. I was about to take a random sword from one of the many barrels when a woman's voice startled me.

"You don't want that one, Tiergan." she said, with a hint of curiosity, as if she wanted to know what I would do next.

I spun around to see a beautiful thirty-some blonde woman. I realized that she had two startlingly grey eyes, the same color as Tess's one. I figured they were related.

"Then which one do I want?" I asked. I was also wondering who she was, and why she was helping me, and why she wasn't helping with capture the flag game, but I figured she would tell me if she wanted to, and if not, I would ask her later. I needed her help desperately. I had no clue what I was doing.

"I like you," she said, "you don't ask questions you don't need to. Very mature. Very interesting."

"But, um, I still don't know what weapon to get." I asked, as politely as I could.

"And persistent too. Very interesting. I like you."

Before I could interrupt again, she said, "As to your weapon, Tiergan, if you would follow me."

This time I noticed. She hadn't called me Ajax. She called me Tiergan. I was certain I had introduced myself as Ajax.

She must've seen my perplexed look, because she added, "It's written on the tag of your underwear, Tiergan MacDonald."

My face got red as a beet. Damn my mother! She had never called me Ajax. She absolutely detested the nickname I had been given, saying it 'undermined my rich Celtic heritage.' She refused to accept anything that made me seem less Scottish. As I thought about how much she would have opposed this camp, I realized how much I missed her. How much I had left behind. I realized how worried she would be. She probably thought I was dead. And why did she insist on writing my name on my underwear anyways? She knew I lived alone, it's not like I could get them mixed up with someone else's. But I wasn't living alone, I was living in an undecided cabin with a bunch of eleven-year-olds. That reminded me of my mother again.

As I wiped a tear from my eye, I said, "Lead the way."

I thought she wanted to lead me somewhere outside the armory. There wasn't much to the small building, but she walked right past me towards the wall. I looked to see what she was doing, but she walked behind two barrels of spears and started to get shorter, a foot at a time. I realized there must have been stairs.

She suddenly stopped, and asked with a small smirk, "Coming?"

"Yeah!" I said. She laughed as I quickly followed her.

When I walked down the small spiral staircase, I was slightly surprised. I expected the second level to be just like the first, but there were it was a lot tidier, with many fewer weapons. Each weapon had its own shelf, with little plaques for each one, written in a language that I couldn't understand. I realized it must have been ancient Greek, but Tess had said that all Greek demigods could read ancient Greek, and the Romans could read Latin. I briefly entertained the thought that I was a Roman demigod, but I definitely felt more Greek than Roman. The weapons had a slight glow to them, like they were hollow, and had bright lights in them. I doubted that, but that's what it looked like.

I pushed that thought aside as I joined the woman who looked suspiciously liked Tess in standing by the only thing not on a shelf.

It was a very large wooden box pushed up against the far wall, maybe ten feet wide, five feet long, and a foot tall. It had a plaque too, and I couldn't read it either.

The woman looked at the box with a sort of reverence, but I assume that she was more in awe of what the box contained. I thought It could have been a hoplite spear, or something, but I didn't have much time to guess because the woman opened the box, leaving no room for doubt.

"Yes, this might work." She muttered to herself, before turning around to look at me.

"This blade, for lack of a better translation, is called Ponderous." She said informatively.

And ponderous it was. The grip alone was nearly a yard long, and the enormous blade was about seven feet long. The blade was about a foot wide at the guard, and stayed the same width the whole sword up until about six inches from the end, where it tapered to a point. I thought it was incredibly atypical. Its ridiculous size aside, Greek swords were usually leaf shaped, occasionally half leaf, in the case of the Falcata. I had learned this when I tried to convince my parents to let me have a sword, which they didn't. I was admiring the skill required to forge something this massive when I remembered why I was here.

"You can't possibly expect me to use that! It must weigh five hundred pounds!" I shouted incredulously.

"More than that," She said with half a smirk, "at least a thousand. But if you can lift it it's yours. Which would be a miracle, but you won't know unless you try."

"You must be joking. I have no chance!" I yelled, which I immediately felt bad about.

"Look, normally I wouldn't even think of bringing an undecided in here. A lot of claimed campers don't even know about this room. It's filled with the most heavily enchanted weapons on the planet. I wouldn't have brought you down here if I didn't think you had a shot. So just try. Okay?" She smiled hopefully at me.

"Alright." I grumbled. I put my hands on the grip, which I hadn't realized was floating slightly off the ground until I put my fingers underneath it with no trouble at all.

I pulled up on it.

It didn't budge.

Which I expected.

"You didn't even try! Do it again."

"How'd you even get this in here?"

"Magic. Duh."

"Uggh."

"Try again."

"Fine."

"That's the spirit!"

I pulled up with all my strength this time, calling on every muscle in my body; arms first, then legs, then back, forearms, calves, fingers, even toes.

I thought I felt it move a little, but the woman said, "Are you even trying? Move over, let me do it."

'Is she stupid?' I thought to myself.

"Shut up!" I shouted, not giving up.

"It's obvious you can't do it. Let's go and find you a different weapon." she said. I was too focused to realize that she didn't say it with a resigned tone.

"Never!" I yelled. There was no way I was going to let this stupid chunk of metal beat me.

"Look, it's clearly much to heavy for you."

"No it's not!" This was getting personal now.

"Just give up!"

"No chance!" I thought she didn't want me to give up, and now I'm not good enough? This was ridiculous.

"Just grab a bow or something. I thought you were special, but it turns out you're just like everybody else. Just part of the mainstream."

I think that last bit was what pushed me over the edge. For as long as I can remember, my biggest goal in life was to be different. Not to conform. I didn't have to be better than everyone else, just not the same. When other people wore ankle socks, I wore crew socks. When other people wore athletic shorts, I wore cargo. I didn't even own a single pair of jeans. Everyone wore jeans. They were mainstream. I wasn't. I spent my entire life trying to break away from the mainstream. Now, to be called mainstream, by a strange woman I didn't know, just because I couldn't lift a sword that weighed over a thousand pounds, well... That was far too much for me to take lying down.

I was filled with a familiar, unstoppable rage. I let it consume me. All I could think about was throwing something heavy. At the moment, that thing was Ponderous. I screamed as I started to lift it, slowly. But I wasn't done raging. All I could think was that I was not lifting the thing in my hands nearly fast enough. I screamed even louder, if it was possible, and Ponderous seemed to respond. After about half a second, Ponderous was above my head. I didn't even realize that I had just sliced through the ceiling, because I was far too focused on throwing Ponderous to the ground in a massive swing. It flew down with blinding speed as it ripped straight through the ground like it wasn't even there.

At this point, I was no longer raging, and I was able to see that if Ponderous continued its arc and I didn't adjust for it coming back out of the ground, my arms would be ripped off my body. So, I turned as I controlled the immense momentum into coming out of the ground, slicing through Ponderous's box in the process. I quickly turned the flat of the blade parallel to the ceiling, so that it wouldn't cut into the ground again. When Ponderous finally stopped it's arc, I was very relieved.

I nearly fainted like I had the last time, but I remembered that Tess was waiting for me in the forest, which snapped me right back into reality.

The woman, now grinning wildly despite the fact I had just left an enormous scar in the ground and ceiling, walked past me and slapped a cheesy looking nametag like sticker right on the blade of Ponderous. It read, "PROPERTY OF: _" with Ajax scribbled in the blank in green crayon. I thought that made Ponderous look quite silly, and a low grumbling noise coming from the sword told me it agreed with me.

The woman stepped back, and Ponderous started shrinking. And shrinking. And shrinking. Until finally it was the size and shape of a normal Greek sword, and the nametag was nowhere to be seen. I realized that that was incredibly convenient, all things considered. Just because I had lifted it once didn't mean I could carry it around all the time, and also, how exactly does someone carry a ten foot long sword? On their back?

The woman looked impressed and confused at the same time. "Huh. I didn't know it could do that."

I looked at her incredulously. "You mean no one has ever used it before?"

"I don't think so. It's only a few hundred years old. Herakles probably could have wielded it, but he was a god long before it was forged."

I had so many questions. Who had forged it? And why? And why did the camp have it? And why could I use it? Why was I chosen?

I would have asked those questions, but I realized that capture the flag was still, like, a thing, that was happening.

The woman smiled, unaware of my curiosity, and said, "Well, a promise is a promise. Ponderous is yours. Here."

She grabbed the sword, but soon realized that she could not lift it.

"You try." she said simply.

So I did, and it was just as heavy as it looked: a few pounds at most.

I lifted it easily, and the woman said, "It seems as though Ponderous has chosen you as its wielder. I don't think anyone else can lift it."

"Thanks."

"You are quite welcome. Do you want a scabbard for it?"

"Maybe later." I shouted as I ran up the stairs.

I paused at the door to the armory to shout back down, "Thanks again!"

I felt like I could do anything as I sprinted back to where I had left Tess. I wondered how long that had taken, and then a sickening thought entered my mind.

What if Tess had already been attacked?

I tried to forget that thought, but I still ran quite a bit faster.

As it turns out, I wasn't that far from the truth.

As I neared the spot that I had left Tess at, I was relieved when I saw her right where I had left her.

I was about to shout out to Tess when I heard a girl's voice.

"So this is where you've been hiding, half and half blood." Someone else laughed, but I didn't quite understand the joke. Why had this person called Tess a half and half blood? What did that mean? I crouched behind a tree and poked my head out a bit to get a good look at them.

There were five people including Tess. The four besides Tess were all girls; two from the blue team and two from the red team. Why were our teammates not taking out those blue teamers?

I didn't have much time to wonder before the head of the group, a brown haired girl a little older than me, from the blue team, spoke.

"I can't believe you had the nerve to even show your face after you lost the game for us last week."

There was a small sniffle before Tess spoke, with a small, incredibly sad voice that broke my heart as I gripped Ponderous a little tighter.

"I-I'm sorry."

"Sorry?! Sorry isn't going to turn eighteen straight losses into wins, is it, you filth?"

I gripped Ponderous a lot tighter now. This was no harmless harassment. I suddenly realized that this was what had caused Tess to react so violently when I asked her about capture the flag. These girls were going to get it.

Tess spoke once more, really on the edge of crying now.

"N-n-no. I-I just wan-wanted to-"

"Wanted to what? Help? Make things better? You can help by leaving and never coming back, you bitch!" On bitch, she slapped Tess in the face hard enough to send her flying. I could see Tess just lying on the ground. I could hear her sobbing loudly now. I couldn't see her face, but I was sure that tears were flowing freely now. Looking back on it, it was a good thing I didn't see her face. Otherwise I might have killed them.

In my mind, those four girls were pure evil. No matter how awful Tess was at capture the flag, there was no way that she could be responsible for eighteen whole losses. Even if she was, this was no way to react. And I could tell this wasn't the first time it had happened. I think now that I know why they were so angry at Tess. Where Tess had a perfectly launched slinky, these girls' had tangled theirs up. Where Tess's tape was the right size, theirs were too small, or cut badly. Where Tess's water fountain stream was the right height, theirs had splashed them in the face. Where Tess got a perfect score, they had failed. Their foreheads were not nice.
This incredible pettiness would have been enough to send me into a rage. But I had only had this revelation after the fight. Instead, it was Tess. Just the sight of her sobbing made me more than twice as angry as the previous two rages. I think it was the fact that one of the girls was much younger than the others, maybe twelve or thirteen, that gave me the time to turn the edge of Ponderous away from the girls.

Ponderous sensed my rage, and started to lengthen. I screamed and ran out from behind the tree, startling the girls to no end. They barely had time to raise their swords before I swung. The flat of Ponderous caught each one of the girls in the side as the weight behind the swing flung them nearly twenty feet away. I looked over at them, ready to fight them all, still in a rage. None of them moved. But I was still consumed by rage. I made four huge slashes in the ground before I trusted myself enough to go near Tess, and Ponderous shrunk to its smaller size.

Tess was still sobbing uncontrollably. She was in her own world. She hadn't noticed anything I had done. I could barely bring myself to do it, but I looked at her face.

The pain was unbelievable. I looked into her eyes, but she couldn't see me. What those girls had done to her went much deeper than a little emotional pain.

They had broken her.

All I could do was kneel by her, resting her head on my legs, and cry along with her.

I still have no idea who won the game of capture the flag.

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