hey everyone! it feels like it's been forever! i'm so sorry I haven't updated but I've been kinda swamped with school and whatnot alos, I was feeling rather uninspired, but I finally got my but into gear and finished up this chapter. so anyway I hope you guys enjoy this chapter! oh! and before I forget, I want to thank everyone who reviewed! especially those of you who reviewed more than once, I really appreciate it :)

disclaimer: I do not own anything you would find in the PJ series. ALL RIGHTS TO UNCLE RICK!

Chapter 10

Clara's point of view

"This is amazing," I breathed, staring at all the different items strewn about the room, all in different stages of assembly.

"Yeah, it's pretty cool," Leo agreed.

He watched me while an amused smirk played across his lips as I flitted from object to object. It was crowded, and I had to be careful not to knock things off of tables, and not to impale myself on the various weapons. The air was thick with the tangy aroma of motor oil and…was that tobacco sauce? Different mechanical smells drifted through the forge, all of them swirling together into one big mass that made my eyes water.

"So you spend how much time in here?" I coughed.

"Eh, not too much," Leo laughed. "I kind of have my own…arrangements…" he picked his way over to me as he spoke, looking around at all his siblings' creations.

By the time he reached me, I was studying a map on the wall. It was old and looked like a battle map of the camp, with marks and pins placed here and there.

"What's this for?"

"It's from, er, something the cabin was trying to do before I got here," he explained quickly. "Hey, check this out, Blondie!" he reached behind me and picked up a little windup toy made from bronzed coloured metal. "Let's see if it works…"

He wound up the little bronze centaur equipped with a bow and arrow, and set it on one of the tables. Almost immediately, the thing jerked to life, and clattered around the table surface yelling, "Die, mosquito! Die!" it fired several arrows in our direction and Leo pounced on me and sent us both sprawling to the ground. I landed with a grunt, expecting Leo's weight to crush me from above, but it never came. I cracked open my eyes and saw that Leo was already crawling towards the tiny bronze figurine. He grabbed a hammer from his tool belt and swung it towards to bronze centaur, which was still yelling and demanding the death of flying parasites.

Leo's hammer crashed down on the figurine, smashing it to bits. Little pieces of bronze charpenal were scattered, and one managed to scrape its way across my cheek.

"Man, I thought they fixed this thing!" Leo cried, shoving the remains of the little centaur off the table. "None of those little needle-arrows hit you, did they, Clara?" Leo asked as he glared down at the little devil windup toy and nudged the pile with the toe of his boot.

"Well, not the arrow…" I murmured as I wiped blood off my cheek.

Leo looked over and his eyebrows nearly merged with his hair.

"Mierda! You alright, Blondie?" he came over and frowned worriedly as he swiped the tips of his fingers across my cheek more gently than I would have thought possible.

"I'm fine," I promised, blushing hard.

Leo seemed to notice my über red face, and he looked down, taking in the minimal space that was smushed in between our bodies. I saw a grin creep across his lips, even though I was trying not to look at him.

His fingers trailed lightly from my cheek down my neck, and the length of my arm. He intertwined our fingers with a sly grin, tugging my closer.

Ohmygodsohmygodsohmygods!

What was he doing? What was I doing? I was just standing there, is what! Was he going to try and kiss me? Oh my gods, he was going to try and kiss me!

Okay, so…this was about the time when my brain melted into a pile of mush and drained down into my stomach, giving it a strange, heavy and sick-like feeling. Leo edged even closer, his breath quick and his cheeks red. His hand in mine was hot, and as he reached out and gently placed his other hand on my waist, and I felt it smoldering through my t-shirt. A brief image of Leo's hands burning their marks into the hydra's scaly leg flashed through my mind, but I found my arms playing traitor to my thoughts (yes, I had regained some line of coherent thought). I tentively reached up and slid one of my hands around the back of his neck and twined my fingers through his soft, curly hair. I found my other hand clinging gently to the red fabric of his shirt just above the top of his abs. I felt my eyelids flutter closed, and I knew Leo was doing the same. I felt his lips hesitantly ghost over my own, leaving a small trail of fire cross my cheek as his lips brushed across it as well.

Now, I'm not sure if I should be thankful or not for whoever walked in at that moment, because honestly, I was about one second away from ripping out his hair in my desperate attempt to reach his lips. But when I heard the mystery person do what sounded suspiciously like a spit take and start choking, I shoved Leo away from me in a panic and jumped back against the wall.

Leo oofed as he landed on is butt in a puddle of grease with a dazed expression. But I could feel my cheeks burning, and if there is one thing I hate the most, it's being so embarrassed that you feel like the world is turning upside down and your feet are strapped to the floor, so that you end up upside down with all the blood rushing to your head. And that, my friends, is exactly how I felt.

But seriously, can you blame me? Trying to have your first kiss is awkward enough, but when someone walks in right as you're about to–well, you know, then that just adds a whole truckload of awkwardness into the mix.

Turning to face the intruder, I folded my arms tightly across my chest and imitated one of Val's fiercest glares the best I could. I planned to go and shoot off my mouth at them, but at the last second, I realised that I really didn't want to be one of those super rude people that just go around blowing up at strangers. Like Val! Also…I'm not sure how much the person would have actually heard, because he was doubled over and clutching his stomach from laughing so hard.

"Ugh!" Leo moaned from the floor.

Oh…opsie!

"Gods, I am so sorry Leo!" I rushed over to help him up, and tried (most unsuccessfully I might add) to hide the blush on my cheeks. "Are you okay?"

He winced and replied playfully, "Nothing hurt but my pride."

"I didn't mean to push you over!" I squeaked, barely getting the words out past the embarrassed blockage in my throat.

"Hey, it' no big deal, right Jake?" he called over to the gasping boy near the entrance.

So Jake was this little moment wrecker's name? Okay well, I guess I could also be called partially responsible for wrecking the moment…but it was mostly Jake!

Leo looked at me and rolled his eyes in an absolutely adorable way at Jake, who was actually sitting on the floor trying to regain control of himself. Every time he seemed to calm down, he would glance over at Leo and erupt into a fresh burst of laughing and choking.

I did get one pleasure out of watching this kid laughing at us from the floor, and that was that with all the fumes in here–not to mention the heat–it was pretty hard to breathe properly at the best of times, and it was certainly difficult to breathe while laughing your ass off.

So laughing inevitably caused coughing fits, but this guy didn't seem to mind. In fact, he seemed to be almost enjoying himself!

"Dude!" Leo laughed as he bounded over to Jake's side, hauling him up while he coughed and hacked. "What's up?" I was amazed at how Leo could just act so…so…Leo after what his guy just walked in on us doing.

"Apparently not much, compared to you!" Jake croaked with an I-don't-believe-this-is-actually-happening grin plastered across his sooty face.

Now that he was standing up-right, I had a chance to study him. So as him and Leo prattled on about how amazing this was (either they'd totally forgotten I was there or they just really didn't care), I took my time sizing up this Jake guy.

His previously bright red face was fading a bit, making him look less like a deranged chipmunk, and more like a regular human being. He actually looked a bit like Leo, with dark semi-curly hair and dark eyes. But that was where the similarities stopped. Although Jake wasn't much taller than Leo (a few inches at best), he was much better built, not overly bulky, but you could tell he was used to working with heavy things, and I could see his hands were calloused from working with them so much.

"Anyway…" Leo drawled, idling back over to me. "We've got places to go, things to do!"

"I hope our cabin isn't on that list of places to go," Jake snickered.

"Okay–" I started forward, fully intending to slap that smug smirk off his face, but I felt Leo's arm slip around my waist, halting my advance. "Leo," I growled in a very un me-like way, struggling against his strong hold. Apparently he had more muscle than I originally thought, because it was like having a chain attached to my middle that anchored me to a brick wall. "Let me go so I can smack him!" I wailed, desperately fighting against him.

"Well, looks like we'll be leaving now," Leo grunted, trying to restrain both my flailing arms with one of his big hands. With a huff, he squashed me to his chest and plucked my off the ground, carrying me out of the forge while I thrashed and kicked futilely. The echo of Jake's laughter fallowed me for a while.

As Leo waddled away from the forge, I ranted to myself in my head.

How dare he do this! He is so going to get the biggest beat down I've ever issued! I'll go get Val and she'll beat him up! I'll skewer him with a random sword! I'll–I'll–

"Leo! Put me down!" I shrieked, causing just about everyone who was in ear-shot to turn and gape at us as Leo carried me along.

"What?" he laughed as he passed a group of younger looking kids clustered around an older looking blond camper near the archery range. They all gawked at us. "You aint never seen an uncooperative little mortal girl before?"

The kids in the group shuffled their feet and some of them scoffed or shifted nervously. Obviously Leo's barbaric behavior was unsettling them.

"I thought you and Nico were on a quest?" the older camper called out to Leo as we passed. Leo–realizing that I'd given up struggling and was just hanging limp form his grasp–switched his hold on me so that I was tucked under his arm and resting on his hip like a football or something. Can you believe that?

"Yeah, we came back earlier with this one and some other mortal," he explained. I couldn't really see anything except the ground, but I could totally picture Leo rolling his eyes jokingly. "They're supposedly part of the prophecy, so we brought them back here to explain stuff."

"I see…"

"Yeah, so…anyway, I've gotta go and give Clara here a little talking to, so see ya!" he teasingly patted my back and then I assumed he waved or something because of the way he let go of me with one hand.

The next thing I knew, I was bobbing up and down with each step Leo took. Just as I was thinking that I had figured out how it felt to get motion sickness, Leo righted me and deposited me on a rock.

"Bad," he scolded. "Very bad!"

Okay, is he seriously treating me like a dog now? After carrying me like a football while he leisurely strolled across half the camp he had the nerve to treat me like a new puppy who'd just peed on the carpet? Well. If he thought he could get away with that, he had another thing coming!

"Oh, can it, Leo!" I stood up on my rock, towering above Leo. "You do not ever do that to me again, you understand?" I jabbed at his chest hard with two fingers. He stumbled back a step and opened his mouth to speak, but I jumped down off my rock and advanced on him. With another jab at his chest, I threatened, "I will go find Val right now, and not only will she beat you up, but she will run you through with Nico's sword–which she will forcibly remove from him if she has to–and then I bet you she'll chop you up into a billion pieces and toss you right into Tartarus!" with one last good stab at his chest with my fingers (which were quite sore by now I might add), I realised that Leo was backed up against a tree.

His eyebrows were in his hair, his jaw was on the ground, and his eyes were so big I thought they might pop out of their sockets.

I put my face close to his and whispered as darkly as I could manage, "Do you understand?"

Leo nodded meekly, looking like there was something he wanted to say.

After a few more seconds of trying to intimidate him with my eyes (it probably didn't work that well), I spun on my heal–hopefully whipping him with my hair–and marched back towards where I thought the Big House was.

After a few steps, Leo called out, "Clara, wait!" when I kept walking (maybe a little less quickly though), Leo scampered up beside me. "Hold up, Blondie! I wanted to show you something! It, well…it kinda involved that map you were looking at…" Leo's steps seemed to falter for just a second, and he slowed his pace–and his words.

And I guess that was what made me stop. The random change in attitude had me, well…for lack of a better word, I would say it had me worried about him. Also, I was pretty curious about that map.

"Somewhere that has to do with the map?" I asked, turning around cautiously.

Leo was staring off wistfully into the forest, probably not realising that I was watching him. He looked so sad that I just wanted to gather him up in a big bear-hug and not let him go until he was happy again. And not just that fake smiley and cheerful façade that I noticed he had a habit of putting on, but the real thing.

So with a gentle smile that was more for myself than for Leo, I brushed my fingertips across his bicep and murmured, "Okay…"

Leo jumped slightly and looked back at me like he'd forgotten I was there while he was lost in sad memories.

He gave me a half-smile and told me, "Stay close, the woods are dangerous,"he danced away from me while making a demonic face, before he turned away from me with a cute little chuckle and strolled towards the woods.

I run up beside him nervously.

"What do you mean, dangerous?"

"There's monsters all over in there," he explained. "They're supposed to be kept as a challenge for campers to help work on their fighting skills, but I seriously think it might just to be to keep couples from sneaking off into the woods for some alone time, if you know what I mean," he waggled his eyebrows at me. "There's not much privacy in the camp. Just ask Percy and Annabeth!" he laughed.

I rolled my eyes at his constant dirty implications. Was there nothing else on this boy's mind?

Fighting the blush I felt creeping up my neck, I asked, "So, have you ever?"

"Ever what?" he furrowed his 'brows and glanced at me.

Is he just playing dumb? Or does he actually not get it?

It didn't seem like Leo was messing with me, so I decided to elaborate.

"Have you ever, you know…brought a girl in here…"

Almost instantaneously, Leo's face turned as red as a tomato that someone had dumped in red paint and then injected glowing red juice into it. In other words…he was very red. But then again, so was I.

"Umm…no," Leo coughed, rubbing the back if his neck.

"Oh," I bobbed my head in response, not even looking in his direction.

Needless to say, we pretty much walked the rest of the way in silence after that.

After what was probably only about fifteen minutes, but what felt like absolutely forever thanks to the thick-as-heck awkward silence between the two of us, we came face to face with, well, a rock face.

"What is this?"

"Limestone," he answered.

As he stretched his hand out towards the towering limestone wall, I scoffed and breathed, "Thanks, tips!"

"Just wait a sec," he shushed me, waving his other hand dismissively.

I watched as Leo flattened his palm against the rock as I agitatedly tapped my foot. A heart beat after he touched the limestone wall, glowing red lines seeped out in an intricate pattern, slithering up the rock and eventually creating the luminescent outline of a giant door.

I stood ogling at what had just been a solid limestone rock wall as it swung open with no more than the whoosh of the air that it displaced.

"C'mon," Leo grasped my hand and led me through a gaping hole in the side of a cliff that hadn't been there a moment ago.

My legs moved mechanically, following Leo's lead. He walked fearlessly into the pitch black mass. Once we were a few steps in, the giant door silently swung shut, sealing us in.

Leo called out, "Lights!" and fluorescent light bulbs from somewhere above us burst to life one by one, illuminating the biggest, most amazing workshop I'd ever dream of seeing.

"Whoa…" I breathed, slowing my pace until I was at a stand-still in the very center of the room.

I spun in a slow circle, my neck craned upwards to take in the impressiveness of the place I was standing in.

Like, seriously. Just the fact that this place was hidden in a cliff and you got to go through a magical glowing door the size of a cross made out of school buses to get to it, totally blew my mind.

Then, of course, there was the inside.

It looked a bit like the forge, but imagine everything magnified like five times at least and still there was so much space that you couldn't even call it crowded, let alone as cramped as the forge had been.

Directly in front of me, there was a large, circular platform where something big and metal looking rested, glinting in the harsh light. Above it, there was an old banner that bore the words, Bunker 9 that was strung up under the rafters. Catwalks circled the whole space from far above, hugging the walls and criss-crossing the open air. A fall from up there would be really nasty.

Back on ground level, I saw tones of what were probably storage containers, most of them grouped in a corner to my left, out of the way of where people (probably just Leo if I had to guess though) would be working and moving about.

Work tables scattered about the floor were cluttered with various pieces of scrap metal or abandoned projects. Different blue-prints and schematics were tacked up on the walls, and more were littering the floor, peeking out from under boxes and tables.

I could see a little forge area glowing near the back, complete with anvils, welding tools and weapons (some in progress and some finished, hanging proudly on the wall). And next to that, the most impressive war ship I'd ever seen, just sitting there collecting dust.

The only thing, it was missing a masthead.

Out of everything, I found myself drifting towards the metal clump on the stage sized platform directly in front of me. What can I say? I like shiny things.

"What's this?" I asked Leo as I climbed onto the platform, transfixed by what seemed to be the huge head of a metal dragon. A statue perhaps? Or the missing masthead?

"Oh, that's my dragon," Leo's voice was strangely quiet.

As I neared the golden dragon head, I reached out and my fingertips grazed the intricate golden scales that adorned the dragon's head, glittering beautifully.

"Careful," Leo's voice sharpened, taking on a protective tone.

"It's beautiful," I murmured as Leo slinked up beside me, looking sullen–a very un-Leo-like expression. "What's wrong?"

"It's just–" he sighed, averting his eyes and blinking at the ceiling. Just like people did when they were trying not to cry… "Nothing," he amended, turning and walking to the edge of the platform where he took a seat and propped his head up on his hands.

After a brief hesitation, I followed and took a seat next to him. I'm not even sure he noticed me come, the way he sat there staring off into nothingness and rubbing at his mouth like he did.

"It's just that–" Leo growled, clearly frustrated. He dropped his hands down so that his forearms rested on his thighs, rubbing his hands together between his knees. He let out a puff of air and hung his head, shaking it slightly.

"Leo…" I scooted closer to Leo and placed my hand on top of his. Instantly, they froze. "Leo it's okay, you can tell me," I spoke softly, afraid that any loud noise might shatter his fragile state. I'd found that it wasn't often that he was this serious, and I didn't want him cooping up inside of himself again.

"It's just…Festus…" he must have sensed my confusion, or at least anticipated it, because he gestured behind us at the golden dragon head.

"The dragon head? You named it Festus?" I asked. Because, honestly, if someone was acting like their polar opposite and then told you it was because of a dragon head figurine, wouldn't you be confused? "What's that for, anyway?"

"Festus is the masthead for my ship," Leo sighed, rubbing my hand absently. "I–I had to take him down to do some repairs, and I…" he let out a deep sigh and shook his head dejectedly.

This was obviously a painful subject for him, but seriously? A dragon head? Even if he made it and it broke, that's no reason for him to be so upset, was it? Maybe I should get more…acquainted with the situation.

"So, you made a dragon head for the front of a ship…? And it…broke?"

Leo chuckled humorlessly.

"I didn't make him. Just fixed him up a bit. And, he wasn't originally a masthead…"

"So it was…what? A whole dragon?" I giggled nervously at the thought of a giant, fire breathing dragon on the rampage–supposedly Leo's friend.

But to my dismay (don't tell Leo!), he nodded.

"So, you mean…" I couldn't even finish.

Just picturing this was making me queasy. Fortunately, Leo understood what I was getting at, and he nodded.

"Yup. I had a sixty foot long, flying, fire breathing metal dragon as a friend."

I glanced uneasily back at the head and wondered aloud, "What happened to him?"

Leo winced, and I suddenly felt bad about pushing this conversation onto him.

"Sorry, you don't have to tell me…"

"No, it's–" he took a deep breath and let it out. "It's okay." He assured me. "It happened on a quest, a few days after I got here. We needed a ride to go north–to Canada if you'll believe it–and it couldn't go by land, so I had this…idea."

"I'm guessing it was a stupid idea?"

"Kinda. Well, actually yeah," he chuckled a bit and shook his head. "You remember that map you were looking at back in the forge?" he asked, slanting a questioning look over at me.

"Yeah. That one with all the marks and stuff?"

"Yeah, that one," Leo confirmed. "Well, when I saw that, it was when I was first explained about Festus's little problem," he gestured sadly to the dragon head.

I couldn't help but ask, "He was just a head?"

Leo surprised me by laughing. Something I had not been expecting.

"No! He'd gone haywire, and the Hephaestus campers were trying to catch him so that they could dismantle him. They were gonna do it with…" Leo shuddered theatrically. "Acid sprayers. So of course, being the super macho and fearless guy that I am, I set out into the woods all alone and found him. After springing one of my siblings' traps, getting Festus out, and having him lead me here," Leo gestured to the bunker we were holed up in, "I fixed up his control disk and attached wings to him and we used him for transport on our quest."

There was a long moment where Leo stared somewhere far off, before he continued.

"About half way there, we came across this super high tech security system and got shot out of the sky. Festus got all but vaporized, and my dad brought his head back here so I could reuse it on the Argo II." Leo shrugged, and I could tell the story was almost done. "He was the best thing I ever fixed, the closest thing I had to family in a while, and I went and got him destroyed." He let out a deep, shuddering breath and deflated, shrinking in guilt. "I just always feel so frickin bad about it. Every time I take him down it reminds me of how I broke him…how it's my fault…"

I felt a wave of sorrow wash over me for Leo. He seemed like he was always so upbeat and optimistic, always cracking jokes and looking on the bright side, but I guess that was all just a front he put on to hide the pain. And what he said about Festus being his only family…

"Leo…what do you mean Festus was the closest thing you had to family?"

I felt Leo tense up, muscles contracting even more than they already were, and I bit my lip, wishing I'd just kept my big mouth shut. I was probably just making things worse.

"Sorry," I murmured, moving closer and laying my head on Leo's shoulder. "Forget I said anything."

After a few minute of silence, the rumble of Leo talking startled me out of the light state of sleep I hadn't even realised I'd been in.

"My mom died in a fire when I was young."

I blinked and straightened, looking right at Leo. But he refused to look at me, no matter how hard I stared. Finally I just sighed and resumed my comfortable position leaning against Leo. He slid his arm around me, adding to the pleasure I was already feeling.

I don't even think I blushed. I was so tired. I just yawned and zonked out, right there in Leo's light embrace. Not like there was anywhere better I could think of to be at that moment than wrapped up in a hot guy's arms. But ah…anyway…

A few moments late, I felt Leo shake my shoulder.

"Blondie, wake up. We should get you to bed. I think it's getting late."

Without even registering what he said (I was too out of it by that point), I nodded and grunted something that was probably incoherent. I'm pretty sure that's what usually happens when you try to talk without anything particular in mind that you're planning to say, anyway, right?

So, Leo led me back to the Big House as I walked in zombie mode beside him. When we reached the Big House, he brought me in and made up a bed for me on one of the two couches, complete with a cozy looking blanket and a pillow. By the time he was done, I had a very inviting bed I was ready to climb into, weather it was a couch or not.

"'Night, Clara," Leo smirked and leaned in–seemingly on impulse–kissing me on the cheek quickly.

Then he was gone. Out the door and to his cabin I guess.

In a daze, I turned towards my couch bed and climbed in gratefully, burrowing down until I was almost as warm as I was with Leo in Bunker 9.

I remembered at the last possible second before I dropped off the deep end and into a lovely, flaming hot guy/dragon/damsel in distress filled dream, that Val wasn't there. The other couch was unoccupied. I managed to crack open my eyes enough to find the glowing red numbers of the alarm clock that was across the room.

11:57 and Val was still out somewhere, probably by herself.

Hopefully she wasn't still mad…

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