… And I'm back.
Well, I couldn't do NaNoWriMo this year… College prep. *sighs* Anyways, here are replies to PM's and comments I've received so far –
lilyfowlpotter - Well, I hope you've finished The Last Guardian by now; I feel that my version of Percy needs a LOT more work than where he is now, but he won't be too big a character in the story (as of now). Glad to know you liked the chapter.
zoesimpson12 - Sure - I'll try to keep the swears to a minimum.
Apollo Holmes - I know - Holly's here! I'm trying to make her portrayal as authentic as possible, with a few quirks of my own.
InkstainedHands1177 - Thanks!
RyukMelonLordofTime12101 - Thanks.
Guest - Good to know you like Ana. And I feel really privileged knowing that you consider this fanfic good enough for future reference. I'll try to keep the momentum.
This is a bit of a filler chapter, just to introduce some seemingly mundane details that might be important in future chapters. Artemis is a little taller here.
Here we go. Read and Review!
Artemis
"Can we get moving now?"
While Artemis still could not believe that a centaur apart from Foaly existed (due to Foaly's rather passionately delivered Intel that there were only a dozen of them left on and below the Earth now), the wheelchair contraption and his stallion-like body rising from the average-sized wheelchair was an impressive trick. He could see the schematic of the device building itself in his mind, the carbon-fiber and duralumin exoskeleton coming together to support the hollow stallion-like support for the paralyzed lower limbs.
During the meeting, he had been informed that he was the descendant of the god of Death (Thanatos, not Hades, as many surmised) and this discovery, while welcome, would lead to several complications in his already complicated existence, with several of the complications revolving around a "prophecy" which had been repeatedly mentioned.
An oracle had been mentioned too, but it certainly wasn't one of Larry Ellison's (he cringed inwardly at his terrible pun). Rather, it was one of Apollo's, with the spirit of Delphi residing in the 17 year old red-headed female who had been present in the room throughout the conversation. Percy Jackson and Jason Grace had groaned at the mention of a prophecy, with Nico di Angelo having just rolled his eyes at the word. They had all looked at the read-headed female (who was Rachel Dare, daughter of multibillionaire and closet Extinctionist William Dare - her presence here confirmed the rumours that Dare Industries wasn't passing down to any heirs soon).
"Well, I'm not a jukebox, am I?" she had retorted for a reply, staring pointedly at the other three boys in the room. "When the spirit wishes to reveal it to everyone, it will."
With that the meeting had been concluded, and the four exited the centaur's office, where Miss Dare fed Cheetos to a cheetah (whose head was the only visible part of his body – Artemis assumed they released the animal from the scaffold at nighttime, when there were no impressionable young men to regale with paltry acts of trickery). I'm certainly acerbic today. And he had every right to be – hoodwinking was something he appreciated, but only when he was the one performing it.
"Can we get moving now, Fowl, when you're done daydreaming about whatever in my father's name it was?" Nico di Angelo reiterated his question, and Artemis got moving.
"Your father really is Hades." Nico turned to look at him.
"No shit, Sherlock." The rest of the walk proceeded in silence, till they reached cabin 13. While Artemis was not afflicted with triskaidekaphobia, he still disliked the number. It was four twice added to five, and adding death twice to a nice round number like five wasn't really ideal in his post-Atlantis brain. And two individuals with Death for supposed ancestors wasn't good either.
Come to think of it, cabins 4, 8, 12 and 16 had struck him as more disagreeable than the rest. Gods damn it. Then came the mental smack.
"Here you go," di Angelo walked in, and Artemis felt like someone had transported him to Bram Stoker's 'Dracula'. "Trust me - I didn't choose any of this - campers think Hades kids are more of vampires than just normal demigods." Well, di Angelo's pale Italian complexion isn't helpful.
"I don't suppose the cabin has any other occupants?" Nico nodded while pointing to a bed.
"That's yours. I threw the old beds out - you should thank me for that." He noticed that only occupied bed (till now) was one of the most austere, a futon with plain black sheets. His was slightly higher in height, but more or less of the same design. "We have capture the flag in forty minutes, so meet me outside the cabin in twenty minutes tops - lights out is usually by twelve, but you can have it earlier: I don't mind the darkness at all."
Artemis decided to make the most of his twenty minutes by lying down on his bed and burrowing under the covers, thinking. He could hear di Angelo walking out of the cabin, and decided to poke his head out to confirm his short-lived solitude. Sure enough, he was alone now.
As mentioned before, Artemis' solitude was indeed short-lived, and the end of his twenty minutes was signaled by di Angelo waving a pillow by his side, the object occasionally hitting the covers.
"Back from the land of the dead?" The two exchanged a stare, after which the Italian sighed. "I know; it's a terrible pun. Just get up - you need to suit up." Nico received a raised brow as a reply. "Well, you don't expect to survive swords, spears and Clarisse la Rue with just your luck and extreme sprinting, do you?"
Ana
Even if that lion didn't, the Ares cabin would certainly kill her tonight.
While Ana considered the plan foolproof, with even Annabeth giving it her 'Nestor nod', anything could happen in Capture the Flag, and having the Ares cabin on your opposing side wasn't the best thing that could happen to a person.
With everyone in attendance, Annabeth was busy surveying the plans and cross-checking with their allies (who were the Apollo, Poseidon, Demeter, Dionysus, Hephaestus and Hades cabins, amongst Nike, Hypnos, and Hebe), Malcolm was checking artillery while Percy chatted with the cabin head counsellors, revisiting duties assigned. Ana was taking attendance of squad members.
"Defense?" Thirty hands shot up. "Archers?" About ten more.
"Offensive?" Counting her, six.
"Weapon commanders?" Leo, along with Nyssa, Austin and Harley, grinned and whooped.
And so on.
Percy walked up to her. "Where's Nico?"
"Should've been here five minutes ago."
"Jason's saying he'll beat us to the flag. I told him that with Nico on our side, fat chance. But if he doesn't show up… I know that wouldn't happen." He fingered the straps on his arms. "What about Artemis - where's the new kid?" A moment later, Percy grinned, elbowing Annabeth while pointing to the approaching duo. "Doesn't look too different from me on my first day,eh?" Annabeth gave a confirmatory nod, smiling, while Ana wondered if Percy had really looked like his armour was about to swallow him and drag him three metres under the ground.
"I'll need proof," she told Annabeth. A minute later, Chiron trotted into their midst, surveying the campers with the same studious look as always.
"Campers, you know the rules - capture the flag."
And so began their weekly camp conflict.
The Ares cabin was unrelenting. As usual.
They had decimated the Demeter kids, with the exception of Katie Gardner, whose poison ivy and Venus Flytraps had Mark and Sherman screaming like five-year olds. The Hebe cabin had done a fairly good defence but was flattened by the electric spear. The Apollo kids were holding up magnificently, with Neil and James leading the archers. Castor had refused to help, being too drunk to actually do anything. The Hypnos kids were good the first few minutes, but fell asleep after knocking out a couple of Hecate kids. Leo had the flag covered, and Percy and Nico were on the opposing team's case. Annabeth will hold the fort - I should check on Artemis. So she ran behind Nico and Artemis, the former rescinding his shadow travel in order to not make his partner puke his guts out.
"Ghost King!" Nico whirled, blade at her chin. "I'll take over from here - you join Percy." With a nod, Nico disappeared in the nearest shadow, the dryad wailing.
"Why do all of you willingly risk your lives? For a mere rush of adrenaline?" By that time, Ana was quite irritated with the tactical situation already, and the last thing she wanted was to take care of a petulant, whining teen who didn't know how to fight.
"As much as you think it's stupid," she snapped at him, "we actually learn real combat-" He scoffed loudly, giving her a condescending sneer.
"Which could be done in safer environs, had you all the sense to involved holographic technology."
"Guess what, genius?" she bitterly spat out the word. "There is no safety on the battlefield, and enemies sure as hell aren't holograms. But you'd know nothing, having never been involved in a war." The colour seemed to drain from Artemis' face, replacing it with white anger, which began to turn cold, icy and biting. She didn't know what she'd said, but if looks could kill, every living being in a sixty feet radius would be dead and disintegrated.
"Miss Cromwell, don't speak of things you have no inkling of." He stepped closer, backing her by the tree, and for the first time, Ana found his five feet ten inches tall frame intimidating. "I have faced dangers you could have only imagined. So Do. Not. Speak of it." She would've said something, but a lion's roar is good enough to break the thickest of tensions.
She could vaguely hear Jason's voice in the distance and remember Artemis darting out of the way as the beast charged towards her, grey fur glinting like steel. Thanks to three scared bush dryads and a protruding tree root, she tripped and ended up barricaded between the tree and the lion. To climb or not to climb, that is the question. She had begun to scramble up the tree when a sharp whistle sounded across from her, and a vague instinct told her that something very stupid was about to happen.
Artemis
He should really return the title of 'Europe's Smartest Individual'.
Artemis could've waited for backup, but no, he had to whistle and turn the damn beast towards him. While the alternative was letting the girl who'd helped him not make an idiot of himself be mauled to death (which, he mused, looked very probable when he committed the idiotic), this was just as bad a deal.
It got worse when di Angelo jumped in.
Not that Artemis was too worried about the Italian he'd just met, he didn't want any deaths on his conscience. The lion was at least as tall as Artemis and would weigh approximately 600 pounds. 600 pounds of pure muscle and myth versus a 110 pound sixteen year old armed with only a sword - the comparison was laughable.
Well, laughable until the shadows cloaked the beast, trapping him in a shroud like cover. Di Angelo parried and struck, holding the beast at bay while the other campers shot whatever they laid their hands on - that ranged from arrows to knives to hairbrushes (he had a faint idea where the last might've come from). The blonde nurse (Will, he reminded himself) joined them, hacking at the ankles of the creature, while di Angelo took front, All seemed in control, until the lion decided it had enough and trapped him and Will by a rather large pine.
Will, sandwiched between him and the lion, tried wriggling out, which was counterproductive from the very beginning, Artemis mentally berated as the beast pushed them further into the tree. "Stop moving immediately - lions only further maul their prey if they struggle!" Apparently free advice was not welcome advice.
"If you could stop spouting facts and help me out here it'd be great, Fowl!" Artemis was already having a hard time thinking with the bark pressing into him - he could feel the fabric give way as his skin prickled and smarted, the rough wood scraping his back thoroughly. A roaring 600 pound lion, whose claws unhelpfully scraped his arms, and a 130-pound demigod pressed between the two wasn't helping him at all.
Just as he felt he'd dealt with enough pain for the coming years, the lion was suddenly yanked back by a combination of wind, shadows and platinum-goldlike chains. Artemis and Will slumped against the tree while Ana, Grace, Jackson, Chase and di Angelo, along with a few more campers, roped the animal in. In a final bid for freedom, it reared with full strength, its body weight aimed towards Artemis, who did the only thing he could think of then - he raised his arm, the other pushing Will out of the way.
I really shouldn't have done that.
Well, that wasn't his fault. Intentionally.
Artemis had not expected a person to just drop dead on his touch during capture the flag, but that's what had happened. Or that's what it looked like, because it didn't look like that child of Apollo was breathing.
"I apologize for my actions, if that lessens the severity of the situation." It seemed to help matters, but certainly didn't, because after a minute's worth of shock and silence, Nico di Angelo was flying at him, his fists pulled back.
"Nico!" He heard Jackson call out.
It was a split second in which di Angelo's fist collided with his nose. "You.." he snarled, voice quiet but utterly menacing - he felt himself recoil from the son of Hades, "Murderer. I can't feel Will's spirit." He punched Artemis in his stomach. "Because..." another, "of..." and another, "You..." Ana was trying to pull him away, while Jason and Perseus wrested Nico from him.
"I don't think he's dead. Would've done you all some good to give some CPR and check his pulse, you know?"
Kneeling beside the son of Apollo was a young lady with nut brown skin, her mismatched eyes reminding Artemis of the many adventures and catastrophes they had been through.
"Holly?"
Ana
She'd had a lot of strange days , but this was the strangest.
Watching someone just drop like they're dead was something that was still mythical to Ana, and her entire life was a myth.
So when the lion just dropped, she wondered if someone's sword had run through it, but with no marks and no blood around, this was number one on the list of the most creepy things ever. Standing in front of the creature was Artemis, his arms raised. She looked at him, and the look he returned was something mixed with horror and fascination. Apart from the fear and curiosity she felt, a major part of her sighed with relief that the animal was dead and no one had been fatally hurt while bringing it down. Looking at Will though, she mentally scratched out the last sentence. He looked like death, and probably is, she thought, horrified, as Nico's face lost all colour, the boy stumbling backwards looking like he'd been stabbed.
After a minute's worth of shock, Nico was all rage and anger, and Ana had just barely pulled Artemis out of harm's way. She could feel something sticky coat her arm around him and she pulled it back to see the small pool of blood coating his back. Lions seemed enough for the day, but it clearly had more surprises as the strangest being she'd ever seen knelt by Will, observing his pulse and running what seemed like blue sparks across his skin.
Artemis seemed to recognise her (it seemed like a female), even called her by a name - Holly? (again, a female name) - and walked towards her, shaking hands with the barely-a-metre-high person.
"We'll talk later, but these two need some serious medical attention," she said as Artemis began to sway. Ana put an arm under him, dragging him back to the infirmary, the camp staring at her and the female as the latter levitated Will back.
Once Will was settled, the female proceeded to help Artemis, running the same blue sparks across his arm but stopped short. He looked at her derisively while she kicked a chair in frustration.
"Still unprepared, Captain?"
"It's Commander to you, Mud Boy. And if you weren't involved in such a shitstorm, I'd have dragged you by the collar of your Armani to Haven first thing right now." Artemis smirked, the look fading into concern at the end of her sentence. Ana pulled out a pair of scissors from the first aid box.
"Just as a heads up, I'll be ripping apart your shirt," she said, cutting through the fabric while the female poured a pitcher of ice-cold water down his back. Artemis turned, annoyed. "You know it constricts blood-flow, genius." Holly grinned at her comment, pouring another pitcher down his back. Once the flow was contained, Ana turned to dress his wounds while Holly studied Will closely, Nico barging in after a few minutes.
He glared at everyone - Artemis in particular was given a look of deepest loathing - and took a seat by Will, holding his hand and checking his vitals.
"He's biologically living," Holly spoke to Artemis and Nico after a long silence, "but his soul seems absent. Like in a clone." Artemis nodded knowingly. "However, I don't know how his soul will be returned to him. What happened?" Artemis narrated the entire incident, and Holly shook her head tiredly, like a mother hearing her son's mischiefs for the umpteenth time, often muttering "Frond" or something like "Duh are wit", which sounds like cult lingo, but hey, who am I to judge?
"Like always, you had to be related to myths and do something weird and reckless in a world you barely know anything of," Holly gave him a reproving glare. "And if Lagrange is your doing, then Frond alone help you."
"Lagrange?" She looked at him quizzically, and they exchanged a series of looks, Holly's face settling into a worried look.
"So you didn't do it?"
"Whatever it is, which I'm guessing is related to the Cube - no, I didn't."
"Just what we needed," she muttered, "more genii knowing about us". Curiosity won over propriety as Ana butted into the otherwise private-not-so-private-but-private-anyway conversation.
"Wait, clone? Like a living, biologically functioning creature but with no soul? How does that work? How does it normally function, how does it think - how is it sentient without a soul? Can you even call it alive if it isn't sentient? And what of Langrange? C-Cube? Your biological makeup?" She had a lot more questions which tumbled from her mouth in a series of rambles and she looked across the two, waiting for an answer which she was sure would only compose of either "Nothing", "Calm down" or "You're clearly stressed out". Surprisingly, Fowl and the female smiled.
"You must be as confused as I am," she spoke, putting a hand on Ana's arm, "because it seems like we both have absolutely no clue of what we're doing."