Two chapters in one day! Again! That's gotta be some kind of record for me or something.

I had to do some shout outs here:

Moonlight22qu: Your review was sweet, and I'm glad you liked the chapter. I also PMed you to answer your questions and edited chapter 11 to fix up anything I needed to.

DeadlyHuggles: this person is a great reader of mine. I cannot even tell you how many of my stories this person has read and reviewed, and their reviews always make me happy.

Cady-Marionette: this person's reviews are beyond amazing and always make my day. I am so grateful that I can't even find the words. Thank you.

A big thank you to all of my readers, who stuck with this story, even after I pretty much disappeared for six or seven months, and I hope any new readers are enjoying the story!

Disclaimer: I do not own PJO or HOO or any of the characters. It all belongs to the amazing Rick Riordan.

Chapter 14: That's Gonna Hurt In The Morning

A few hours later, the tale of the prank Chris and Leo had pulled on the Stoll brothers had spread through camp like a wildfire. It wasn't everyday the pranksters of Camp Half Blood got a taste of their own medicine, after all.

By the end of the day, Leo and Chris had made their marks as the ones who pranked the Stolls. Even Travis and Connor had to be impressed, if a bit begrudgingly.

Leo was heading to the first camp activity on his schedule (Ancient Greek class. Like he needed any more lessons after seeing monsters that had been in Tartarus so long, they hadn't even made it into the Mythology books) when a sudden voice made him stop in his tracks.

"I hear you've become quite famous around here."

Leo whirled around and engulfed Percy in a hug, lifting him off the ground (which wasn't easy. Leo had yet to gain the lean muscles he'd had in the future) while the son of Poseidon laughed and hugged him back.

"I'm glad to see you're okay," Percy stated after Leo put him back on the ground.

Leo chuckled. "I'm glad to see Zeus didn't smite you."

Percy shrugged. "Well, I was carrying the Master Bolt. He probably couldn't risk smiting me without smiting his weapon."

"Oh, please," Leo scoffed, jokingly. "Your puny mortal body would be a pile of ashes, and that weapon would barely be scratched."

"Hey!" Percy exclaimed in mock offense. "That's my puny half mortal body," he corrected, and the two friends bent over with laughter at the joke.

"That joke was so lame, it was hilarious," Leo responded as he straightened back up, his laughter subsiding.

"Those are the best kind of jokes," Percy pointed out.

Leo shrugged one of his shoulders. "Point taken. Anyway, how's your mom? She doing okay?" he asked, genuinely concerned for the curly haired woman he'd met in the Underworld.

Percy nodded with a small knowing smirk. "I think she's going to be just fine," he replied, confidently.

Leo blinked at him, but he didn't question it.

"Anyway, happy to be back at Camp?" Leo inquired.

Percy nodded, eyes wide with sincerity. "Definitely. I've had enough adventure for a lifetime. One quest is more than enough."

Leo smiled, mostly jokingly but a little sadly. "And yet something tells me you're going to have a lot more."

Percy sighed. "I hope not. How are you holding up? I assume you're settling into Cabin 11?"

"Settling in?" Leo repeated. "I'd fit right in. If I didn't already know who my dad was, I would've thought I was their half brother."

"You and me both," Percy agreed with a chuckle. "I pity Beckendorf when you're claimed."

"Beckendorf?" Leo asked, feigning ignorance.

"Head councilor of the Hephaestus cabin," Percy answered, pointing at the all too familiar Cabin Nine.

Leo whistled. "I love Cabin 11, but I can't wait until I'm claimed. I think I'm going to like it there. That and forge privileges. Can you believe that only claimed children of Hephaestus can enter the forge?" Leo sulked.

"Can you believe I'm only good at canoeing?" Percy retaliated.

Leo chuckled. "Dude, didn't you fight Ares? I'm pretty sure that requires at least basic skills in sword fighting, so there's two camp skills for you. You're already two ahead of me."

"Just wait until you get in that forge. Or have to fight off three Manticores again," Percy added.

"Let's hope that day never comes," Leo said, although he knew Manticores wouldn't be the only monsters he fought, nor would they be the worst. Not even close.

The rest of Camp continued in much the same fashion. Leo attended his camp activities and hung out with the Stoll brothers, Chris, or Percy and Grover (and occasionally Annabeth) whenever he had the chance. He pulled pranks; he played Capture the Flag (actually been on the winning team for a couple of games); and more. Leo was actually having fun for the first time in a long time. Even his nightmares were few and far between.

For a moment, everything was perfect…

But then that moment ended.

Leo had forgotten about The Day until Connor said something, to be perfectly honest.

"Hey, Connor!" Leo called as he appeared by the younger Stoll's side, who was sitting on a bench in the center of the ring of cabins (omega of cabins?). "Have you seen Percy?"

"Uh, I think he went to the woods with Luke," Connor said, barely looking up from his cell phone.

Leo nodded. "Thanks," he began, turning to walk before slowly turning back around to ask, "Aren't cell phones against the rules?"

Connor raised an eyebrow, finally looking up at Leo. "We're inside a magical barrier that has kept monsters out for centuries. I don't think one cell phone is going to change that."

Leo shrugged. "Good point," he told Connor, trying not to think that that could happen next year when the barrier went down, before he twisted on his heel and strolled away, not truly paying attention as he headed for Cabin 11.

Wait a minute.

Leo stopped dead in his tracks, trying to place what had given him this sudden feeling of uneasiness.

He glanced around. No monsters. No goddesses/evil baby-sisters (cue rumble of thunder on a sunny day). No evil Dirt Queens. Not even Luke.

Luke.

The image flashed in front of Leo's eyes so quickly, he could've missed it if it didn't practically hijack his brain.

"Well, we actually didn't find out Luke was traitor until the day he tried to kill me."

Percy's voice was older, the voice of Percy's future self, a voice Leo knew and a voice that had uttered countless heart breaking screams that Leo would never forget.

"What?"

Frank. Leo hadn't heard his voice since be arrived in the past, not even in a nightmare or a flashback. It made his heart beat stutter and trip over itself trying to get back on its rhythm after the shock of the voice that belonged to the son of Mars.

"Yeah," Percy continued. "He took me into the woods- away from everybody- and had a poisonous scorpion sting me."

"Dude, he couldn't just push you off a cliff and say you tripped or something?" Leo had questioned. "He had to go for a dramatic death."

"Well, good thing he did," Percy had replied. "I made it to the creek, which didn't heal me completely, but it healed me enough for me to run back to camp. I lived, obviously. It still hurt like a b-"

Oh, no.

Leo attracted quite a few stares as he bolted through camp and practically thundered into the woods, making quite a racket as he snapped straight through branches and crashed through bushes and probably alerted every monster in the woods hey, tasty demigod over here! but he didn't care. All he cared about was getting to Percy.

"Goodbye, Percy."

Leo broke through the trees just in time to see Luke slash his sword through the air, and Leo threw logic to the wind. He didn't think. He simply acted.

He smacked the scorpion off of Percy's hand, luckily before the scorpion stung the son of Poseidon, and Leo stood back, smiling in relief at Percy as the scorpion tumbled into the river, sinking to the bottom (Leo didn't know if scorpions could swim, but evidentially, this one couldn't, which worked out for the two demigods).

His smile dropped when he saw Percy's horrified expression.

It was only then that the adrenaline wore off, and Leo felt a sharp burning in his left hand. He lifted his hand until his arm was at a ninety degree angle, bent at the elbow, and slowly turned his hand over to look at his palm.

There was a small, red puncture mark that was steadily turning green as the poison began to run its course. A few heart beats passed before Leo truly felt the affects. The nausea and the dizziness came first, followed by a numbness that spread throughout his legs and started clawing cold fingers towards Leo's upper body.

White spots danced across his vision, and Leo started to wonder why he was seeing three Percys when his legs gave out, and he collapsed into one of the Percys arms.

Leo didn't black out yet. He wasn't sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing, but he vaguely remembered Jason telling him that if you have an injury, you shouldn't go to sleep until you were positive you were going to wake up again, so he was going to go with good.

Where is Jason anyway? Leo wondered. He should've been back by now.

Leo couldn't remember where Jason was coming back from, but he knew his best friend had been gone a long time, and if he wasn't so tired and it wasn't so hard to think, maybe he would be more concerned for his brother in all but blood.

Unfortunately, all of Leo's thoughts were slipping away quicker than sand through his fingers. His vision was growing even blurrier, and his ears were pierced by a high pitched ringing that threatened to make him pass out from the sound alone. The sound and the blurriness and the bright light dancing in front of his eyes was not helping his migraine at all.

The ringing was making it hard to hear, but he was pretty sure he heard someone talking.

"Leo… Old… On… Ing… Okay!"

Leo. He was pretty sure that was his name. Old? He didn't feel that old. On? On what? Was ing even a word? Okay. Okay was good. Okay was very good.

What was he thinking about again?

Oh, the person was talking again. Leo should really start listening more.

"Leo!"

He knew that voice.

"Percy?" Leo managed, but his mouth felt like it was full of cotton, and it was suffocating him.

"Yeah. Yeah, Leo. 'm here," Percy responded, but his voice sounded far away.

Why wouldn't you be here? Leo wondered, but he didn't have the energy to say it out loud.

The light suddenly intensified, and Leo felt like screaming from the pain in his hand and in his head and in his entire body, but he barely had the energy to breathe, much less scream.

Yet somehow, Leo managed a single full sentence before he passed out:

"That's going to hurt in the morning."

Yep. Those could've been Leo Valdez's last words.

But they weren't his last words, thankfully, because three days later, Leo was waking up in the Infirmary.

"Am I dead? If this is Elysium, I got ripped off," Leo groaned.

A familiar laugh to his right. "It's not Elysium. Leonidas-" the person sounded like they were sniffling a laugh- "Sammy Valdez, welcome to the Camp Half Blood Infirmary."

"Thought so," Leo agreed as he leaned on his elbows to sit up a little. He found himself staring at a boy not more than a year older than him and definitely not older than Percy and Annabeth. He looked familiar, but Leo's foggy mind couldn't place him. "Are you my doctor? No offense, but you don't look much older than me."

The blonde boy laughed. "Son of Apollo. Will Solace," he greeted, and Leo was impressed that he didn't flinch at the realization that his friend (in the future, the one Leo had left to die) was standing right in front of him.

Leo shook his hand. "Leo Valdez. But you already knew that."

Will nodded. "Yep, medical charts are a great place for making friends," Will stated, sarcastically. "Anyway, how are you feeling?"

"It's a little hard for me to think, but other than that, I feel fine," Leo answered.

"Confusion is expected," Will replied, placing his hands on Leo's arm.

"Uh, what are you doing? Sorry, dude, but I don't swing that way. I do have a friend I can set you up with, though," Leo laughed.

Yeah, that friend of mine is your future boyfriend.

Will chuckled. "No. Part of my powers are the ability to measure vitals with my hands. Your heart beat is normal- 73 beats per minute. Blood pressure is a little low, but everything seems average or close to it. You're in surprisingly good shape for somebody who just got poisoned."

"I'm just awesome like that," Leo quipped.

Will rolled his eyes. "I'm sure. Anyway, you have a visitor. A few of them, actually, if you're up to it," Will informed him.

"Sure, send in my loyal followers," Leo deadpanned in a mock superior voice, making Will laugh once again.

"Of course, your Highness," Will returned, giving an exaggerated bow, before heading for the door to fetch Leo's visitors.

A minute later, a whole crowd hurried into the room. Okay, maybe it wasn't a full crowd, but it was certainly more than Leo was expecting with Travis, Connor, Chris, Annabeth, Grover, and Percy.

"Wow, I didn't know I had a fan base," Leo stated, sarcastically.

Travis rolled his eyes. "Aw, shut up, Valdez," he replied before he engulfed Leo in a hug.

Leo instinctively hugged back in surprise. It was only then that he noticed how stressed and worried they all looked. "Geesh, you guys are acting like I almost died or something."

Travis released him from the embrace, and the six of them exchanged glances before Annabeth spoke up:

"Leo, you almost did."

Leo tilted his head to the side. "What? It couldn't have been that bad. It was just one little scorpion."

Besides, if both Percy and I survived it, it couldn't have been that bad of an injury. Right? Leo thought.

"A poisonous scorpion," Grover corrected.

"Yeah. Will said that if Percy had gotten you back to camp two minutes later…" Connor trailed off, leaving the implication heavy in the air.

"Wow," Leo muttered. It wasn't the first time he'd nearly died (It was probably closer to the 200th time, and no, he was not exaggerating), but he was a little shocked that he had almost been defeated by a scorpion of all things. After everything he'd been through from a Great Prophecy to an apocalypse to time traveling… and his downfall was nearly a scorpion the size of his palm. "Still, guys, you should've known that I would not allow myself to be killed by a scorpion of all things. Where are the heroics in that?"

"Well, you did save me," Percy pointed out, sitting down on the bed. "Thanks for that."

"Well, you carried me back to camp. I save you, you save me," Leo settled on, clapping his friend on the shoulder.

"I save you, you save me," Percy reiterated in agreement.

Notes:

Leo will have a strong bond with Percy (and Annabeth and Grover), but he will also be great friends with Jason (I love his brotherly relationship with Jason, so expect to see that when we get to that point in the plotline) and Piper (I also love the idea of Leo knowing she can take care of herself but still being a protective big brother, and she knows he's strong, but when he's in danger, she thinks of him as the baby brother that needs to be protected, so expect to see a lot of protective Piper- and protective Leo- as well).

I wasn't sure how to write poisoned Leo, so I hope I made that scene and his injury induced confusion at least somewhat realistic.

There will be one more chapter to wrap this story up, but it will be a series.

Last but not least... did anyone catch the How To Train Your Dragon reference (or the Tangled one)?

Thank you for reading! Goodbye!