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Perseus: Master of the Elements

FOR THE SECOND TIME

"How funny is it," Percy muttered, "that the son of Zeus died by a son of Poseidon's hand…"

Hercules's eyes opened wide and his arms thrashed wildly, but it was no use. The demigod was stronger than he was, and eventually, the god stopped writhing and lay still.

Percy had defeated the greatest hero to live.

Correction: the second greatest hero to live.

- Ω -

ANNABETH walked amongst the wounded in the infirmary. The stench of blood and the cries of pain attacked her senses, and she felt as if she were going to vomit. One three-hour battle with the Romans and the dead count was already higher than the second Titan War. Luckily, it was worse for the Romans; the Greeks fought upon their own territory, and it was common knowledge that defending is easier than attacking.

Familiar faces flitted throughout her vision as Annabeth pointedly avoided eye contact, and she felt a little sigh of relief when she didn't see Davis's face amongst them. She didn't want to appear cruel and heartless, but Annabeth knew that if she went into a prolonged conversation with one of the wounded, she would end up bawling her eyes out and looking weak – and the last thing Annabeth wanted was to be thought of as weak.

Killing monsters was easy. There was no regret when a monster dissipated; they were soulless creatures that hunted demigods. But humans, Roman or not, shed blood. They live, they have lives, and they love and try their best to live in a very big world with very big people. It was wrong, Annabeth thought, when she saw Romans fight Greeks, old friends against friends – so this, the girl realized, was why the gods were mad at Hera when she mixed the two groups. They didn't want war to break out between the Greeks and Romans, but guess what happened.

Annabeth was good enough to use non-lethal methods. Even though all children of Athena hate Romans for sacking Athens, Annabeth managed to convince her brethren to try not to kill, but she knew that they were too inexperienced to do so. And it would've helped if the best fighters, the Ares cabin, even attempted to disarm them – Clarisse was an indomitable force on the field and she killed more Romans than Annabeth liked to think about. The Ares cabin hated Romans more than the Athenians did, and it was clearly shown in battle.

A cold hand grasped her shoulder, and Annabeth shuddered. Whirling around in a huff of annoyance, she found a shy Nico looking furiously at the ground. "What."

"Uh, the counsel wants you," he muttered. "War meeting, I think."

Annabeth nodded, and she started walking towards the exit of the infirmary with Nico, glad for an excuse to get out of this place of hurt and pain. The two walked in a rather comfortable silence before reaching the Big House, and when Annabeth opened the door she found that she was late. Mentally scolding herself, she pulled out a chair and sat down, taking out a notepad she brought with herself everywhere.

A salty breeze blew through the room and heads jerked towards the now open door, announcing the arrival of a disheveled Percy and a blushing Piper. They hurriedly took their seats, but Annabeth noticed the small tinge of red on Percy's cheeks and the little marks on his neck – oh, dear. His saltwater gaze met hers and Annabeth instinctively shrunk away, feeling her face heat up.

"So. Surprise meeting. This better be pretty important," Percy said, smiling a warm smile. Okay, so Percy didn't change that much, Annabeth noted. Him being gone for a couple of months didn't destroy his compassion. Piper had a small grin on her face that only Annabeth noticed.

"Yeah, who's the genius that called this?" Leo asked, feet resting on the edge of the Ping-Pong table.

"I don't know, but it's definitely important," Katie chided, folding her arms in a motherly-style. "We're in the middle of a war."

"That's your definition of a war, Katie?" Clarisse asked, actual shock reaching her eyes. "This was more of a… skirmish, one could say."

Annabeth felt herself detach from the conversation as they argued over and over about some pointless detail, and she felt a headache coming on. The unstoppable squabbling of the counselors sent her head an instant note saying, hey, Annabeth's mind? Yeah, prepare for a damn big migraine.

Time slowly slipped out of her grasp. Her head swam with confusion when she bothered to check on the conversation, and she heard things like, we should definitely get some horses, cavalry and everything, to more outrageous words such as, who in the name of Zeus called this retarded and pathetic meeting? Apparently they were trying to figure out tactics such in order to defeat the Romans, but they were just causing more fighting to break out amongst themselves.

"Guys," Annabeth called out, asking for attention. She received none, and the girl started getting impatient. Banging her fist on the table and shouting, "Oi! Shut up," Annabeth managed to get the room to quiet down, which was a good thing, since Annabeth hated being ignored and probably would've castrated someone if she didn't get the spotlight.

"Yeah guys, listen to Annabeth," a smooth voice responded. "The girl has probably gotten a strategy already."

Glaring at Percy's sarcasm, Annabeth continued: "Guys, we really should be more united. The Romans pretty much listen to the Praetor's word while we are fighting over petty things and wasting valuable time."

"Octavian turned becoming Praetor into a dictatorship," Jason said quickly, eager to defend the Romans.

"Gosh," Annabeth muttered, "What I'm just trying to say is to be more united as a whole. Will that be so hard to do?"

Nods were given, and Annabeth sighed in content. At least the counselors listened to her suggestions and would be wise to continue doing so – not to brag or anything, but Annabeth was pretty sure that she was the smartest person there. Hubris, her deadly flaw, allowed her to think such thoughts without feeling slightly guilty. And the girl was right to think like that, for she was the smartest person in the room, but what she did not know was that, one day, her pride will lead to a great defeat.

But that's too far into the future.

"Octavian has possibly a thousand troops under his command – all including cavalry, infantry, archers, stuff like that," Jason informed glumly. "All the citizens of New Rome will fight if necessary, and they will carry out the Praetor's words. But over three-fourths of his forces are probably retired; I would know because when I was Praetor, we had two hundred fifty campers at Camp Jupiter actively participating in the Legion. The other seven hundred fifty are all retired legionnaires living in New Rome."

"So what you're saying is that the Roman army is made up of two-fifty actual legionnaires, and that the rest of his forces are retired but still fight anyway," Katie said. Jason nodded, and the girl continued, "We're outnumbered four to one."

Jason nodded again, and Annabeth deflated a little bit. Camp Half-blood didn't even have horses, how were they going to compete against the Roman horsemen? "Let's focus on the more immediate problems," Annabeth decided. "Kind of like the group of Romans nestled at our front door."

"I say we smash them when they're still pitching tents," Travis said. Connor continued, "After all, they're probably beat and worn after that battle."

Clarisse's eyebrows arched and her mouth parted. "Holy Zeus – did you two just say something intelligent?"

"Yeah Clarisse," Katie added, "I was getting a similar vibe."

"Hey, war's a serious matter," Travis defended, eyes wide and sincere. "It's not something to joke about."

The mood in the room seemed to drop a few octaves. When the most joyful, carefree and happy-go-lucky kids at camp get serious, then Annabeth figured that serious stuff was about to go down. After all, the only time she had seen a Stoll behave so seriously was when Travis tried asking Katie out on a date – and that was a memory hard to forget, much to the disdain of the Hermes children.

"Let's go over statistics," Annabeth said, trying to change the subject and mood. "Does anyone know how many squares of ambrosia we have?"

"Three whole squares for each camper," Katie supplied, and Annabeth was slightly shocked. Way back in the Titan War, Annabeth remembered that the Hermes children had to steal mortal First-Aid kits to temporarily substitute nectar and ambrosia due to the shortage of supplies. Percy evidently felt the same way too, and his eyebrows were comically set in a way as if to say, "Da heck you just say?"

"Armor and weapons?"

"At least one set for each, assuming we still have two hundred fifty or so campers." This time it was Leo who supplied the data, being the son of Hephaestus and a natural around the forge. "Definitely good enough quality."

"Good. Anybody know the stats from the Roman side?"

This time, Frank, who hadn't said a single word yet, spoke up. "Guessing on how they fought, I'd say that Octavian brought about one hundred and fifty fresh soldiers. They definitely weren't retired soldiers."

"And they don't have cavalry," Hazel added. The little girl seemed shy and nervous speaking in front of so many people; her hand was subconsciously fanning her heating face. "But I have a question. Do we really have to do all this fighting and bloodshed? Why can't we, you know, strike a peace treaty?"

"Funny coming from a Roman," Clarisse sneered. "Romans are–"

"As long as Octavian lives, we–uh, the Romans will never give up," Jason interrupted, preventing an argument from happening. Annabeth was eternally grateful; her migraine just started settling down.

"Assassination?" Percy suggested, smiling innocently. "I saw him, Octavian – he's part of the one hundred fifty."

"I like that," a Stoll said. "Sneaky sneaky."

"I think assassination is out of the question," Annabeth argued. "Look, you guys are forgetting that the Romans have some sort of support. Even if we do neutralize the Romans, there will be other things to deal with. Hyperion, for example. The flaming idiot should be in Tartarus, but ever since Hades lost control of the Underworld…"

"Someone took over the Underworld." Nico looked uncomfortable sharing this information. "Someone powerful. Ancient. And I'll bet a couple of drachma that the Romans helped in some way."

Jason seemed to be visibly offended by this statement. Frank and Hazel seemed a bit uneasy, but if they were angry then they were hiding it well. Jason, on the other hand, exploded. "Romans don't deal with Titans. End of that."

Silence. Then:

"What took over the Underworld wasn't a Titan."

Eyes stared in wonder as Percy told them about Tartarus and Erebus.

PERCY stumbled into his cabin late at night, silently cursing the surprise meeting. It had left him drained, weary, and just plain out beat; plus, he was in the middle of a little "reunion" with Piper when a freaking naiad told him to report to the Big House.

And the stupid thing was, turned out that there was a miscommunication and that there wasn't supposed to be a meeting, but some idiots (the Stolls) decided to prank everyone at the most inopportune moment. The Greeks need to be organized and disciplined, not arguing and pranking each other, calling fake meetings and staging food fights in the mess hall.

To make matters worse, he was bombarded with questions on where he was during his eight month disappearance before, during, and after the meeting. Percy told them that he was away at his father's palace and returned when he learned that there was fighting going on. Gods, he had a headache right now. It was worse than taking that Chimera drug with the Primordials. He felt so annoyed and angry, almost ready to snap at little notice.

The boy undressed and plopped down onto his newly washed bed (which was nice, since this cabin hadn't been inhabited for eight months but was still washed anyways) and closed his eyes. Sighing slightly, Percy let sleep slowly engulf him. Like a silent claw, darkness crept over his mind until he no longer thought his own thoughts and instead his mind wandered, dreaming of random scenes and–

"Wake up, Perseus Jackson!"

With a startled yelp, Percy banged his head on the bottom of the bunk above him and shouted a colorful string of curse words. Luckily the cabin was soundproof; otherwise the other campers would've been woken up.

"Gods, what in my father's name…!"

Percy stopped when he saw who woke him up. Said father stood above him, wearing a casual Hawaiian t-shirt and khaki shorts, eyes glowing with smile wrinkles surrounding them, and fresh scent of salt water lazily hanging in the still air. Percy was slightly shocked. It wasn't everyday that your godly parent paid you visits, especially during a war. Plus, Percy thought there was some sort of Ancient Rule forbidding against that kind of stuff.

"… is your father doing here?" Poseidon finished for his son, grinning slightly before a more somber undertone took a hold of his facial expression.

"Yeah," Percy lamely said, and he sat down on the edge of his bed, carefully avoiding bumping his ehad on the upper bunk bed. "Why are you here?"

The god smiled sadly. "Can't a father spend some time with his son?"

"Not if he's an important Greek god who never visits," muttered Percy, and he was surprised to find a bitter tone creep into his voice.

"You know I'm not allowed to visit."

"Then why now?" Percy responded angrily, fisting the sheets underneath him. "Why not when my mother died? Why not when I found out my girlfriend cheated on me? Why not… why not… why didn't you ever come when I needed you the most?"

His unexpected outburst left Percy feeling raw, drained, and tired. Rubbing his surprisingly wet eyes, Percy rested his head against his blue pillow and willed himself to calm down. It was not fitting for a demigod to yell at a god like this, but everybody has his or her snapping point. Percy felt as if all his anger, all his feelings of resentment and hatred simply transformed into a state of melancholy and undeniable sadness, and he hated it, it made him weak – it made him vulnerable. Great heroes cannot be vulnerable or weak.

A soothing hand went through his hair. "I'm sorry."

"Sorry doesn't cut it."

"I really am."

Percy didn't even bother responding. Instead, the demigod let the silence rule unopposed. But eventually it became too stifling, his father's soothing hand felt too fake, and Percy was just sick of it all.

"Why do gods even pretend to care about their children?"

"We do care."

"That's a lie."

"No it isn't. We love all of our children."

A small pang of anger beat against Percy's veins. "Then why did the Titan War start? Didn't it start because the gods didn't care enough for their children?"

"We have changed, my son," Poseidon said, "for the better."

"Really," Percy said, voice dripping with sarcasm. He had so much he wanted to say, to rant about, to complain and quip about, but Percy decided that it was better if he didn't say those things out loud. By now, Percy was honestly sick of the gods, sick of them relying upon their children to do their dirty work and then turning the other way when they were in trouble. And what Percy hated above all was being a pawn, a pawn in the mighty chess game of the gods.

"Why'd you even bother coming?" Percy asked.

Poseidon seemed to think on this for a second. "Well, I'm just going to be blunt with you." He seemed to wait for Percy's approval, and when Percy gave him the nod to continue, the sea god started speaking again. "This civil war with the Romans won't last long."

"Really?"

"Yes. The gods know this. But, it's the war afterwards that will hurt the most."

Percy's mouth literally fell off. Another damn war? Poseidon, sensing his son's distress, quickly continued. "Demigods will die. Many demigods, both Greek and Roman. But… I don't want you to be a part of the dead. You belong on Olympus, feasting with the gods, or down in Atlantis with me."

Percy's mind whirred with thoughts, and then it suddenly all clicked. "So you want me to god."

"Precisely."

"In the middle of a war."

"… yes."

"Leaving behind all my friends."

"… in a way, yes."

"Then, no."

Poseidon sighed, exasperated, and rubbed his head. Why did his son have to be the hero? One of the many reasons Poseidon vowed to never have children again was because he hated watching them grow old and die as Zeus's children get the limelight and become gods – one demigod son turned god, that's all Poseidon ever wanted. Is that too much to ask?

"Percy, I want you to think about this."

Percy thought it over. He was reminded of a conversation he had with the Primordials. And when you god, give this to the girl you love and she will join you in immortality. The ring was still in his desk drawer, sealed in the small velvet box. I don't want to become a god. True, he didn't. You have no choice.

Oh yes he did.

"No, father, I would much rather slug it out and die with my friends than take the easy way and ditch all of them," Percy answered. "So, please don't waste anymore time, dad, and leave."

Poseidon nodded sadly, and he turned away. He had been expecting this answer, but a little part of him hoped that his son would just join him in immortality – Poseidon remembered the Three Fate's eerie words and how short Percy's life span seemed to be.

The door shut behind him, and the god disappeared in a flash of bright light.

The Savior of Olympus refused godhood for the second time.

Sorry for not updating. It's probably really bad, but I felt as if I owed something to all of you faithful readers. I will continue this to the very end, and then some. This chapter, or the latter part of it, was composed in order to show some of Percy's bitterness.

See ya, and have a nice day.