Lance looked across the unnatural colour of the blaze of the fire, over to Piper who stood there, miffed, face decorated with makeup she was attempting to scrape off to no avail and clothed in an ornate chiton, before braving to look up, eyes wide and face bathed in a glowing blue.
There, floating a few centimetres above that one little stalk in his hair that never quite sat flat, was a symbol, a decorative trident that moved slowly, losing colour at the same pace. His jaw dropped and the dark blue of his eyes glazed over. A collective gasp rose from a sea of faces, each different in features but, suddenly, remarkably similar in expression, as Jason looked past him, over to Piper as one other girl prioritised her over lance who was somewhat lost.
"No!" The nameless girl explained, pretty features contorting, twisting in a way that made her much less attractive "No way! You are not my sister!"
Piper was making a face herself, one that suggested to Lance, a fact he accepted with a snort of laughter that drew much more attention to the other new camper who had just been claimed as the blue fizzled away entirely, that she was also unhappy with the situation. "I guess so…" She said begrudgingly.
"No! Aphrodite is the goddess of love and beauty, look at her and tell me she's my sister!" the other girl was in hysterics.
Jason looked at piper, mockingly pretending to be examining the composition of her features. He may not have known her, even if she remembered them being in a relationship and knew rather too much about him for him to be able to deny her claims without a slight pang in the side of his head and stomach. "I see beauty there." he told her confidently, not allowing his speech to falter even as his cheeks flushed crimson.
She huffed and turned her head, a wave of ebony curls spinning with her as she ignored him dutifully.
Across the campfire, from where he overlooked the goings on, Chiron cleared his throat purposefully. His eyes scanned the crowd, stopping upon the two newest demigods to be claimed, as a smile graced his aged face.
He introduced the two, formally and traditionally, by their titles at that moment.
"Piper Mclean, daughter of Aphrodite," Piper subtly kept her breath held, distracted momentarily from the unfamiliar unpleasant weight of the makeup her claiming had bestowed upon her, as she prayed to every god she could think of no one would make the connection between her and her father. No one did.
"And Lance, son of Poseidon." Chiron continued, watching as Lance sheepishly scanned the crowd, every face he saw confused, wondering about the lack of family name attached to the title that made even him, suddenly reminded of his unfortunate situation, somewhat uncomfortable.
After a moment of palpable silence, someone finally gave in to the urge to break it, initiating a wave of unsure clapping that not one person did not halfheartedly join in on.
That night, Leo spent the night in the cabin of his father, warm and cosy, comfortable and comfortably occupied with a fair number of kids, the youngest being Harley who had not stopped smiling. The air smelled distinctly of metal, not that Leo minded it at all. He was, however, plunged into a captivating mess of thoughts - thoughts of his mother, more specifically when she had ceased to be his mother.
Piper had been required to spend her life in a less pleasant environment, in a cabin decorated in various shades of pink that began to claw at her eyes, stinking of perfume and cologne that tickled the inside of her nose and clawed insistently at the inside of her throat. Drew, the girl who had quickly made her disapproval of Piper obvious, turned out to be her head camper and was abusing the power, making a nice boy, Michael, she recalled, pick up the contents of the bin that had been tipped across the floor, screeching like the banshees Piper hoped did not exist.
Though Jason and Lance were both convinced they would have her beat.
The Zeus cabin was occupied primarily by a giant statue formed in the visage of his father. It seemed to be watching the entirety of the cabin, stern facial features, etched in hard stone that could have been constructed of cloud and been no less terrifying, making him feel as though he would rather be almost anywhere else.
The cabin was cold, and, aside from the statue, empty. At least until he found the nook in the all that gave way to a cot, Polaroids on the wall, tacked up haphazardly, faded but far too familiar not to stir up a storm of recognition in his clouded consciousness. He slept there, alone in a room that felt as far from home as anything could, missing comfort, missing companionship, missing much of himself.
Lance was missing just as much.
He had been escorted to the long, low-walled cabin by Annabeth whose eyes had glazed over, face unreadable. This had been her boyfriend's cabin and he couldn't help but feel as though he was intruding upon a place in which he was not meant to be.
She hadn't said a word but, as he walked across the hard floors, footsteps echoing, barely audible over the rush of the fountain in the corner, he saw one of the eds unmade, the surrounding floor littered by signs of life.
He steered as clear of it as he could.
He knew, as he perched on the end of one of the other beds in the room, eyes perusing every crevice of the room that sent unpleasant tingles up the length of his spine, that the space he was observing was the living space of the missing Percy Jackson he had heard of.
He couldn't sleep that night. The running water he would usually have loved filled his ears like a raucous chorus of poorly played drums. The lack of people in the room made im uncomfortable, beyond his understanding. He looked over at the empty beds with heavy eyes that wanted to sleep but were not allowed to, feeling like it was something he was much unused to.
The next morning, he escaped the confines of that cabin as soon as he could, thankful to be able to breathe the fresh air of the chilly morning. He was aware that was a very strange thing for him - he like to sleep for as long as possible. He laid on the small stretch of beach, back in the sand, sun moving laboriously over the muted blue of the sky. This - the crashing of the waves on the sand, lapping over his outstretched feet, the whistle of the wind in his ears, the all of the birds above, the noise of people a short distance away, going about miscellaneous tasks - was so comfortably familiar he had to smile.
Leo had been looking for Lance that morning and found him on the beach. He had dragged him to breakfast soon after, cloaked in sand and feet soaked.
"How's the beach?" Leo asked as they walked across the luscious grass that carpeted the camp.
"Good," lance answered "Not as good as Varadero, though." he continued casually, not noticing anything until he realised leo had stopped and was looking at him through widened eyes, face positively glowing.
"Varadero!" he repeated excitedly.
Lace stopped and looked at him, head tilted "Yeah?" he didn't understand, but then he did.
"Oh my god! Varadero! Where's Varadero?"
Leo shook his head as he pondered "I don't know - Annabeth seems to know a lot - she might."
Lance wasn't going to admit he was sure Annabeth didn't like him; he was meant to convince people he was convinced everyone liked him until they had literally tried to kill him. So he went along with Leo's disagreeable plan.
Annabeth had looked up from her book, eyebrows pulled together as she thought "Varadero, Varadero, Varadero," She repeated the word until the boy next to her piped up:
"Varadero, a beach resort town on the narrow Hicacos peninsula of Cuba. Why do you ask?"
"Malcolm!" Annabeth exclaimed "Of course,"
Lance's eyes lit up "Cuba," he mumbled.
Leo responded for him, looking over at him and receiving a careless nod of approval to tell the story, that was lacking a sizeable portion of itself he was sure the children of Athena would hate not knowing, was okay to tell.
"Did you guys get the news of Miracle Boy here?" he asked. They nodded after a moment.
"You aren't telling me…?" Malcolm trailed off, grey eyes trailing over lance who was still mumbling happily to himself.
"Yup." Leo told him.
"Why Varadero?" Annabeth asked.
"I asked him about the beach and he mentioned it offhandedly - I suppose he went there frequently enough for that to stick with him?"
"Cuba," lance repeated, directing it to Leo rather than the ground this time "I'm from Cuba."
Annabeth had, thankfully, become less opposed to Lance that morning than she had been the night before.
"We need to get you two weapons," She told him and piper as the three walked hurriedly towards and old shed "This is the Athena weapons tore but the Aphrodite one isn't the best," piper sighed, grateful for the fact the makeup had faded "And I'm not even sure if we can access the Poseidon one at present."
She pulled open the old door, revealing a cluster of weapons that filled the area that seemed much bigger from the inside than the outside. Upon her gesture, Piper and lance entered the area, looking around. Piper hefted a machine gun curiously but quickly put it back.
"Not your style, huh? Guns are pretty flashy." Annabeth said as Piper continued to search, having lost sight of Lance a moment ago.
Then something caught her eye. There was a short blade, a dagger, sitting in the corner, dusty and isolated but, for whatever reason, completely enrapturing. She reached forwards and picked it up between her thumb and forefinger, hesitant to touch the ornate sheath too much as the fascinating weapon was not yet hers.
She pulled off the sheath; the bronze blade almost shone beneath. She could see her reflection in it, the coco-colour of her hair and the brightness of the feathers twisted into a few of the random, uneven braids among it.
Then Lance emerged, eyes glistening just as much as they had when he had discovered his own place of origin, a somewhat bulky rifle held so familiarly yet so casually in his hands that it actually made Piper somewhat nervous to see.
Annabeth eyed the weapon "A rifle?" She confirmed as she looked over at piper's glimmering blade "You know how to shoot?"
Piper was hoping he would say no.
But he nodded. "Yeah, I'm sure of it." he looked over at Piper "Only, I don't know why."
Annabeth sighed "I suppose that's to be expected."
They walked out, Annabeth locking the shed back up behind their retreating backs.
"We'll get you two to training with those later - don't worry, they won't hurt mortals, just be careful around demigods."
Lance had shocked everyone at the range that afternoon when he had proved his skill with the weapon. Piper, having finished her own training session before his began, was watching as he stood in his section of the range, sight raised to his eye as he closed the other.
His left hand acted as a shelf as his right rested over the area in which the trigger was located. Through the aiming-circle in the centre of the sight, he could see the centre of the target however far away it was. He pulled back the bolt and breathed once, deeply, to check his position. Sure enough, after the rifle raised with his breath, it lowered steadily back down to the same area.
He pulled the trigger back with his index finger, holding it back as the bullet went firing forwards, releasing itself from the rifled barrel, flying at high speeds through the air, before piercing through the centre of the target where he had aimed for it to go.
Piper gasped as he pulled back the bolt again, breathed and released.
The bullet went back through the same hole.
He emptied the entire magazine into that target before lowering the weapon and turning to face Piper, smiling widely.
"You know, Sharpshooter," She grinned "I don't think whatever life you had before was all that normal either." She laughed.
He laughed back "I feel like you might be right," he observed his work keenly "Sharpshooter?" It felt as familiar in the weapon he held, like it fit neatly into the thousand piece puzzle of which he felt he owned a mere five pieces.
"Sharpshooter." She confirmed with another smile and a wave of her hand towards the target
A/N
Am I diverging from the canon a bit? Yep.
Sorry for not uploading last week, by the way, I just couldn't get wording that I liked. It just didn't happen.
I hope this is okay, I'm not against it so I hope it reads okay to people who are not me and were not in my head as I wrote this, knowing exactly what I meant by every word.
~We'reAllABitOdd