The song for this chapter is "For What It's Worth" by Buffalo Springfield.
July 23rd, 2018. Albany, New York
Alabaster C. Torrington squinted, looking past his cup of coffee to the television showing a skyline he recognized, along with something above it that he didn't.
As he read the headline, he mentally swore.
Another alien attack on New York, but this time, they were after something specific, and had apparently gotten it, since the craft had left minutes later.
Alabaster had his suspicions about what the aliens were after. As long as there were records, one could find the odd mention of objects of unrivaled power, called infinity stones. After the alien invasion in 2012, Alabaster had heard claims from some of his sources that one or even two (as one source had claimed a few years later) had been involved, and much more recently, that another of the gems was in New York City, at the heart of a magical artifact the Eye of Agamotto.
Leaving some cash at his table, Alabaster decided that he needed to look into what happened, because if aliens had just taken the object in New York, then he would have bigger concerns than being on a godly hit list.
After exiting the café, Alabaster ducked into an alley, and cast a spell to transport him to the city. "Incantare: Porta Caliginis." [Incantation: Gate of Mist]
Cairo, Egypt
Amos Kane wondered, not for the first time, if he had made the right choice to prohibit the involvement of the House of Life in mortal affairs when it came to threats like what had happened in 2012
At the time, he had thought that leaving issues like alien invasions to the Avengers would make things much simpler in the long run, but now, he realized he had been naive. Just because something wasn't directly related to the Egyptian pantheon didn't mean that it wouldn't affect him.
And what he had recently heard absolutely would. Amos had gotten the memo from a contact that someone was collecting the infinity stones with the intent to use them to slaughter half of all life in the universe.
Despite knowing that it was something that needed to be stopped, Amos couldn't do anything but watch from the sidelines, unless he wanted to lose the trust of the Nomes that had taken so long to establish.
He would, however, advise them of the situation. After all, if his niece and nephew decided to go against House of Life policy, that was hardly under his control.
Hell's Kitchen, New York City
Nico di Angelo could tell when lots of people were about to die, through some sort of odd sixth sense inherited from his father. But what he was feeling now was more… odd, almost the same, but not quite.
At first he had attributed the sense to be a combination of the rumors of giants in San Francisco and the disaster that was his attempt to recreate a recipe from his childhood, but after finding out that the rumors of giants had turned out to be nothing more than the actions of some regular humans, and several days worth of airing out the apartment, Nico realized that there was something else coming…
So when he got a text from Will, telling him to 'Go outside and look up, right now!', Nico knew something bad was happening.
What he saw was an alien spaceship hovering over Greenwich Village, literally beaming someone up.
Nico sighed, and memories of what happened the last time aliens had visited New York City played back in his head
Death. Destruction. Chaos.
Nico knew he couldn't sit on the sidelines this time.
Greenwich Village, New York City
Alabaster looked around Bleeker Street, taking note of his surroundings before starting his search to find what had happened to the Eye of Agamotto.
"Incantare: Ostende Mihi Energīās." [Incantation: Reveal to me energies] Alabaster spoke, casting a spell to trace the path of the various energies, magical or otherwise.
Scanning the area, Alabaster found a particularly strong path of green energy, winding throughout the area before moving into the sky. The intensity of the energy path was stronger than anything he'd ever seen, including his mother Hecate. All this made him almost certain that it was indeed an infinity stone that the aliens had taken.
His suspicions confirmed Alabaster quickly scanned the area for anything else that could explain what happened, but as he turned, he found a sword in his face.
"Nico." Alabaster acknowledged politely, as though there wasn't a sword in his face. "Fancy seeing you here."
"Alabaster," Nico said the name as though he wanted to get rid of it as fast as he could. "You're either insane or an idiot to be in the city, especially after it's just been attacked."
"You do know that this wasn't me, right?" Alabaster responded, almost mockingly, as he took a step back from Nico's sword
"You don't exactly have the best track record." Nico retorted."The last time you were in the area, a lot of people died."
"I know that, better than most, except for maybe you." Alabaster grimaced, taking another step back. "Every sibling of mine was dead by the time Jackson killed Kronos."
"Percy didn't kill Kronos." Nico disagreed. "That was Luke."
Alabaster snorted. "That's a fabricated story to make sure there weren't any martyrs to rally behind, and you're an idiot to believe it." As he spoke, Alabaster crossed his arms in front of him.
"I should know better than most." Nico said, using Alabaster's own words against him.
"You know, you've gotten a lot less pleasant since the last time we met." Alabaster remarked, pulling something out of his sleeve and tapping it. "But I have bigger problems than arguing about the past. So get out of my way, or I'm going to make you."
As he finished speaking, Alabaster grabbed the now fully formed imperial gold sword, and he assumed a fighting stance.
"Bigger problems than denouncing the Olympians?" Nico raised an eyebrow, even as he assumed his own stance. "My father must be really cold right now."
"Very funny." Alabaster spoke, as the two closed in on each-other. "Leave me alone, or you're gonna be able to check for yourself really soon."
With that, the fight started.
Carter Kane thought he had a basic idea of what Greek demigods were capable of. But last time he checked, neither Percy nor Annabeth could teleport, especially mid-fight like what both of the Greek demigods were doing in the area where the magical surge had happened.
Earlier in the day, his Uncle Amos had warned him that someone was collecting infinity stones, and that New York was one of the targets.
After much internal debate, Carter made the choice to leave the issue up to the mortal world, and their heroes, who had apparently already been alerted of the situation. At around one thirty in the afternoon, he saw the alien spaceship over New York, and still decided to do nothing but watch, even as the ship left the atmosphere of Earth after beaming something up.
Then Sadie had told him that there was a sudden surge of magic in Greenwich Village, near where the aliens had visited, and he decided to scout the incident out. He hoped that whatever was going on would be a distraction from the fight between his morals and his duty as Pharaoh.
Which led him to now, where Carter was cautiously staying back and considering his options until he noticed that his sister had already transformed back into her human form and was walking towards the duel.
As she moved forwards, she wordlessly summoned gusts of wind that knocked both of the demigods to the ground.
"Please explain to me why two demigods are fighting at the site of an alien invasion." Sadie demanded.
Both demigods tried to answer at the same time, so Sadie pointed to the closer one, a kid with black hair, holding the iron sword. "You first."
"I'm trying to figure out what just happened here and Alabaster," the black haired one pointed at the other demigod, "shouldn't be here."
"That's the thing Nico," the brown haired one, apparently named Alabaster, interjected. "I'm checking up on what happened here too, but you would rather bring up old grudges."
"Oh, you mean the part where you helped invade Manhattan?" The black haired one, Nico, countered.
"We have much bigger issues than trying to butcher each other di Angelo." Alabaster deflected. "Whatever attacked this place got ahold of an infinity stone."
"Is that supposed to mean something to me?" Nico responded. "Or is it just more of your bullshit?"
"Well, for comparison, the energy trail the stone left behind is almost as strong, if not stronger, than an energy trail left by a Primordial God." Alabaster replied. "The energy that each one one is capable of outputting is enough to make you-know-who's master bolt look like a sparkler, so I'd rather not find out what the purpose of taking the stone was the hard way.
"I can answer that." Carter spoke, "The people who took it are aliens who plan to collect the whole set and kill half of all life in the universe."
Nico looked at Carter and Sadie and narrowed his eyes. "Who are you two anyways? I haven't met anyone with powers like yours before."
"Carter and Sadie Kane, members of the house of life." Sadie responded. "Basically we're Egyptian Magicians."
"How did you know about demigods then?" Nico asked suspiciously.
"We ran into Percy Jackson a few years ago." Carter responded, after a moment, deciding that the time for caution was in the past. "He and his girlfriend helped us recapture a rogue malicious spirit by the name of Setne."
"Of course it was him. A complete lack of subtlety combined with a hero complex. Involving himself in something that wasn't his business and revealed the Greek gods to potential threats is no biggie when you're Perseus Jackson." The way Alabaster had said the name was practically dripping with spite.
"It's more complicated than that." Carter contradicted. "But how about we save the discussions until after we figure out our next move."
"Well, there is one more infinity stone currently on Earth that I know about." Alabaster said. "The brain of Tony Stark's pet robot, the Vision."
"Then the Avengers will protect it, right?" Nico asked.
"Clearly you don't pay close attention to the mortal world." Alabaster commented. "The Hulk and Thor haven't been seen since 2015, outside of conspiracy theories, and then the UN tried to take control of the team, so a lot of them are on the run after disobeying that. The only one who's in any position to help right now is War Machine, since Stark and Spider-man got beamed up. Even if he gets help from the King of Wakanda-"
"It won't be enough." Sadie concluded, looking around the battlefield. "They need all the help they can get."
Nico di Angelo looked around, seeing the storefronts that had been caught in the alien attack as well as his and Alabaster's duel, as he listened to Carter and Sadie Kane debate over whether to involve themselves in the protection of the infinity stones.
"Even if we knew where the Vision was, and could get there in time," Carter Kane was saying, "Who's to say we don't make things worse, either in the fight itself, or when the House of Life finds out that we involved ourselves in mortal affairs."
"Is it any different to us following the path of the gods when we were younger?" Sadie responded. "This threat may not be related to Egyptian mythology, but it's still our fight. But you want to play politics instead."
"Hey." Nico interrupted the argument. "I think I have some idea about where the Vision is."
"How?" Alabaster asked. "And where?"
"Mortals." Nico pointed to a shop front on the other side of the road, with a TV in the window, a ship just like the one over New York in frame.
"That's Edinburgh, in Scotland." Sadie identified the location. "I'm going to try and help Carter, even if you won't." With that she walked towards Nico and Alabaster.
Nico looked at Alabaster. "You wanna open a portal for us? I won't be much help if I have to take everyone across the Atlantic."
"I can't create a portal to somewhere I've never been." Alabaster spoke through his teeth. "You of all people should know how magical travel works.
"If you can get me to Cleopatra's Needle in Central Park, I can open a portal to Edinburgh." Sadie interrupted.
"Quick word of warning, Central Park is pretty much at Olympus's front yard, so I might get smited as soon as we get there." Alabaster spoke, before opening a portal with a few whispered words. "Or they might decide to smite everyone here. It really depends. So I'd prefer it if you opened the portal quickly."
"Got it." Sadie replied, looking at a watch quickly before she stepped through Alabaster's gate of Mist.
Central Park, New York City
Sadie Kane immediately walked over to Cleopatra's Needle, after shaking off the awkward feeling from going through the Greek magician's portal. After checking her watch to ensure that an auspicious moment was happening at that moment, Sadie pulled out her wand and cast the hieroglyph needed to open a portal of her own, to Edinburgh, Scotland. "W'peh."
𓄋
𓊪𓏴
Open - she mentally translated the hieroglyph on instinct.
"Door's open." Sadie spoke, looking back to where Nico, Alabaster, and her brother had just walked through the previous portal. "Are you coming to help Carter, or are you just here to lecture me?"
"I'll help Sadie," Carter responded. "But if it blows up in our faces, I'm going to say I told you so."
"I wouldn't expect any less, brother dear." Sadie replied, noting the brief looks of surprise on the faces of Nico and Alabaster.
One by one, each of the others walked into the portal until only Sadie was left.
Taking a deep breath, she walked through the portal.
Edinburgh, Scotland
Sadie looked around, scanning the area she had just arrived in, to make sure everyone else was already there.
"This place feels like death." Nico commented, reminding Sadie of Walt. "Where exactly are we?
"Calton Hill." Sadie replied. "It's a graveyard in Edinburgh's Old Town."
"What now?" Carter questioned. "We're in Edinburgh but there isn't exactly a neon sign saying that the Vision is here."
"Actually, there is." Alabaster replied. "You just have to look a little more closely. Incantare: Ostende Mihi Energīās." [Incantation: Reveal to me energies]
From that, Alabaster pointed at a yellow line of energy, almost exactly like the green one Sadie had seen in the duat in New York. "You just need to know where to look."
Sadie and the others followed Alabaster out of the graveyard, but then she heard screams from down the road, including what she thought was someone saying Vision.
"I'm pretty sure that's our alien attack." Sadie spoke, sprinting in the direction of the noise while she pulled out her wand again. "Just follow the sounds of chaos.
The others followed her, the whole group running towards the chaos into a train station, where a full blown battle with Black Widow, the Falcon, Captain America, Wanda Maximoff all fighting aliens who were trying to get to the collapsed body of the Vision.
Immediately, Sadie sent a powerful gust of wind into the alien with horns, launching them away from their fight with the Black Widow and Captain America, and the horned alien landed next the other one who'd already been taken out by the Avengers, as her brother and the demigods drew their swords. Carter with his khopesh, and Nico with the sword he had been using previously, while Alabaster brought out a new sword with the material rippling throughout the blade.
Natasha Romanoff looked in the direction the gust of wind had come from and saw four people in their early twenties standing there. One with a staff and boomerang while the others all had swords. "We've got at least one enhanced in the field, and more people with them, watch our backs Sam. They could be here to hunt Vision down too, even if they are fighting the aliens." She said into the comm channel, before turning back towards the aliens.
Natasha looked as the horned one tried to help their partner up before speaking to them. "We don't want to kill you, but we will."
"You'll never get the chance again." The horned alien replied as she triggered something that beamed her, her partner, and their weapons up.
"Well that was dramatic." One of the newcomers said. "Chances are that they'll be back soon enough, probably with an army."
"I'm sorry, who are you?" Sam asked.
"Alabaster C. Torrington." The newcomer replied. "That's Nico di Angelo, and Carter and Sadie Kane." He gestured to the others as he spoke.
"What are you doing here?" Natasha asked. "Alien attacks aren't exactly a spectator sport."
"Making sure that stone," one of the other newcomers, Sadie Kane, gestured to Vision's head as she spoke, "doesn't get into the hands of Thanos."
"We're on your side," Another of the newcomers, Carter Kane added, putting the khopesh into a sheath on his back.
"We need to get Vis help." Wanda interrupted. "We can do introductions on the way."
"Both of the makers are missing," Alabaster spoke, "and I don't think there are any robot hospitals in the area."
"Actually, we know where Bruce Banner is." Steve replied. "The Avengers Compound.
"Well then," Carter replied, "mind if we hitch a ride?"
Avengers Quinjet, Somewhere over the Atlantic Ocean
Sam Wilson looked across at the four people who had helped take down the aliens in Edinburgh, before he decided to break the ice. "So, you three," he gestured to Carter, Nico, and Alabaster, "have swords, and she," Sam pointed at Sadie, "has a magic staff. Did you make a stop in Middle Earth on the way here or something?"
"Or something." One of the newcomers, Alabaster, replied.
"Well that clears things up." Sam snarked. "How do you even know what's going on anyways. Today is the first time any of us have heard of this Thanos guy, and that was from someone who's apparently been in space for the past 3 years."
"The memo was passed through the grapevine to some of the more influential people in the magical community." Carter answered. "I heard it, indirectly, from the people who were guarding the time stone."
"And Bruce Banner was there when the time stone got taken." Steve interrupted the conversation, having just gotten off a call with the aforementioned doctor. "They probably learned at about the same time as us.
"How come it's just the four of you that've come to help anyways?" Sam asked. "And why now?"
"None of us should really be helping in the first place." Sadie stated. "It risks revealing our existence to the whole world, and you of all people should know why that's an issue."
"So you're it as far as reinforcements go?" Steve asked.
"On our end, yes." Carter spoke, before looking at Alabaster.
"Nico would know better than me," Alabaster answered the unspoken question, "but I doubt anyone else would come to help, especially since I'm here."
"Nobody that I can get into contact with, that I actually trust." Nico affirmed, with some bite in his words Sam noted. "Almost everyone from our generation is either dead, retired, or unavailable."
"Your generation?" Sam questioned. "You're like twenty-two, max."
"There weren't a whole lot of us to begin with," Nico replied, "and after three wars, there are even fewer."
"Wars?" A concerned look appeared on Steve's face.
"Closer to skirmishes from your sense of scale." Alabaster stated. "But everyone left from our generation lost someone."
"What happened?" Steve asked.
"It's complicated." Alabaster said with a tone of finality. "I don't know what the Kanes were up to at the same time, but I'm pretty sure they had their own issues to deal with."
"How come you don't know each-other that well?" Sam asked. "You act like the Kanes are from a separate group, same with di Angelo."
"Again, it's complicated," Alabaster glared at Sam briefly, "but for me personally, I've been operating by myself for years."
"Essentially, there are a lot of smaller factions within the realm of magic users." Carter clarified. "My sister and I are a part of one known as the Per Ankh, and Alabaster and Nico belong to another. Usually, we stay out of each other's way, but sometimes things happen that involve multiple groups."
"Sounds complicated." Sam said.
"Maybe," Alabaster conceded, "But usually, it works out. Today is the first time I'm even hearing confirmation that their group exists."
"Hey," Sam shrugged, "who am I to judge the wizards."
Alabaster only sighed in response.
Author's Notes:
Before anything else, I want to address the biggest issue I have with this chapter as it is now, and that's how rushed the pacing feels. I'm pretty sure I can blame this issue on the fact that it was originally supposed to be two chapters (and might be changed back to two chapters later on), but I wanted to release all of this at once, and felt that the word count split between two chapters was inadequate.
Song for the Chapter:
This is just a personal touch that I'd like to see in each chapter, but I feel like adding a song that relates to how the chapter feels, preferably having been released by the time the chapter takes place, makes the fic that much more interesting.
So the song for this chapter is "For What It's Worth" by Buffalo Springfield, a protest song from the Vietnam War era.
Formatting:
For the setting, I have a bold header at the top of each section that states the date, and the location of the character we're seeing the POV of. If some or all of the header isn't present, then that part of the setting hasn't changed since it was last given.
'"Incantare: Porta Caliginis." [Incantation: [Gate/gateway] of [mist/murkiness/intellectual dark]'; this is how Alabaster's magic is handled in the Son of Magic, with him saying Incantare (which essentially means incantation in Latin), followed by a spell name that is linked to the effects of the spell, with the spell name also in Latin.
I know the hieroglyphs used in the spell to open the portal don't exactly match up with the ones seen in the Kane Chronicles, but this is because Rick Riordan had the luxury of being able to put images in his chapters that showed pre-combined hieroglyphs, while I have to use the Unicode hieroglyphics system and the limited formatting options there, all while writing on a cell phone. I'm honestly happy that I was able to get hieroglyphics to work even a bit. (Sidenote, ffn wants to put a line in between the first and second lines of the hieroglyph, and frustrate me)
Addressing Nitpicks with the Plot:
When Sadie was able to knock down both Alabaster and Nico at once, I'm not saying that she is more powerful or could reliably beat them in a fight, but she had the element of surprise while they were focused on fighting each-other, so by catching them off guard, she had an immediate advantage and enough power to capitalize on it with a move that would stop both in their tracks.
As for why Alabaster might sound like he doesn't like the accords, I thought might be fitting for him to compare the UN and how it tries to control the Avengers to his own issues with the Olympians, even if the situations do have notable differences.
The reason I'm making Alabaster in particular talk a lot in certain situations is because I feel that given his characterization in Son of Magic, he's likely someone who would want to be the smartest person in the room, with somewhat of an ego, sort of like Tony Stark, but with a much more serious attitude and little patience for anyone who's in his way since he's used to working alone, so maybe closer to Dr. Strange, which is honestly a bit ironic in my opinion.
Also, for anyone asking why everyone didn't just take another portal back to the compound… the answer is more about me wanting to have some character interaction as opposed to actual efficiency in terms of my initial intentions, but I will add that if everyone portaled back to New York City, having to use an artifact other than Cleopatra's Needle so they don't overload it, then they'd have to travel through New York City without encountering anyone trying to arrest or otherwise delay them, and then travel upstate, now without a quinjet. It might actually have taken longer travel through NYC to be honest, because they either have to go through process of renting large car or 2, 'borrowing' them, and then dealing with road trip going to upstate New York, after dealing with traffic… or, they go on foot until they get out of the city, which gives more opportunities for people to delay them because they're the Avengers… then obtain a large car or 2 drive upstate. There's also another reason why I don't think they'd want to open a portal into any big cities, that's mentioned in the next chapter. As far as in-universe explanations though, I'm going to blame Carter for still being a bit hesitant to fully reveal stuff, because he wants to interact with Avengers a bit more first.
Disclaimer:
I do not own anything in this story. All characters were created by someone else, such as Rick Riordan, Haley Riordan, or any of the people who work for Marvel Comics Marvel Studios. Anything I didn't mention probably belongs to Disney, the publishers of the Riordanverse books, the owners of film rights to Percy Jackson, and the puppeteer behind Marvel Studios. Bow down to the House of Mouse.