Writer's Month Day 14: Fairy Tale
Written for the Writer's Month thing on Tumblr. I think back in middle school I wrote in my notebook about this AU (except it was flipped around with Travis at Jupiter instead) and I rewrote it for Writer's Month Day 14, Fairy Tale. I'm going to be upfront and say that I have literally no idea where this will be going. MCD, happy ending, sad ending, they both die, anything can happen.
Rated T for some bad language.
Chapter 1: It started with you
Fairy tale. His life is a fairy tale. A world filled with monster and magic. Dragons and witches. One-eyed behemoths and spell-casting sirens. It's a fairy tale, but not fully. There's no strong prince or princess to save the country. There's no kind king or queen. There's no knight in shining armor. It's just him and him alone (No, wait, that sounds wrong) against this big, cold world.
Oh.
He and the wolf.
Only the strong survive, she says.
He's not strong. (but somebody is out there waiting for him so he needs to survive. He will become strong. He will get through this.)
And he did.
When Connor was four, he survived the Wolf House, traveled to Camp Jupiter, and became a Roman soldier.
Years pass. It's not so bad at Camp Jupiter. Sure, there's little annoyances here and there: like, Octavian always glaring at him, him being stuck in the fifth cohort, his inability to learn Latin that well, his weird preferences for the Greek names over the Roman ones, and the most annoying of all, an itching, indescribable feeling that somebody is waiting for him. Somebody… which is ridiculous.
He nobody outside of Camp Jupiter so he doesn't understand this feeling.
He barely has anybody here at camp.
Almost everybody hates him for some reason. There's this rampant avoidance most of the legionnaire has towards him even among the outcast of the fifth cohort.
His only friends are Gwen, Dakota, and Jason. But Gwen is busy as a centurion, Dakota is also busy as a centurion and Jason is missing. So the time he used to spend by playing board games or karaoke with the others is now spent alone. Most days he sneaks out of the camp to search for Jason. Some days he stalks Reyna or Octavian to see if they're harboring secrets. And rarely, but every now and then, he rolls himself in his blankets and sleep.
It's during one of those rare days that he finally meets Nico Di Angelo, the other child of Ha— Pluto like Hazel. Nico has been visiting as their ambassador for months now, but it's like fate was keeping them apart. His plans to introduce himself was always thwarted by Reyna assigning him a task or some saty— faun asking him for help. Or maybe it wasn't fate. Maybe it was just coincidence. (Nothing is ever a coincidence.)
"Let me put away my books and we can go to New Rome."
"So this is your living quarters. It's … nice."
"Yeah, isn't it?"
Connor lifts a corner of his blankets up and squints at the two bodies, one voice familiar and the other not so much. "Hazel?" he says.
One of the body startles. "Connor, hey, what are you doing here? Are you okay?"
He slinks off his bed, blankets crumpled into a pile, and stretches with hands locked over his head. "Yeah, I'm fine. Just taking a cat nap."
"You were slacking off, weren't you?" Hazel tuts in disapproval, a hand on her hip. Beside her, the stranger stiffens.
"Nah, I finish all my duties first. I would never, ever dream of incurring Reyna's wrath," he says lightheartedly with a slight smile.
He turns to the newcomer and welp. He can tell. They're not going to get along. The boy, maybe his age or younger, is wide-eyed, jaws clenched. His hands are trembling in a fist by his side and Connor made himself be very aware of the dagger sheathed on the kid's belt. His own weapon is a few feet away under his pillow. There's a window directly to his right four feet away and two doors, one behind and in front of the barracks, for his exit. Not that it'll do anything against shadow traveling, but it doesn't help to be aware of all his exits.
"Hi, my name is Connor. I don't think we ever met," he says and holds out a hand.
It wasn't reciprocated.
And Connor lowers his hand back to his side.
Hazel peeks curiously between them, unsurely muttering the kid's name (Nico) in concern. Nico snaps out of whatever trance he was in and coughs behind a hand which he stuffs into the pockets of his black leather jacket. "Sorry about that," he mutters.
Connor smiles brightly. "Don't worry about it. It's fine." No, it's not. I never met you. Why di you react that way? That hurts. That really, really hurts. "It must be the bed hair. I know it terrifies everybody every morning."
And he laughs really loudly to fill the awkward silence. Nobody laughs with him, so he lets it die. Nico is still staring at him with wide eyes albeit less intensity.
Hesitantly, Nico asks, "Con… nor, right?"
"Yup, that's my name."
Nico eyes him up and down again. "Do you… are you… your face looks familiar. I am certain I met you before. Do you have a twin?"
Ah. He knows what must have happened. Octavian or some fucknut probably had some child of Hekate mist them to look like him and screw with Nico. Despicable, but he isn't surprised. It happens all the time. If he can only secure solid proof, he might be able to stop the impersonations. It's going to get him killed one day. (And he can't die yet. Someone is waiting for him.)
With a beaming smile, he answers, "Yeah, no. I'm an only child. You probably mistook me for someone else."
Except, no, that is wrong.
He knows it's wrong the moment the words "only child" cross his mouth.
He's not an only child. (Someone)
And when he sees a stranger with sea-green eyes and black hair, carrying a lady on his back and crossing the Little Tiber, when he runs over to help him, when they lock eyes, when the sea-green eyes widen in surprise, when the lady (Goddess) own eyes widen too but in panic, when a name not his own passes through the stranger's lips, when the name punches a hole into his gut that he keels over gasping, he knows.
He's not an only child.
"Travis?"
Reviews are appreciated! If there are spelling/grammar mistakes, please tell me. Thank you for reading!