Okay, look. I'm not the best writer. I know that, you'll soon know that and it's going to be lovely. But sometimes an idea takes root and ya just gotta get something out there, right? So that's what this is. Hope you enjoy.
Also, a little poetic license is taken with this story, so I may (read: will) reinterpret some things or bend a few things from the original series (and Greek mythology in general) to make this work.
(I also don't own any characters originating in the PJO series.)
EDIT: that author's note is from 2016. That's when I started writing this. It is now 2022, and I can only barely remember the details of where I was taking this, but I wrote so much and I really want to somehow finish it. So if you notice a change of writing midway, it's because I am now older and a bit rusty.
The blond boy was two, maybe three. He played happily on the carpet of a well-furnished living room, surrounded by toys and stuffed animals. Sandy bangs swept over his eyes, freckles dusted his nose and rosy cheeks.
Behind him, out of focus, a couple argued in low tones. The woman seemed off-kilter, exuding a shaky, dangerous air. To Percy's eyes, she looked sweet and unassuming, but the man opposite her held his hands up and tread lightly, like he was afraid of how she might react.
The little boy made two of his cars crash into each other with a delighted squeal. His mother froze. The man cursed under his breath, grabbed her shoulders roughly, spat words in her face. They began to blur further into the background as the mother began to seize. His arms were the only thing holding her from collapsing to the kitchen tile. Her voice grew, sliding upwards in pitch until she was screeching unintelligibly.
The blond boy twisted around, away from Percy. "Is Mommy okay?" he asked with a slight lisp.
"Mommy is fine," the man ground out over her shuddering cries. "Why don't you head back to your room."
The boy looked on for a few more seconds before turning back around. He looked down at the toys he had dropped, his little eyebrows pushed together. He licked his lips and went to look back once more, but thought better of it. Instead, he grabbed a few stuffed animals, clutched them to his chest, and climbed to his feet, toddling out of the room.
His mother let out a guttural cry and reached for him, but the man wrapped his arms around her and held her back. She dissolved into tears and crazed mutterings and began to pound half-heartedly on his chest. His mouth tightened into a grimace, but her fists weren't what caused him pain.
The room shifted, taking on a darker light and a mustier smell. Dishes piled in the kitchen sink, collecting mold like moss in a forgotten cave. Filth crept up the corners of the visible windows, sucking the life out of the sunlight that fought through. The toys on the carpet vanished. No furniture changed but it visibly sagged, evidence of years of misuse and decay. Scratches on wood, stains on light material, a thick layer of dust carpeting most surfaces.
Absently, Percy noticed an empty space where a smoke detector used to be.
Outside, the sky darkened and swelled with thunderclouds. The white noise of rainfall settled in. The man and woman dissolved, leaving the cluttered room empty. A boy walked in, his intense blue eyes fixed on a small device in his hands. His thumbs pushed feverishly at some buttons, emitting small sounds that were swallowed by the room's silence. His hair was longer, he was taller, but it was the same boy.
He maneuvered around the books and boxes that lay on the ground without looking up from his game and lowered himself onto the couch. It sagged under his slight weight.
His mother crossed behind the kitchen door, still out of focus.
"Baby, do you want some cookies?" she called in a sweet, cracked voice.
The boy rolled his eyes. "Mom, you always burn them."
"No, I don't," she replied lovingly. "You can take them to school tomorrow."
"Like always," he muttered under his breath. His mother didn't hear him and busied herself with ingredients and measuring cups that were already laid out on the counter. If Percy squinted and tilted his head, he could see a jug of red liquid near the sink.
She set one of the cups down on the counter with a clatter, and the boy let out an annoyed sigh. "Mom, please, I don't want any more cookies. Leave it alone, will you?"
She shook her head. "No, you always want cookies. And don't you worry, I'll always be here to make them for you, baby." She began to hum lightly, and didn't even flinch when there was a pounding at the door. "Honey, will you get that?"
Thunder rumbled outside, so loud Percy could feel it shaking in his chest.
The boy dropped his game and reached for something at his hip before he got to his feet and approached the door. He pulled over a small stepping stool and peeked into the viewing hole set in the middle of the wood. "Mom!" he shouted. Percy could hear the fear in his trembling voice, mixed with panic. "It's another one!"
"Then open the door, sweetie." She busied herself with the mixing bowl behind a wall of fog separating her from her son's reality.
"Mom! Please!" He leaped off the stool and into the kitchen to pull at his mother's skirt. "There's a monster at the door!" When he spoke, Percy could see that one of his front teeth was missing.
"Oh, I love that movie," she responded easily, cracking an egg and dumping the entire thing, shell and all, into the gray paste she was creating. "Maybe we can watch it tonight, eat these cookies as a snack. I can always make more."
The boy let out a desperate noise and spun when the pounding resumed, fist tightening over his bronze knife. A distorted voice gargled something outside, but Percy couldn't understand it. He couldn't tell if it was just muffled or if the thing outside was speaking a different language.
The boy squared his small shoulders, then marched over to the door, kicking the stool out of the way. He waited a beat, then slowly pulled the door open. No! Don't open it! Percy wanted to scream, but his teeth felt glued together. He wanted to take a step forward but gravity pulled him backwards and down and away with a vise-like grip on his bones.
A silhouette stood in the doorway, backlit by a porch light against the dark clouds swirling in the sky. Percy couldn't tell what it was, but it was too tall and bulky to be human. It stood tilted, like one of its legs was longer than the other. A gust of wind blew in, slicing freezing rain across the threshold and rustling the mess on the floor.
The figure took a single step forward.
The boy lunged from where he had been waiting behind the door, swinging his knife into the thing's stomach and ripping down. It let out a hoarse roar and swung blindly, but its fist went over the boy's head and crunched into the open door. The boy took another swing and tore open its leg. Within seconds, the figure began to disintegrate, covering the floor in dust.
The woman poked her head out of the kitchen. "Oh, dear," she said, like she had accidentally dropped something. "Looks like we're gonna have to sweep the floor again. Close the door, will you, baby?"
The boy stared at her, trembling. His blue eyes shone with frustrated tears. Percy's heart splintered along with the door.
The scene dissolved once again, showing the same boy maybe a year older. They were in a different room, smaller, darker, cramped. The boy already had his backpack over his shoulder, dark clothes on, one lanky leg out a window. He glanced behind him, where the scent of burned cookies lay thick on the air, then swung his other leg over the windowsill and tumbled out.
Images flew by quickly, the boy growing older in each one. Living on the streets, alone, wielding a blade that glowed with golden light in the shadows; a girl that looked around his age with electric blue eyes and messy dark hair, sprinting a step behind him, laughing around a fire on the side of the road; the pair taking down monsters twice their size, making wild eye contact in the aftermath of dust and blood; a second younger girl, her small, dirty face streaked with tears, wide eyes shielded by dirty blonde hair. And suddenly the trio was no longer on the streets, but exploring familiar territory. The Big House, the cabins, people Percy had never met at camp. All three kids growing up.
A burial shroud displaying the sign of the Hermes cabin burning slowly, smoke winding up to the stars.
Percy's eyes shot open. He sat up and let his head loll backwards. "Can I please just get one good night of sleep?" he croaked to his empty cabin. Moonlight cast a silver glow on the floor, illuminating the clock that told him it was 2:30.
He groaned and fell back on his pillow. Most of his nightmares made no sense, but this one had felt so real, even though he hadn't recognized anyone in it. Maybe I'm finally going crazy. He massaged his forehead with calloused fingers. Maybe the gods have decided to punish me for existing after all. His very existence was an embarrassment to the most powerful of the gods, evidence that they couldn't keep their word, that they were just as vulnerable to a pretty face as the weakest of humans. The gods were fickle, and he was a wild card. But hopefully these past eighteen years, devoid of almighty interference, meant they'd decided to leave him alone.
Percy turned on his side and buried his face in his pillow. Maybe if he remained still long enough, his brain would be tricked into falling asleep before the sun rose. But the blond boy's grief stricken face as he looked at his mother haunted Percy's thoughts until the night sky bled into morning colors outside his window.