A Quick Note- Thank you so much, everyone who takes the time to leave a review, favs, or even follows this! I'm insecure about my writing sometimes and it means the world to me that people like it! And for those of you wondering where Leo is, here ya go!
The last thing Leo remembered was standing on his beloved ship with Percy while they waited for it to crash. He couldn't help guessing how the crash would play out. Maybe Jason would swoop in at the last second to rescue Percy and Leo would go down with his ship. Maybe Jason wouldn't even come and Leo would be the one to blame for him and Percy getting injured, possibly dying in the crash.
Stop thinking like that, Valdez! Jason's not the kind of guy to leave people behind. It'll be fine.
Then, he felt something grab hold of him. Like talons, digging into his arms from underneath, dragging him off the ship.
Leo gasped from both shock and pain, feeling the warmth and stickiness of his own blood dripping down his arm. Instinctively he lit his body on fire and felt the claws loosen.
"Great! Now let me go-" Leo started excitedly, before realizing what exactly that meant, "No, no, nope! Nevermind!"
But it was too late to extinguish himself. The talons unhooked from around his arm and Leo was falling. It felt like he was going much faster than when he was on the Argo II, but then he considered the speed of falling in physics and guessed it was exactly the same speed.
It reminded him a lot of that first day at the Grand Canyon, when he'd been flung over the edge and only barely managed to grab onto the edge. It definitely wasn't the most terrifying part of his life. He'd faced a lot worse in foster homes. Maybe not quite as life threatening (and that was a pretty good sized maybe), but Leo knew his life wasn't all sunshine and rainbows and wasn't ever going to lie to himself that it was. But it still was terrifying in its own way, and there were times when Leo had to work hard to get the memory of it out of his thoughts. Like now- when he couldn't stop thinking about it even though he was falling from a deadly height.
"Think, Valdez!" he ordered himself, though he could barely hear his own words over the overwhelming panic of such a dangerous fall.
His emotions took over, and Leo could feel the flames coming alive on his skin. Leo fought against gravity, twisting himself around so he didn't have to look down.
His life didn't pass before his eyes. As he stared at the blue sky, and to the far upper right, his precious ship plummeting just as he was, he was met with simple flashes of how he spent his days on the Argo II. His time on the ship was brief, but it had been the happiest he'd felt in a while, working alone in the engine room with nothing but the machinery. No one would judge him if he took a joke too far. No one was there to notice how those jokes were a cover-up in the first place. Only the machines knew about his little breakdowns when he couldn't stop himself from crying.
Then he considered what happened when someone actually did see him upset. Percy didn't hate him for it. He sat and listened and said he could relate. Why?
Just before Leo breached through the trees, he summoned all the fire he could muster and shot it out of him.
Come on! Work like a jetpack! If Iron Man can do it, so can you! Do the Azula thing!
Leo always joked his way out. And though it tore him apart inside and felt like he was just lying to everyone that he was so funny and happy, it worked. Why wouldn't it help if he joked with himself?
He shot up a few feet before gravity took hold again. The force of the fire was only enough to delay the inevitable. As he started to run out of energy, the inferno began to sputter and grow smaller.
"AHHHHH!" Leo yelled, his terrified voice squealing and cracking. He pushed his now extinguished arms out in front of himself to cushion the fall.
Crack. Thud.
Leo realized his stupidity a split second before his right arm hit the ground and he felt bone snapping. Then he crushed the already broken limb under his own body weight, only adding to his agony.
"Help," he wheezed as he curled up on his side, his eyesight brimmed red from the pain, "Somebody help me."
By the way, I'm on Spring Break, so this may slow down how fast I release chapters for a week or two because I mainly wrote during Study Hall or after finishing work in classes, but now that I don't have that free time in school to dedicate to writing! I'll try and get back on track as soon as I can though! -Apollo
