Chapter 7: Percy Jackson Refuses to Kick My Butt

(Peter)

I met with Percy Jackson after lunch, much to Miss Sunshine's surprise. Typical Sue. She thought the world revolved around her.

She had been so annoyed when Percy Jackson and I headed off to the arena and I refused to take a hint and invite her along. But that's what she got for completely ignoring what I had told her before.

I hadn't expected my speech to work, but I had to try. I had no intention of getting cozy with Miss Sunshine even though she was hot and smelled good and had given me Harpe which despite its obnoxious magical girl appearance, was actually very easy to use.[1]

None of that shit mattered, because Andromeda Sunshine was a Mary Sue and Mary Sues were fucking dangerous. I didn't want my entire personality to be warped for the sake of shipping.

Plus, Annabeth, aka Best Girl, existed in this world and she was worth a million Sues. I just hoped she was alright. People kept saying she was lost or missing but no one would say how or why it had happened.

"So," Percy Jackson said, breaking into my thoughts.

I looked up at him.

"Why didn't you invite Andi to join us?"

"Why would I?" I snapped.

Percy Jackson continued to watch me.

I sighed. "I don't like her. The less I see of her, the better."

"Really?" he asked. "Most guys can't stop thinking about her."

"I bet," I grumbled. I continued in a louder voice, "She's not my type. I prefer…intellectual girls," who aren't Mary Sues, girls like Annabeth.

Instead of responding, Percy Jackson gestured at the arena. We had just arrived. "It's empty," he said excitedly, "Come on."

We each headed towards the center and then took positions across from each other. Percy Jackson pulled out a long sword from off of his back. The hilt made a cross with the blade as the fourth direction. All three ends of the hilt split and forked out like a snake tongue.

Percy Jackson held out the sword and squatted down into a fighting stance. Then he said, "I'm ready, when you are."

I gulped.

Earlier, I had considered telling him that all I wanted to do was talk and that I sucked at sword fighting. But when I met him after lunch, he had a gleam in his eye that was hard to ignore. I mean I was excited too. I was facing Percy Jackson, the guy who once bested the god of war in a fight. It was awesome. And terrifying. But mostly awesome.

And I was basically slated to take his place in the narrative. The least I could do would be to attempt to show him that I was worthy. So, I tried to copy him and squatted a bit with Harpe in my hand. "I'm ready."

He didn't hesitate. He lunged forward and swung for my neck.

Shit!

His blade stopped, inches from my skin.

Percy Jackson's eyebrows furrowed and he lowered his sword. "Ah…" he said regretfully, "I thought your stance was weird. You don't have any training, do you? Why did you agree to fight me?"

"I…I…" I stammered, "Well you invited me so…"

He shook his head, "I could have hurt you. We were both using real swords, you know."

"Yeah… I just…"

"You just what?"

"I just want to be friends," I said lamely.

Percy Jackson gave me a sardonic smile. "Peter, you just told me a few minutes ago that you didn't want to hang out with Andi, even though she is the daughter of Zeus, our best fighter, a total sweetheart, and the prettiest girl in camp. And now you're saying that instead you want to be friends with me, some unclaimed Hermes kid who spends way too much time in the water?" He shook his head. "I know we already agreed that it's prophecy related, but still, you're a crazy guy, Peter."

I shrugged. What could I say?

He leaned back onto his sword and said, "But, I'm not insane. I can't fight an amateur. I could kill you."

"Oh…" I said. Somehow, I was disappointed that he didn't want to carve me up. How fucked up was that?

"Do you want me to help you train instead?"

"What?! Yes! Fuck Yes!" I said, breaking into a huge smile.

He smiled back. "Okay then. Let's start with your stance."

Percy Jackson spent the rest of the afternoon with me, showing me the basics. It was hard and made me glad I had returned Riptide. There was no way I could have done all this practice with that heavy sword.

At one point, Miss Sunshine stopped by and stared at us, "You two look like family," she said.

"Technically we're all family," Percy Jackson replied.

"Hmm…." she said as she gave him an appraising look. "You better be careful with Peter. He's new."

"Of course," he said.

Miss Sunshine continued to scrutinize him. It took over 20 minutes to get her to leave. I couldn't believe her. Who did she think she was? My fucking mom?

When I finally got rid of her, Percy Jackson gave me a mocking look.

I groaned. "Look. I don't want to talk about it."

"I didn't say anything," he said, trying to look innocent.

"Let's just get back to training," I grumbled.

"Sure thing," he said, but I could hear the suppressed laughter in his voice.

The afternoon went by fast, but I was happy. After a roller coaster of a day, I was ready to call this experience a win.

Dinner came and I sat at the Poseidon table while Percy Jackson joined the Hermes table. He sat there fairly quietly as the other campers joked around. And I felt guilty. He didn't belong there.

"Hey, Peter."

I turned and stifled another groan as I saw that it was Miss Sunshine again. What part of "stay out of each other's way" did she not understand?

Because I had learned from this afternoon that ignoring her didn't work, I said, "What do you fucking want?"

She wrinkled her nose, but didn't comment on my "language" this time. Instead, she smiled like the Cheshire cat and said, "Are you sure you don't want to sit with me at the Zeus table? It must be lonely being here all by yourself."

"I'm fine."

She frowned and said, "If you're sure."

"I am," I said tersely. "Go the fuck away."

"Alright, maybe next time then."

I concentrated on my food and to my relief, she left.

The next time I dared to look up, I saw her with Nico and Grover at her table. I don't know why Nico was allowed to sit with her.[2] Actually, I did. She was a fucking Mary Sue, but it was still weird.

Nico noticed me looking and glared at me. I actually felt a chill go down my spine. Even without my new policy to avoid Miss Sunshine, that look was enough to make me keep my distance. For being just a kid, the son of Hades was damn scary.

I went back to my food and started thinking about safer topics, specifically Percy Jackson. He was pretty similar to the canon Percy Jackson though he did seem a little sensitive about being unclaimed, but I guess that wasn't surprising.[3]

Most unclaimed demigods were sensitive about the topic. Ensuring that demigods got claimed had been the reward for winning the war in the Last Olympian after all. And it really wasn't fair. I was willing to bet that the reason why Percy Jackson hadn't been claimed was because he was still Poseidon's son. This backwards Sue fic just hadn't acknowledged it yet, since I, for whatever reason, was now Poseidon's son too.

Or at least, people thought I was Poseidon's son. I hadn't really demonstrated any cool powers yet and I couldn't even fight. If a quest popped up, I'd be in deep shit. People died all the time in PJO books and I wasn't in the mood to test how thick my plot armor was. Hell, I had almost died just today, right here in camp. I was a nobody compared to Percy Jackson whether he was claimed or not. If only…

An idea formed in my head. Percy Jackson had been pushed into the background, but if I could trigger something like getting him claimed, then maybe I could push him back into the narrative where he belonged. Then I could avoid any deadly quests, and possibly even wake up.

Because as cool as this all was (and it was supremely awesome), I was beginning to think about the big questions like 'what happened if I died here?' 'Why was I here?' 'How was I here?' And most importantly, 'how could I get home if I wanted to?'

After dinner, we had a camp fire. I let Grover and Nico flank Miss Sunshine while I went over to sit with Percy Jackson.

"Hey," I said, sitting down.

Percy Jackson nodded. "Hi."

"You said you were unclaimed, right?"

"Yeah?" He gave me a weird look.

"Well, I think I can help with that."

He raised his eyebrows. "Really?" he said. I could hear the doubt in his voice.

I looked Percy Jackson straight in the eye and said, "Yes."

He grinned and asked, "What do I have to do?"

Footnotes

[1] Now that I think about it, I bet Harpe looks like She-Ra's sword + a sickle attachment. It does sound extra.

[2] This fic takes place before Trials of Apollo came out, so Peter couldn't know that Nico would eventually get to sit with his boyfriend, Will Solace, in a similar manner.

[3] This might just be me, but I disagree with Peter. This Percy acts a bit more mature than I'm used to, so when I first read this story, I thought that Percy must be older. More on this later.