FWI I decided to update twice today because I'm a nice person and I rote a chapter faster than I thought I would have.
Liam
All in all, it was a fairly nice funeral.
There was Grape Crush for all of the guests, and nobody wore fancy clothes—just hoodies and jeans and the like. There was even a nice campfire, though that was later used for the burning of her shroud.
Liam hated it. Normally, being at Camp Half-Blood was enough to put him in a good mood. Today, it did the opposite.
They had the funeral at Camp Half-Blood because it had been one of Alex's favorite places. She'd spent only two summers there, but she had made the most of them. She'd placed first in the hunting competitions every time (no surprise there), first in the archery competitions (also not a surprise) and was even fairly good at horseback riding. She had even formed a shaky alliance with the Apollo cabin, who usually complained about her flawless accuracy. Oh, and she was amazing at capture the flag. The banner still had the symbol of Artemis on it from the last game the camp had played. She had snuck right past the opposing team by climbing through the trees and dropping down right next to the flag. It sounded amazing, but she had admitted to Liam later that being that high in the air for so long nearly gave her a heart attack. She was scared of heights. Or, she had been, at least...
Of course, Camp Half-Blood was also one of the only places that could contain all of the demigods that came to say goodbye. The only other place was the school, but it hadn't seemed right to hold a funeral there.
They had the casket in the center of camp, near the dining pavilion. It was a closed casket—Alex hadn't liked people staring at her. Cooper was lying next to it and howling mournfully. There were some fifty chairs set up before it, but some people were still left standing. Beside the casket, a picture of her in the wilderness stood (it had been her first time actually hunting with her family). And next to that, a small podium.
Annabeth had offered to give the eulogy. Lawrence was too emotional, and Bobby looked like he wanted to punch the next person to speak to him.
Liam sat in the front row, not feeling like talking to anyone or doing anything. His mother sat next to him, rubbing his shoulders comfortingly. She had really liked Alex, but he could tell that she was trying to keep it together for his sake. Beside his mother, his sister Jasmine sat. Her posture was as straight as ever, but Liam saw that her eyes were red. Alex had even made an impression on his sister. He would have laughed if his chest didn't feel like somebody had dropped an anvil on it.
It's not fair, he kept thinking. Most half-bloods died before they reached forty, but Alex had been one of the most powerful demigods he had ever met. She had killed a Titan single handedly! It just didn't make sense to him that she could be snuffed out so easily. Hell, he had expected her to outlive him.
It's not fair.
Annabeth's eyes were red as she approached the podium. Like most of them, she was wearing a black t-shirt and dark jeans. When she reached the stand, she cleared her throat and wiped her eyes before beginning.
"When I first saw Alex," she said, her voice barely loud enough to be heard, "she had been sandwiched between two demigods in Goode's office."
Annabeth went on, but her words stirred a memory for Liam. When I first saw Alex…
It had been the middle of October. Liam was running late for school, and had run through the front doors, nearly dropping his project for science. Of course, the morning rush hadn't been over, so he had been forced to push his way past the crowd gathering in the front of the school.
Suddenly the crowd parted, and Liam nearly dropped his project again, but for a different reason.
There was a girl standing there. Not just any girl either. She was so beautiful that he momentarily lost the ability to breathe. But she carried herself in a different way than the other pretty girls at school. She wore simple jeans and a hoodie, with no makeup on her face. She also appeared to be trying to make her way to the office, but the crowd was just too thick. He could see the panic behind her eyes (one green and one brown, oddly), but she kept her face impassive. No, this was no ordinary girl.
Liam was about to walk up to her and give her directions, or maybe just babble like an idiot, but in a moment her resolve had visibly hardened and she had forced her way through the crowd, gone.
For a moment, Liam just stood there like an idiot, staring at the spot where she had just stood. Then the bell rang and he rushed off to Mr. Brunner's.
When she walked into his first period Greek class a few minutes later, he about fell out of his seat. Alex Clayton, Chiron had said her name was. He forced himself not to stare as she sat next to his half-sister.
Then he had walked into the lunch room, only to find her sitting in his spot at the lunch table. He wasn't sure if it was a good or a bad thing that he kept running into her. When he saw her, he wanted to say something suave, something awesome to sweep her off her feet. Instead, he settled for saying something really intelligent, like, "Hey! The newbie is sitting in my seat!"
She had turned to appraise him then, and Liam had a hard time not gaping as she analyzed him. Her asymmetrically colored eyes had an intelligent light to them, and if Percy hadn't interrupted, Liam would have blurted out something that would have embarrassed himself. He wished he could have known then that this girl would change everything.
Liam snapped out the memory feeling worse than he had before. He'd secretly had a crush on her from the moment he met her, but he had fallen for her hard after Selina's party. Just remembering that made him want to hide somewhere where nobody could see him cry. Instead, he tried to focus on what Annabeth was saying.
She went on to describe how Alex had been courageous in fighting all sorts of monsters, including Chelsea the hidden empousa. But Annabeth also described Alex's kindness, and her unwillingness to not help anyone or leave them behind.
Tactfully, Annabeth left out how Alex had been homeless for several years. That was a secret she had only shared with her inner circle of friends, and Liam doubted that she would have wanted it shared with everyone.
When Annabeth was finished with the eulogy, they turned to the campfire, where Percy and Beckendorf were lifting Alex's shroud. It was a glowing silver color, with the symbol of a moon and a bow intertwined in gold stitching. It was the same symbol that adorned their banner for capture the flag. With a few manly sniffles, Percy and Beckendorf lit the banner on fire.
Liam felt tears well up in his eyes as he watched the banner be consumed by the flames.
It isn't fair.
x x x
After the funeral, Alex's inner circle of friends went to the Clayton household to go through her things. She hadn't had a will, but typically when a half-blood died, their possessions went to their closest friends and next of kin.
Lawrence led them to her room silently. Liam felt horrible, but Alex's father must have felt worse. He had just gotten his daughter back, only to have her taken away by a black crossbow bolt.
Liam almost cried again when he saw her room. It was just as neat as he remembered it. Her clothes were folded neatly and her books were placed on a tall shelf in the corner. A spare quiver hung from a coat rack next to her bed. The walls were painted purple, and a picture hung on the wall: the first day at Camp Half-Blood. Everyone from their lunch table had been in the photo. The room even smelled like her: pine trees and a hint of Grape Crush.
Liam swallowed a lump in his throat as Lawrence spoke.
"She would have wanted you six to have her things," he said, his voice cracking. "I'll be downstairs when you're done."
The older man turned and left, surreptitiously wiping his eyes. That left Liam, Thalia, Percy, Annabeth, Grover, and Beckendorf alone in Alex's room.
All was silent for about five minutes as the group surveyed their surroundings. Liam sat on her bed, listening to the squeaks the mattress made as he did. He rubbed his face as the others looked around the room. On one shelf, she had placed strange souvenirs. There was the manticore spike from her mother's puzzle room in Atlantis next to a harpoon (also from Atlantis). There was also what looked like an albino hellhound claw, from when she had discovered that Lawrence was her father. Phoebe's broken spearhead was off to the side, glowing golden. There were also artifacts of her more recent exploits: a strange silver arrowhead (from when Artemis's huntresses had tried to recruit her and failed), a large steel bolt (from a cyclops that had tried to eat her), and a large horse shoe from a strange horse-like monster. Her Nemean Lion's pelt/jacket was folded up on the shelf as well, along with her silver watch and hunting knife.
THUD!
Percy's fist slammed into the stone wall by the window, shattering the silence.
"Styx!" he shouted, though whether it was from the pain of punching a brick wall or from the pain of losing a friend, Liam couldn't tell.
"Percy," Annabeth said, laying a hand on his shoulder. Percy seemed to calm down a little at her touch. The two had been dating a little longer than Liam and Alex had been.
"It's not fair," the Son of Poseidon grumbled, echoing Liam's thoughts. "She shouldn't have…"
"Alex would have wanted us to move on," Beckendorf said. He was a big, burly kid with muscles the size of Liam's head. Despite his tough exterior, Liam knew that Hephaestus's son was really a big teddy bear. His real name was Charles, but everyone called him by his last name.
And as much as Liam knew Beckendorf was right, it still felt like somebody had stabbed him in the chest with the claws of a hellhound. Move on? How could Liam possibly move on? Alex was the most amazing person he'd ever met. He was never going to meet somebody like her ever again.
Liam bit his tongue to keep himself from biting Beckendorf's head off. Beckendorf meant well. He just couldn't know how much his words could hurt.
"Where do you think she went?" Thalia asked, sitting on the bed next to Liam.
"Elysium," Annabeth replied immediately. "No doubt."
Liam tried to imagine Alex sitting in paradise, sipping Grape Crush out of a tall glass and partying with other heroes. The thought cheered him a little bit. If anyone deserved that, she did.
"Come on," someone said. It took Liam a moment to realize that the voice was his. "Alex definitely wouldn't want us moping around her room."
That launched them into action. They began looking through her things, hesitantly assigning them to new masters. They left her souvenirs alone, though. It felt wrong to touch those.
Liam paused when he saw a small wooden carving of a pine tree. It was left by the bedside, like it had great significance. Beckendorf appeared over Liam's shoulder.
"Is that the one?" he asked.
Liam nodded mutely. Two years ago, when Alex was being controlled by a half-empousa named Derek, Liam had given her the carving in an attempt to snap her out of it. It had worked for a moment, too. He didn't realize that she had kept it.
Liam picked up the wooden carving and rolled it around in his hands, feeling the familiar weight of the wood in his hands. A terrible sadness bubbled up in his chest, and he dropped the tree on the floor suddenly.
He swallowed his grief with great difficulty and leaned over to pick up the carving.
Liam stopped.
Something was carved on the bottom of the pine tree. He didn't remember carving that on the bottom. Had Alex done it?
He picked up the tree and examined the number carved at the bottom.
12.
Ooo yes, the number twelve. What could it mean? The twelve olympians? The twelve days of christmas? The twelve times I walked into a spider web today (by the way, it is horrifying, I do not recommend it)?
Also Alex's chapters are gonna be a little shorter for a little while. Sorry i'll try my best to put some meat on the written bones, but she does have one chapter which is only a couple hundred words long. Again, I apologize.
Ahem. My mom gave me this joke, so we'll see how it goes.
What do you call a man with no arms and no legs in a swimming pool?
Bob.
