Here is The Boy on The Ground. Take two!

Disclaimer: I don't own Percy Jackson, Avatar: The Last Airbender

Chapter 10

The gang and Percy floated alone in peaceful tranquility. The clouds were now big, fluffy and plentiful. They made one think of a picture out of a fairytale book.

Percy was seated at the back, close to the tents while everyone else was at the front, watching Aang. Toph had decided it would be funny to try and make him bend all four elements at the same time.

He was balanced on his butt; a stream of water swirling above one hand, a rock that they had picked up during their lunch break floating above the other.

A small current of air was being produced from his foot, making a leaf dance around. At the moment, he was trying very hard to get a flame from his other foot.

Toph was yelling at him to do something interesting with the rock and Zuko was trying to coax the fire out. Sokka was just yelling.

After a few minutes of watching, Katara left and came to flop down by Percy. "Hey," She greeted him. "What are you thinking about?"

Percy looked up and scrutinized her. He was tapping his fingers nervously on his leg. "Nothing much… why do you ask?"

"You're missing someone, aren't you?" She asked softly.

A surprised look crossed Percy face. "How did you know that?"

Katara waved it away. "I've got that look memorized. I see it every time I look in the mirror. Every one of us wears that look from time to time."

Percy shook his head and smiled sadly. "You guys must miss your families, too, huh?"

Katara touched her necklace and nodded. "It hurts… but you know… What can you do, right?" She shook her head, as if clearing her muddled thoughts.

"So, who are you missing from home?" She asked.

"Guys don't talk about this kind of thing." Percy informed her. He mostly said it for the reaction.

She scoffed, "Come on!"

He laughed. "Fine... if you're going to be so insistent… I miss my girlfriend."

"What?" Aang fell over, the rock and water hit the ground with him.

"You didn't even bend fire." Zuko pouted.

Aang shot a small ball of fire his way and then leapt across Appa and landed in front of Percy. "You have a girlfriend?" He asked happily.

"Yeah…" Percy said slowly, not understanding why it was big deal.

"What's she like?" Katara asked, putting her chin in her hand as if she was about to have a gossip session with a girlfriend.

A wild grin sat on Percy's face. "She's the most annoying person you will ever meet in your life."

"Oh…" Katara sat up and look disappointed. "That's… unfortunate."

"Why is she so annoying?" Toph asked bluntly.

"Well, you see, she's a demigod like me." Percy started to explain. The looks on their faces made him want to laugh. "But she's the daughter of Athena, the goddess of wisdom and battle strategy, which makes her super smart and a really bad know-it-all."

He was met with blank stares.

"Okay…?" Sokka said slowly.

"But just because she's smart, doesn't mean that she's weak… She could probably kick my butt if she wanted too."

Toph couldn't help but snort. "What makes her so tough?"

"She ran away from home when she was seven."

"So did I."

"But you went back." Aang pointed out.

"She didn't go back." Percy said. "She lived on the streets for a while by herself until she met a few other demi-gods. Then my friend Grover the satyr found them and brought them to camp where one of them turned into a tree and the other one turned evil. My girlfriend was pretty much the only who made it out relatively okay…"

There was silence as they all tried to absorb that much information.

"I have a few questions…" Sokka said. "What's a stayer?"

"Satyr." He corrected, "From the waist up, it's a man, but from the waist down it's a goat." Percy explained.

There was a few seconds of silence as that sunk in.

"EW!" Katara screamed.

"That's disgusting!" Aang gagged.

Sokka held his head in his hands. "Why did I ask?"

"And you had the nerve to tell us our world was sick?" Toph yelled.

Katara and Zuko were holding onto each other for support while they gagged and yelled at Percy.

"No!" Percy was laughing. "It's not what you think! They're nature spirits!" He dissolved into laugher again.

He wiped tears from his eyes. "Ohh, Grover would have a cow over this." He said.

"What?" Toph shrieked.

"What? No!" Percy started laughing again. "It's a figure of speech."

Nobody could hear him over the sounds of gagging and protesting.

"You know what?" Sokka said finally. "I'm not going to ask any more questions."

Toph punched him on the arm, hard. "Good idea."

/././././././././../.

The flying bison let out a soft moan as he set his legs on the ground. He had put in a good, long day flying around with so much stuff on his back. The big guy was pretty tired.

Aang jumped off and stood before Appa. His grey eyes gazed at his friend with pride as he put his hand on the big furry head. "Good flying, buddy." He congratulated him. "I'm proud of you."

Percy tried to follow Sokka and Katara's lead as they got down from Appa. The two Water Tribe teens were the most comfortable around the beast other than Aang himself.

"Zuko, could you please get a fire started?" Katara asked as it was already dark and they still needed to set up camp for the night.

"Sure, no problem." Zuko jumped off of Appa from where he was throwing stuff down and started dragging a few sticks into a pile.

Toph, who was still sitting in the saddle, crawled over to where the rest of the supplies was sitting. "Sokka?" She called.

"Here." He answered.

She threw a bag down towards his voice and he caught it and set it down.

They all seemed to have a system. Aang and Katara set up, Zuko was digging a fire pit and making sure there was enough wood to burn all night while Sokka and Toph unpacked.

There was hardly room for Percy.

They all switched jobs now, Toph and Katara set up a few little defenses around the camp ground and Zuko and Sokka finished setting up.

Aang used air-bending to take the heavy saddle off of Appa's back and set it down off to the side.

The sun was very nearly gone and he put his hands on his hips to survey the group.

"There," He said, "We're all done now."

Looking around, Aang realized he was the only one that was finished. He saw Percy standing by himself off to the side and air-bended himself over to his side.

"Hey!" Aang greeted him as he landed. "What did you think of Appa's flying today?"

"Um, it was fine…" Percy said awkwardly. "I've never ridden a flying bison before, so I wouldn't know well from bad, I guess."

"Well, I'll tell you that Appa is one of the best!" His face fell a little bit, "Considering he's the last one, like me."

Percy folded his arms across his chest and smiled kindly at the younger kid. "Hey, I'll take your word for it. It wasn't half as bad as I expected it to be."

The stood quietly for a minute while Aang had a mental war with myself.

"I think I have a confession to make." Aang blurted out, blushing.

Percy raised his eyebrows. "Shoot."

"What?"

"Oh, never mind… Just tell me."

"I saw you walking out of camp last night when I couldn't sleep, I followed you because I thought you were leaving. I saw what you did even though I don't understand what it was." Aang hung his head. "I felt like I was intruding on something private and I'm sorry."

Aang studied the ground, and waited for Percy to chew him out. It never came. Finally, Aang decided to glance up.

Percy didn't look angry or anything even close to it, he just looked sad and worn-out. Plain exhausted, Aang had been planning on telling Percy about the visions he had seen about his life too, but decided against it.

"Are you mad?" Aang asked carefully.

"Nah…" Percy told him, he tried to smile but failed. "You didn't do anything wrong."

Aang's eyes pierced Percy. "But what were you doing?"

"Oh, I-It was stupid."

"It didn't seem stupid last night." Aang said softly.

"It was." Percy's voice bit at Aang, the bitterness in his voice was freezing, and so Aang turned his back and went to help Katara with supper.

/././././.

Later that night, Aang was awoken abruptly by a sharp cry. He sat bolt right up and looked around, sleep still clouding his eyesight.

A cool breeze blew over him and he caught sight of Percy's red shirt moving with the winds.

"Where do you think you're going?" Toph was yelling at him. She pointed a finger accusingly at him. "Why are you trying to leave again?"

"No, no, no, shhh!" Percy had his hands spread out in front of him, reaching out to Toph trying to calm her down. He looked slightly frantic.

Aang shot up and landed beside Toph, he saw that Percy's legs were incased in a thick layer of earth, trapping him. His face held the guiltiest expression Aang had ever seen.

"Aang?" Katara appeared next to him, she was rubbing her eyes. "What's going on?" She quickly took in the scene. "What were you doing?"

"It's nothing…" Percy tried to defend himself, his face was flushed red but the way he was standing told Aang that it was an angry red, not embarrassed. Suddenly Aang was scared. Percy could easily break out of the earth trap and start attacking.

Aang stomped on the ground and let Percy free. Percy took a step back and nodded his gratitude to Aang.

"Hey!" Toph screamed.

Zuko showed up, his hair was a mess and his clothes were crumpled but he looked alert.

"What's happening?"

Katara scoffed and flipped her hair.

"Took you long enough to show up." She spat.

Sokka chose that moment to burst from his tent, blindly swinging his sword and brandishing his boomerang.

"I'm here!" He yelled. "I'll kick their butts! Just let me at 'em!" He let his boomerang fly at the group of dark figures in the shadows.

"Watch it!" Zuko grabbed Toph just as the boomerang flew by her head. He set her safely on his shoulders, high above the rest of the group.

"Put me down!" She demanded and started kicking, her face flushed a deep red.

A bubble of water splashed the still running and yelling Sokka in the face.

"Would you calm down already?" Katara asked.

Aang surveyed the group helplessly. They never functioned well without sleep but this was ridiculous.

"Everybody, stop." Two voices commanded together. The voices held authority and demanded to be listened to.

Aang and Percy looked at each other in surprise.

"How did this all start?" Aang asked calmly.

"I caught Percy sneaking away." Toph said, she scrambled down from Zuko's shoulders and stood her ground.

"I was not sneaking away." Percy countered.

"Then what were you doing?" Toph asked. "Visiting grandma?"

"I was… It's my personal business." Percy folded his arms.

"Percy…" Katara started uncertainly. "You've only just joined our group and you're really powerful and all so you can't blame us for being skeptical. We've been betrayed before and we don't want it to happen again."

Under that logic, Percy crumpled. He dropped his defensive stance and pinched the bridge of his nose.

"Aright, fine. I'll show you what I was doing."