Piper and Jason led Leo back to his cabin, where they currently sat on his bed. Piper was rubbing his back, whereas Jason sat on the other side of the tinkerer looking at him with a guilty look on his face. Percy stood awkwardly to the side, looking almost as bad as Jason, while rubbing his neck.

Leo's cries had reduced to a frequent shudder. The other of the seven had also gathered in the room, Hazel and Frank holding hands, Annabeth sending a death glare that could challenge Nico di Angelo towards Percy. She let out a slow breath.

"What happened?" Her voice was cut and short, as if she was keeping her anger at bay for the son of Hephaestus. Percy and Jason shifted.

Jason cleared his throat. "We didn't mean to."

"Really," Percy said. "It was a prank, and, well..."

"Well, obviously it wasn't a prank to Leo!" Hazel was beginning to let her anger show. Jason looked down, shaking his head. He looked at Leo, who was beginning to calm down. Piper was too worried to even be angry, much less hear the conversation around her.

"Leo," Jason whispered. "What- what happened?" His voice cracked. The others were not one to see Jason emotional, but they knew that if one of his friends was hurting- especially if he caused it- he didn't care if everyone saw him like this. After a few mintues, no one really expected an answer and they were about to leave to let Piper calm him down even more.

"I'm claustrophobic." It was mumbled, barely reaching a whisper, but it was all everyone needed. Percy was looking around, seeing if he could escape from everyone's angry glares, but he found no escape.

"Oh, Leo," Piper said, not even caring what was going on around her. She never wanted to see her friends hurt, but when it was Leo- happy, funny, little brother Leo, her heart shattered.

Jason was currently spluttering, trying to find the correct thing to say, but it was more like: "Leo- sorry- known- never-" He sighed. "Leo, it sounds lame, but I'm sorry."

Leo looked up, giving a small, sad smile. "It's alright, guys. Honestly, you couldn't have known. It was-" He stopped there, as if his brain decided it was a good idea to stop giving information. But it was all the others needed.

"Leo," Hazel asked cautiously. "What happened?" Her eyes widened. "Was it Aunt Rosa?"

Leo gave a humorless laugh- which didn't sound like something that should come out of him- and shook his head. "No. It was another family."

Annabeth knew that the fire user had many foster homes, and ran away from pretty much all of them, but she didn't know how they could do this to the boy. Sure, being claustrophobic was something that many people had, but she had seen Leo's reaction. It had taken them an hour of being in his room just to make the glaze over his eyes fade. Even then, Annabeth could still see his unfocused eyes, as if he was in two places at once.

Frank decided to speak. "W-what did they do?" His gaze was concerned, but curious overall.

Leo looked down again. "I-I was down there for six-" his voice broke here. "-months."

Annabeth put the pieces together. "A basement. They locked you down there."

Leo nodded. "I was found by some of the police who arrested them. They had other foster kids before that, they were all abused too. They searched the house when they couldn't find me."

Piper hugged him, allowing the boy to cry again.

Jason and Percy looked at each other. "Never again," they chorused. They looked at Leo.

"Never."


And that was the end to this two-shot! I hope you enjoyed, and sorry for the abrupt ending/ short chapter. I might do another one of these, because two-shots are easy and fun to write, so... eh.

Questions? Comments? Concerns?