When Percy woke up, he was blinded by the sudden light. He tried to sit up, but he did so too quickly, and all the blood rush from his head.
He blacked out, and fell backwards.
When he came to, an instant later, Alexis was standing over him. This time, she helped him up, this time slowly, to prevent another black out.
She held a look of worry on her face, and kept glancing at the tent door.
"What's wrong?" he asked, as a Surgeon prepared some clothe to replace the bandage on his head.
"Aero's been leading the Legion since you've been out." Percy looked surprised. "Which was how long? Exactly?"
"Four days, if you count the day you were injured."
He sighed, he knew how difficult leading a full Legion could be. He just hoped that the young Centurion was up to the task.
He winced slightly as the old bandage was removed and the new one was applied. Then Alexis helped him put his armor on, which was still dented in several places from the battle with the Pict. Then he made his way out of the Surgeon's Quarters, and towards the Praetor's Quarter's.
As he walked through camp, he noticed several things. The first of which being the strong aroma of wood smoke. Normally this wouldn't bother, they cooked their meals in wood fires, but this was thicker than usual. He made a point of asking Aero about this.
Next thing he noticed was that almost every legionary looked tired, dirty, and battered. His Legion was on the brink of destruction. A few smiled at him, respectfully saluting him.
When Percy passed the grain and meat stores, he noticed that they were heavily guarded. He stopped. "Why are these guards here?" Alexis had a pained look. "The Eagles haven't been getting through very well. The Picts keep lighting fires, the thick black smoke keeps them from seeing where to drop the supply crates.
She didn't continue, she didn't need to, he understood now. They were running low on food.
And the guards were there to prevent stealing.
He continued on to the Praetor's tent.
When he saw Aero, he instantly felt bad. The kid was obviously way too stressed out. His blue, blood shot eye's, dark gray with the stress, dark eye bags, and sluggish movement, all told Percy that he was about to collapse.
Percy walked up to his desk and Aero stood from his scrolls, shoulders still slightly hunched in exhaustion, and formally saluted him.
"You are relieved of your command Senior Centurion Aero." Aero nodded. "Thank you sir." Then walked out of the tent, Percy got the feeling he sincerely meant the 'Thank you' part.
Percy turned to Alexis. "Make sure he gets a day or two in the infirmary." She nodded, and turned to leave, but Percy stopped her. "And if he argues, order him to, with my authority."
"Okay." She replied, then walked out of the tent.
As she exited the tent, his eyes immediately shut tight, his hands came up to his head, touching the already damp bandage on his head.
He could already feel his stress returning. He picked up the nearest folder and opening, he frowned. It was a map, but to where?
Aero had obviously been up to something, he must have had a plan. But why hadn't he told Percy of his plan?
He closed the folder and set it off to the side, making a mental note to ask Aero about the map.
He picked up the next report, a casualty report. These seemed to be on his desk more and more often as of recently. He's lost more men, some were even deserting! This had to be fixed, Percy had seen signs of low morale before. And low morale was something that only got worse if it wasn't handled quickly.
As he reached the bottom of the list, his head began throbbing again and he gritted his teeth. The body count kept climbing in his head. Every Roman on that list, marked as 'Killed In Action' was his fault. It was his responsibility to keep them safe. And now he had to explain to their mortal parents how he had failed that promise.
He wanted to throw up. Simple as that, and the fact that his head was still in rough shape from the fight, didn't help.
He put the report down and sighed, sick of the reports already. "Well," he muttered "if I'm not going to go though my paperwork, I should at least get some answers." He stood and waited for a moment, letting the dizziness pass. Then set out in search of Aero, and Alexis, who would almost certainly be with Aero.
She was unsurprisingly with Aero, as he had expected.
"Alexis, Aero, I need to talk to you two."They each to him and gave him their attention.
"Aero," he began, placing the map on his lap. "what is this?" Aero's face reddened. "Just a hunch really. During the Revolutionary War, there was a fort built in this area, it supposedly had stone walls, and many cannons. Well, when the Brit's left, it was abandoned."
Percy's eye's lit up. "If we could find this fort, we could Winter there, the Eagles would have better cover for resupply." Aero grinned. "So we have a plan?" Alexis answered this time. "You can't be serious! We don't even know if this place exists! Let alone if it's still defensible!"
Aero's grin faded, and Percy crossed his arms. "Do we have a choice? If we stay here, we'll either starve to death or be stabbed to death."
"And we still might Mr. Optimism!" She retorted.
Aero finished Percy's thought. "It's a chance Ally." he said, using her pet name. "If we don't, we're done, we can't beat them in a straight up fight, at least not without Jason and Reyna's 12th backing us up, and especially not without proper food supplies."
She nodded her head slowly, accepting the fact that they were betting their lives on something less than a myth.
"Okay, fine, lets do it..."
(A/N)- Sorry about the delay guys, it's getting harder and harder to find time to write, but I have NOT abandoned this story, and I will not. I just have a busy life XD Anyway, thanks for reading, make sure you leave a review and favorite/follow it makes me want to write more. Also, I can't do longer chapters, I'm sorry, but life is too busy.