Ch1 - First Contact.

When Percy had gone to sleep, that previous night, he had dreamed of sailing, of feeling the waves as they raced along in their craft, on the next expedition which would find them new land, new life. He had imagined the happiness of his adoptive parents (insert the word) when he returned, arms laden with fish, or the pride in the eyes of the elders when they saw his handiwork.
When he woke up this morning, however, it was not to the voice of his brother, though; it was to the sound of a horn.
He was shaken to life by the rough hands of a friend, his weapons in hand in an instant as he scrambled to meet the rest of the defending force who would be tasked with heading off the threat.
Rushing up a tree to the highest possible vantage point, he prepared to scan the horizon, taking a preliminary look before further news was sent back from the men in the watchtower which overlooked that side.
As it turned out, there was no requirement to even look.
It seemed as though there were a mighty fortress on the edge of the reef, wood and metal floating on the water. From towering masts he saw massive white sails, and his mind was cast back to a life long gone, where the streets were grimy and the folk were rude and mean, where community was lost and status was measured in coin.
He heard the words of the elders in his mind, Beware the white clouds, Ahika, and do not trust those who seek to steal what is ours.
Calling out to the onrushing warriors, he fixed his thoughts on the destruction of this craft which seemed to spell the end to life as he knew it.
As he gazed intently on that ship, he could see people being winched to the surface in little rowing boats, flashing swords and short spears in their hands, dressed in blood red and heads covered by ornate headdresses.
These folk, however, would not reach land unopposed.
Already from the forests emerged the defenders of their island, the men painted for battle, armed with their fearsome clubs and axes. Coming from the east, he knew, would be boats of their own, ready to intercept the intruders with weapons ready.

Already, he noticed that the foreigners were brandishing their spears, responding to the new threat as double-hulled canoes glided across the chop, slicing across the surface of the water. The spears, however, were not being prepared to be thrown, rather held as though bracing for a charge, one arm close to the tip, the other held by some tiny metallic loop. He could see their shining tips, forged of some metal, glistening in the early light of day.
He grinned, for these foreign fools could not possibly hope to overcome a charge with these pathetic little stabbing spears. They would have to submit, surely, and acknowledge the people of their island as the superior power.
On their canoes sped, the warriors towards the front ready to make their leaps towards the enemy craft as they had done so many times before.
The foreigners, however, were apparently not fazed by this, unaffected by the fearsome, feral screams which he could hear even from his vantage point atop the tree, which sent shivers down his spine and goosebumps down his arm.
They changed their grips on their weapons, still not a single enemy warrior preparing to repel boarders, instead changing the positioning of their spears, now held against the…
The shoulder?
Fools…
They would all die, and their blood would stain the sea.
It was at that moment, against the cacophony of the screams of the warriors in the canoe, that he heard the loud war cry of the foreigner.
A bang, like a thunderclap, echoed across the harbour, heavy black smoke rising into the sky as though some angry spirit had struck the invaders' boat with lightning.
Two bodies fell into the harbour, and the warriors broke off their attack.
On barely functioning limbs, Percy descended from his vantage point, jaw slack in shock.

From the side of the ship, Annabeth Chase gazed out at the island which they had finally reached, and oh beautiful it was.
Like some picture from an artist's easel or straight out of her wildest dreams, a mountain soared above the canopy of a vibrant rainforest, painted all pretty shades of orange in the light of the sunrise.
The image, however, was not long to last.
From one side of the island came a pair of canoes, outrigger craft racing across the water to meet the landing party, the Marines led by Castellan armed, yes, but under orders not to be the first to fire.
Annabeth was no stranger to war, this was true; her father had shown her much of his own father's memorabilia from his campaigns in India, where Frederick had been born and raised. Her new friend Thalia, sister of the American researcher on the expedition, had spoken of her own experiences in Australia, where she had encountered her own fair share of armed conflict.
Screams of rage and anger echoed across the sea, hauntingly painted, tattooed warriors yelling their battle cries, so shrill, so terror-inducing that Annabeth felt a chill trickle down her spine, fingers gripping the wooden railing on the port side of the boat as she mentally prepared for what was to come, and for the consequences of the inevitable engagement that was to come.
She had been exposed to battle, yes, but that was not enough to prevent her from gasping as she watched the redcoats lift their rifles to the shoulder, despite their orders not to engage first.
That didn't stop either of the girls from turning away as Castellan ordered his troops to fire.
Behind her, the New Zealander; Piper, they'd named her; was bundled onto a boat alongside Professor Pace, Jason Grace and her father. Thalia made to follow, and at a lack of objection to the botanist's boarding of the boat, Annabeth found herself alongside the academics of the expedition, preparing to go ashore, and to face the consequences of this violent first step in their hunt for a world that might or might not exist.

The Chief made his way through the crowd of shocked warriors, eyes wide in a mixture of shock and fury. These folk dared approach further, even with their spears which spoke in fire, and with their robes the colour of blood…
Percy watched as his leader confronted this new foe, the man who gave their war cry, who cast the spell to draw fire from wood and steel.
His skin was deathly pale, Percy noticed, with hair the colour of the snow that sometimes settled atop the mountain, hanging in curls to his shoulders. His men stood in a tight group in what looked to be a horrifically uncomfortable position behind him, their spears held in one hand. He took the chance to examine them further, admiring as the sun glinted off polished wood, peering at the curious metal embellishments that each weapon seemed to have. Truly, its magic was otherworldly, for only witchcraft could have done such a thing.
A second boat came ashore, more of the read-coated warriors disembarking, though this time they were accompanied by who he supposed were the common folk of this other world from which these people came, that world of castle-like canoes and colourless skin.
Among all these people, however, one particular person stuck out.
A young girl, one of their own, was shoved ahead of the invading warriors, eyes wide in shock.
Percy couldn't help but stare back, for this girl looked too frail, too young to be used in such a business as war between her own folk and those who had doubtlessly stolen her from her home. She deserved better, he resolved, and he would need to spring her from the clutches of these tyrants, these mages who wielded the powers of fire.

The girl was used as a translator, speaking with each of the leaders; the enemy wizard and one of the common folk in a curious tongue, relaying their responses to the questions of their Chief back to the gathered warriors, speaking a slightly accented variant of the language which they themselves spoke, a dialect similar to the few sailors who still came to their island from Aotearoa. They had not been told what exactly had happened there, but suddenly they could take a guess, especially considering the girl's weathered appearance. No self-respecting society would allow a child to live alone and uncared for as this little one had, for the system of the whanau, through which extended families were formed, such was the close-knit nature of their people.

Suddenly Percy felt a twinge of hate for people who were so self-centred that they could not care for the people of the island they had subjugated, to the extent that a child could be stolen from her home to be taken on an expedition such as this.

Annabeth observed as the conversation took place, watching as Piper spoke with the chieftain of this little tribe, translating the words of Captain Castellan and her Father to the burly, tattooed man as they explained that they were only here in order to do some research.
It was then that she heard the word Aotearoa.
She knew that word…
Was it from Australia, perhaps?
No, New Zealand.
Was this tribe somehow linked to the Maoris who they had subjugated to take those islands?
The words were spoken with a rage which suggested that she was correct in her assumption, and the translator's eyes flew wide open in terror, knowing for sure that any slip up in her translation could well spell doom for the assembled warriors on the beach and further back in the trees.
It was at this point, however, that Jason interjected, stumbling over some somewhat shoddy phrases in the language Piper and the chieftain were speaking, apparently shocking the tribals into listening.
On the talks went, neither side backing down an inch, despite the sweltering heat of the sun, which now approached its zenith. For the first time, Annabeth missed the simple cotton of the clothes she had worn on the ship, the Indian fabric proving to be more comfortable, and certainly more suited to the oppressive heat of the South Pacific than the extravagant silks of her formal gown could ever be. The powder she wore on her face was beginning to run with her sweat, and the heavy clothes, however, mighty they caused her to appear, did her no favours as her weak legs began to tire.

It was after some time, however, that Jason offered his hand to this warrior chief in a mark of respect, and after a moment of explanation on the part of little Piper, it was returned, the scholar explaining the situation to the gathered British, American and Australian researchers and soldiers. Their expedition could continue, but the peace was a tentative one at best.

It was a few weeks later that Annabeth had found herself entirely bored.
They now had a camp, a small fort of sorts that had been made of wood from the forest and rock from a quarry the villagers had established up in the mountains. As a matter of fact, the young Brit had found herself shocked at the speed with which the tribespeople had given them the materials necessary, and exactly to the extortionate specifications given to them by Castellan a few weeks prior.
The majority of the camp was made up of large tents, a few wooden cabins making up the centre. The rest of the wood and stone had been used in the walls, lest the wild animals, or even the natives, see it fit to launch an attack upon the newcomers to this island.
With the river, they had been granted running water and even some fish, and meat was abundant in the forest, hunting parties going out nearly once a week since their arrival on the island, though they took care to try and avoid the natives' favoured areas of hunting, lest they provoke conflict.
Despite all this excitement, however, Annabeth had found herself caught up in the throes of boredom.

She had learned to shoot from the admittedly charismatic Captain Castellan and Sergeant Major Sutherland, the Grace siblings being some distance ahead of her in this particular discipline, and now she considered herself sufficiently adept with the musket. She also carried a matchet, the cutlass-like farming tool favoured by natives from West Indian islanders, which she used to hack away at foliage, though she knew it would not harm her to be competent in using it as a weapon of war, for it would be far quicker to draw a blade from her hip in the forest than it would to prime, load and fire her 'brown bessie' musket, despite all the advances that had been made in the field of gunpowder weaponry.

Today, she had found herself alone in the forest, the light of day more than sufficient to guide her back to camp, and as an extra measure of safety she had refrained from straying from the river's banks.
She could now name many of the flora of the region, from the pines to the ferns and swamp flax of the wetlands. Prime among the species to avoid, however, was the toxic Foxglove, which would most likely result in illness, and it had been rumoured that a few people had met their ends at the metaphorical hands of the plant.
She had also encountered various dangerous animals alongside her good friend Thalia, though she was not scared.
The Gods of Olympus guided her path.
The intellect of her mother guided her every step, and that fact alone gave her solace in the fact that she was safe.
She was not the only demigod on this voyage, and there was no longer a camp that was set in place to guide them, in Britain, at least, but she had the raw potential contained within every being of her kind, the divinity that would manifest itself as skill at arms and in the field of strategy, though she knew in her heart of hearts that it was above her station to join the men in the war room to discuss such masculine things as battle strategy and tactics.

Jason and Thalia, she knew, were the children of Zeus, and Castellan was a Son of Hermes. She had a suspicion about Sarn't Major Sutherland, but she didn't dare to ask the man about it, for fear of either provoking his famous rage or revealing the nature of Olympus to a clueless mortal. There were certainly more than just these four or five, at least, considering the nature of their mission.
It wasn't just any group of people who were tasked with subjugating the pretenders to Poseidon's crown, let alone bring his son back from those who had stolen him from his rightful place.

The day was fading when she reentered into the camp, the Marines on the gate giving her a wave as they hauled open the large oaken doors. The sun was painting the sky in a host of vibrant colours in a view she was now taking entirely for granted, and her walk back to her tent led her past the cabin which served as the cookhouse for their camp of five hundred or so, a huge container of grain and other such food. It was one of Thalia's favourite spots to simply relax, the quiet of the storeroom at such odds with the rest of the camp, and she hoped to have a word with her friend and confidante regarding their rather more secretive quest.
As she entered the storeroom, however, she realised that the girl was rather more…
Preoccupied…
Than would be ideal for conversation.
That was, of course, unless the rather compromising state in which the Daughter of Zeus and the Commanding Officer of the Royal Marine detachment sent out to accompany them was a simple misunderstanding.
Backing out of the room silently, Annabeth couldn't help but laugh in shock, the hilarity and awkwardness of that moment ever so slightly too much for her sheltered mind, and the image not necessarily one she particularly desired in her mind.
She sequestered herself away in her tent for the rest of the late afternoon, only emerging when the call went out for the day's evening meal.

The night guard scanned the limits of the firelight, the treeline only just illuminated by the torches on the walls of Fort Sentinel, the lack of light granted to him by the new moon meaning that he was constantly scanning the forest, with no visual aids to his mission as a sentry.
It had been quiet all night, a consequence of the new moon no doubt, the only noise from the forest thus far being the chirping of crickets and the fluttering of wings of the few nocturnal birds in the trees.
Not even the wind disturbed the trees.
As it would happen, it was that which caused the little rustle of the trees to draw his attention quite as significantly as it did, the rifle in his hands trained on the source of the disturbance.
It was, however, too late.
The thud of a body striking the wooden flooring of the battlements of their wooden fort caused him to duck for cover, taking cover behind the wall, which would typically serve them as a method to brace their rifles as they picked off an advancing foe from the forest, covering a withdrawal to the ship and its promise of cannonfire which the natives could never hope to match.
It did not, however, account for the single poison dart which had ended the life of his comrade, the life of young Jimmy Saunders over in a matter of moments, lips blue and eyes a shade of crimson that did not belong on the human body. Even now, moments after his passing, his skin was becoming alarmingly pale, all evidence of life having existed in his form vanishing as though it were being washed away in the tide.
He sounded the alarm.

A/N

If it looks offensive, I promise you, it was carefully considered and entirely intentional. If I've said something here that looks imperialist, I encourage you to look at the description of this story, and take a long, hard look at yourself if you think people supported an empire wouldn't be imperialist. It is a characterisation based on an era of history in which people had a certain mindset, and that mindset involved racial and cultural supremacism. This is how I've decided to write my story, because I want to honour some of my favourite movies of all time and combine them with this fandom that we all love, so please, read with an open and understanding mind, because humanity wasn't perfect, and pretending that it ever has been is stupid and people who want to do so are the reason it isn't at the moment.

That aside, then...
No Romans, because that'd just make this shit complicated.
Those of you who've read Even in the Darkest of Times will hopefully be able to notice something that's going to become rather important in future.
What else?
Oh yeah, the plot thickens and all that jazz, if you can guess what I'm planning you win a prize.
Not sure what that prize would be, yet - my everlasting respect, perhaps? We'll work something out.
Until next time then,
Sol
(I don't own PJO)