"Are you sure you don't want one of us to come with you?" L.J. asked for what felt like the hundredth time to Percy.
"No. I've already told you, just take me to the nearest sea shore, I can make my way the rest of the way myself." Percy said annoyed.
"But we don't trust them." Jason said scowling fiercely. "They are imperfect. If you'd let me I'd fix them…?"
"No Jason, I appreciate the offer but there are far more imperfect people who you should be worrying about." Percy insisted and finally Jason and L.J. gave up.
"Fine I'll take you and we won't go with you, but we'll be keeping an eye on you." L.J. said scowling.
"Okay that's fine." Percy said throwing his hands up in the air. "Yeesh you're such a worrier mom.". Percy had started jokingly calling L.J. mom after about the first five times L.J. had cleaned Percy's room or bothered Percy to do it. L.J. didn't seem to mind, he seemed to like it actually. Now he smiled at Percy, please with this small victory.
"Okay then if I'm your mom just let me pack you some sandwiches and fuss with your hair for a bit to make you late." L.J. Laughed sticking out his overly long tongue as he did so letting it dangle down to well below his chin.
"Oh my gods L.J." Percy sighed and hid his face in his hands. L.J. laughed even louder and Jason joined in laughing at the two of them.
"Okay let's get you to your imperfect friends." He said the word friends so sarcastically that Percy couldn't help but roll his eyes. Jason reached out to Percy and Percy took his hand, he was ready when they passed through into Jason's toy shop or factory, it was a bit of both.
"You've been busy." Percy said admiring a Raggedy Ann type doll that was much larger than the toys Jason made. In fact if it had been a child before Jason fixed it, there was a chance it hadn't changed size at all.
"You like that one huh?" Jason asked smiling down at Percy and looking at him out of the corner of his eye.
"I do. You really outdid yourself with this one. It's amazing." Percy praised knowing that Jason loved nothing more than his ego being fed. He could see Jason practically purring as he accepted the praise with false nonchalant.
"If you like that one so much you can have it." Jason choked out, almost managing to sound casual through his pride but not quite. "I can make plenty more where that came from."
"Thanks Ace." Percy going over to the doll to stroke it's yarn hair and feel the warmth of life that still radiated from it. "I'll have to pick it up on the way back though. I don't want to drag it through the ocean with me."
"Fair enough." Jason agreed taking Percy's hand again , leading him back out of the workshop. This time they were on the beach.
"Thanks Ace, I'll see you again soon." Percy assured Jason, but Jason didn't let go of his hand right away.
"If you're not back by tomorrow and you haven't checked in, me and L.J. are coming to get you." He warned and Percy nodded.
"Okay Jason. Don't worry everything will be fine." Percy replied. Jason gave a noncommittal noise but let go of Percy's hand. Percy waved goodbye and walked into the water.
He arrived a bit early so he stayed in the water, below the waves where he could remain unseen. He watched as Hazel, Annabeth, Jason, and Nico came down to the beach and talked quietly together. There were a few other campers standing at a farther distance but it seemed that they were just there to watch the show. When he figured it was time he surfaced and moved over to the shallows, and walked up on the sand. Completely dry as usual.
"Hey it's good to see you guys." Percy said holding out his hands to show there was nothing in them and smiling at them. "What did you want to talk about?"
"Mostly I just wanted to know what your real story is if you've been lying to us all this time." Annabeth said holding out her hands too. Percy nodded.
"Fair enough. You at least deserve to know." Percy sighed, he wanted to shove his hands in his pockets but he knew that wasn't a good idea. "Everyone seemed to assume that before I came to camp half-blood I didn't know about my powers but I did. I just didn't know how to control them, I mean it was hard not to notice I could breath underwater the first time I went swimming.
"People thought I was a freak and I did too. Gabe most of all, he had always been mentally and verbally abusive to me but when I was ten it… got worse. One night when he was… beating me." The word was hard for Percy to get out even now. "I stopped him, my instincts took over and I took control of the water in his body. I stopped his fist before he could land it, then I ran.
"Jason the toy maker found me on the street then. He loves children, but no human children suit his definition of perfect. I did. So he took me under his wing showed me the ropes in his world. Taught me how to cope with being different in the crazy he knew how. I met L.J. and Sally and BEN and they were the best friends I could have asked for. I found a place among them and when I did go visit my mother and Gabe, he was too scared to lay a hand on me anymore. That fear… that power… it's addicting, I loved it.
"When Grover found me I was at a boarding school, it was the second one my mother sent me to trying to isolate me from the creeps. The first time she tried I was ten. I thought she'd give up the idea after a few kids went missing from the school and I came home with dolls that looked just like them and I definitely hadn't gone to school with." Percy laughed when he heard a sharp intake of breath from Hazel. "Ya, Jason likes to make me toys. That was when I got Jessica. Still have her. I've broken a lot of the other toys Ace gave me though.
"Anyway I had decided to be on my best behavior that year, just to see what it was like. Really boring as it turns out but I'm glad I did because Grover brought me here. I really liked it here, this place taught me to control my power better than the creeps ever could. It made me stronger, taught me more self control too. I had a reason not to loose my cool all summer, even though I was almost completely crazy when I went home every fall.
"I told you guys I was at boarding schools so you wouldn't come looking for me and got plants inside the schools to tell me if any of you showed up looking for me. If that happened I just had to find L.J. or Ace and they could teleport me to meet you as if I had been there all along. After I helped mom kill Gabe, she sort of resigned herself to the way I am and decided she was still my mom anyway. I don't tell her about what I do and she doesn't ask." Percy finished and shrugged, they were all staring at him in, well, mixed emotions by the looks of it.
Annabeth was looking at him in a mixture of disgust and curiosity like he was a very interesting puzzle. The disgust alarmed him and he wasn't sure if he was angry or sad about it. Hazel looked afraid and confused, Jason looked like he was in shock. Nico looked… a little bored. Odd.
"So there you have it." Percy said holding out his hands as if he was offering them something. "That's my story."
"And you've been lying to us this whole time." Jason asked, his eyes wide and hurt. Percy winced. He felt almost as bad for keeping things from Jason and Annabeth.
"I'm sorry bro but it wasn't hard. You're all so… honorable it never even occurred to you that I might not be."
"Go to sleep." The voice was too powerful to be any of theirs. It was Piper, he realized as he started to sway. Hazel must have been hiding her with the mist. "That's right, Percy. Go to sleep."
"Less honorable than I thought." Percy murmured as he fell over fighting to stay awake.
"Don't move. Your powers aren't working right now." Piper commanded and Percy found his limbs too heavy to lift. Piper and Annabeth walked over to him, lifting him between them. He ignored Piper and glowered at Annabeth instead.
"Jessica was the first girl I liked, Beth. Ace made her into a doll for me so she could never leave me. He's watching now, do you want to be a doll too?" He didn't think he actually would let Ace turn Annabeth into a doll, but he was angry just then, and feeling her shudder in fear was the reward he wanted.
"Go to sleep." Piper ordered again. Percy could feel sleep dragging him down until something else cut through it.
"Don't go to sleep!" An equally powerful voice screamed from a distance. "Percy wake up!" Percy thrashed and Piper and Annabeth dropped him.
"Drew, what are you doing?" That was Annabeth shouting. Drew? Drew was helping him.
"Percy get up." Drew commanded and Percy got to his feet. A body came barreling into his and one of his arms wrapped around them automatically. He was sure by the glimpse of uniform straight black hair it was Drew.
"What are you doing?" He murmured into her hair, still disoriented.
"Helping you, you idiot!" Drew snapped. "Now snap out of it and stop them!"
Percy listed his arms towards the other demigods before he fully realized what he was doing, and used the water in the other demigods bodies to stop them as they charged. He looked over their faces in a dazed sort of alarm. Annabeth, Jason, Piper, Hazel… where was Nico? Drew was still half clinging to Percy's neck. He wasn't sure if he should do something about that.
"Let's go Percy." Drew whispered to him commandingly. "The waters right there. I know you can keep me from drowning. I can't stay here now can I?" Percy started backing up toward the water before his mind fully processed what she had said. He didn't stop once he had though. Instead he pulled Drew back into the water with him and rocketed away with her until he was no longer in range of the other demigods.
He created a bubble around them and then let go of Drew. He looked her over. Her eyeliner was black today and slightly smudged, her hair was mussed, and her gaze fierce. He had never looked that closely at her before, now she reminded him of a snake.
"What are you doing, Drew." Percy asked coldly. She sighed and combed her fingers through her long hair. He didn't know why, as far as he could tell it never got tangled.
"You're not the only demigod that feels the way you do, you know. I just wasn't lucky enough to have people who understood find me first. Take me with you. I'm sick of playing nice, I'm not even as good at it as you. I've always been a bitch but I want to be vicious, I want to see blood, taste it." He could see the light in her eyes and he recognized it. He knew it, it was his own, and he felt himself drawn closer to her.
"Now." Percy said interrupting her. She cocked her head to the side and looked at him. "We're going to go kill now. We'll see if you really have a taste for blood like you say."
"Okay." Drew answered without hesitation; she looked both nervous and excited. He could remember that feeling.
"I think you're going to love this." Percy purred, smiling at her encouragingly. She smiled back, her full lips quivered a little. Percy wrapped one arm around her and then pushed them both through the water again. She closed her eyes as they moved too quickly. Holding onto Percy for dear life. Apparently this way of traveling was not her favorite, Percy liked it but he supposed maybe for someone who wasn't used to breathing underwater, it was harder.
"We're on land again." Percy murmured once they had reached a beach far away from Camp Halfblood. None of the Mortals on the beach noticed them leaving the water as usual. Drew opened her eyes and pulled away from Percy looking up at him wearily. "You choose who you want."
Drew let go of him and stepped back, scanning the people on the beach like fruit at the supermarket. She opened her mouth to answer and just then two boys walking by her whistled at her, cutting off her words.
"Hey sexy, you're not dressed properly for the beach, but I for one would love to see you skinny dip." One of them yelled and the other laughed. Drew closed her mouth and her eyes, then took a deep breath. She opened them again and looked at Percy with the most done expression he had ever seen.
"Them?" He laughed, she nodded. "Then go get them. We can take them underwater. Screams don't travel well there."
"Oh boys." She called to the two who had shouted. Swishing her hips as she walked up to them, her every movement like dancing. "I'll go swimming but only if you two will come in to protect me from any sharks." She giggled, batting her eyes at them.
"There are no sharks here the waters too cold but… uh sure." One of them said. They obviously weren't used to their attention being reciprocated. Percy scoffed and retreated into the water. Unlike most people his hearing still worked fine here.
"Come on." He heard Drew command. Enough power in her voice that he was surprised everyone on the beach didn't follow her into the water. As soon as they were deep enough into the water he grabbed one of the boys by the ankle and yanked him down into his bubble under the surface.
"Oops those are the sharks I was talking about." Drew said and Percy laughed grabbing the other boy and yanking him down, Drew followed on her own. Swimming down, he reached up to meet her, helping her down into the bubble and forcing all the water out of her clothes and hair. Which had the slightest curl to it now.
"Ready to get started?" Percy purred to her, pulling a switchblade out of his pocket and handing it to her. He always carried a weapon of ordinary metal as well as his sword. "I'll hold them still for you. I can keep them from bleeding too. Don't damage anything and they won't die 'til you say the word. Play as much as you want."
She took the knife from him and stared down at it baffled and overwhelmed for a moment. Then one of them men called her a bitch and something in the air snapped. She turned to them smiling her sweetest smile. Percy sat back to enjoy the show.
Percy didn't know how much later it was when Drew sat back from the whimpering messes that had been the boys who cat called her. He was sure their throats must have been destroyed from screaming, his ears were still ringing. She looked over at him smiling. She was panting, her face flushed with delight, and her eyes sparkling with childish delight.
"You're done with them?" Percy asked and she nodded. He released his hold on their blood which he had been pumping through their ripped veins. Immediately the red liquid began to flow from the many gashes that Drew had opened. She held out her hands letting them get covered in the thick red liquid, staring in wonder as both boys breathing slowed and then stopped. She stayed by their sides watching them bleed until there was nothing left in them to come out.
Only then did she look away from them, looking at Percy with a childish wonder. He smiled at her and walked a little closer.
"That was fun to watch." Percy commented, grinning his crooked grin that had always made teachers a little afraid. She returned it with one of her own.
"It was fun to do." She purred licking some of the blood off her fingers without breaking eye contact with him. His throat was suddenly dry and he cleared it awkwardly.
"You're right, I think you do belong with us." He told her. She stood and ran her fingers over the skin of his biceps, smearing the blood.
"I'm glad you agree." She purred leaning up close to him, her eyes hooded.
"There's not a snake alive who could say no to you, charmer." Percy murmured. He didn't pull away from her, he and Annabeth were over now, that was obvious, and she was beautiful. Watching her kill was the closest thing to a religious experience Percy had ever had.
"Of course not. They recognize one of their own." Drew whispered, Percy could feel her breath on his lips. His lips parted slightly as if he could taste the sweet smell of her breath. "I'm venomous though, are you sure you want a taste? You might get addicted."
"I'm sure I will." Percy replied with a short chuckle. Then their lips were touching. Soft and sweet and complimented by the taste of blood that still lingered on her lips. He didn't close his eyes. Instead he ran his hands through her hair and watched as the blue-black strands slipped through his fingers like water. Percy lost track of time as they kissed and it was her who pulled away.
He knew he was looking at her like she was his new goddess, that's the way he felt. He didn't try to hide it. To his surprise she blushed and looked away. She looked back up at him through her lashes with a shy smile that did not match her blood covered hands.
"I think it's time I met your family. Before I lose my nerve." She murmured wrapping her arms around his neck.
"They're going to love you." Percy assured her. They left the bodies on the ocean floor. Something would eat them and if it didn't then the water would destroy any DNA or evidence. It didn't matter they wouldn't be traced. Now it was time to introduce Drew to a new life that Percy knew she would like far better than she had at camp.
It made so much sense! That's why she had always been so angry, she was suppressing a key part of her nature. Trying to release the violence she felt in little bursts that would be seen as at least socially acceptable. Percy couldn't wait to see who she would be now that she was free.