"I Accidentally Vaporize my Pre-Algebra Teacher" Apollo read and Leo smirked amongst the snickers in the pavilion. Judging from the title, he had the feeling that he would like Percy.
"Look, I didn't want to be a half-blood. If you're reading this because you think you might be one, my advice is: close this book right now. Believe what ever lie your mom or dad told you about your birth, and try to lead a normal life."
"Prissy's giving advice?" A large, muscular girl with stringy brown hair scoffed. "The world's ending." Some mean snickers reverberated around her table but a terrifying glare from Annabeth and Jason's hot sister succeeded in quieting the crowd and Leo turned back to Apollo who resumed his reading with a glee unprecedented.
"Being a half-blood is dangerous. It's scary. Most of the time, it gets you killed in painful, nasty ways."
"Well," one kid pointed out towards the rude girl from earlier, a mischievous glint in his eye, "Percy's probably the best to give advice for that." A few snickers went around but most seemed too nervous around the thundering atmosphere to laugh. Leo fell into the latter category after seeing Thalia's dangerous version of quieting the kids. He liked his eyebrows intact.
"If you're a normal kid, reading this because you think it's fiction, great. Read on. I envy you for being able to believe that none of this ever happened."
"He sounds a bit condescending doesn't he?" Piper whispered quietly, obviously trying not to be heard above the level of the other rumbles of comments. Jason nodded and Leo agreed silently, because Thalia was looking at them and he didn't want to look stupid by randomly shaking his head.
"But if you recognize yourself in these pages—if you feel something stirring inside—stop reading immediately. "
"Too late!" Leo didn't mean for it to come out that loud, but a few snickers went around the group and Piper smacked her hand to her head as Thalia and Annabeth both turned to glare.
"Way to go," Jason muttered as Thalia stood up and walked over to them, Leo blushed slightly and turned to glare at his friend.
"Shut up!" He murmured, straightening up and hastily brushing his hair with his fingers as Thalia came over. She shot one, slightly amused, slightly incredulous look at Leo and sat down besides Jason, pushing Leo to the side.
"I'm sitting here so you behave," she told him, and Leo took it to mean that she cared enough for him not to get hurt by an angry, unbalanced Annabeth.
"You might be one of us. And once you know that, it's only a matter of time before they sense it too, and they'll come for you. Don't say I didn't warn you."
"You didn't warn me," the pale boy besides Annabeth spoke up, one hand lifting to brush his hair casually from his eyes, the silver skull ring glinting in the sun. Annabeth glared at the boy.
"Shut up Nico!" she snarled and the boy smirked ever so slightly.
"Make me Annabeth." She glared and her hand shot to her dagger, mirrored by his shooting towards his oddly short scabbard. Apollo coughed loudly and both sat back down. Leo noted not to mess with the oddly gothic boy, Nico. Anyone who could withstand Annabeth's fury was not one he wanted to deal with.
"My name is Percy Jackson. I'm twelve years old."
"How old?" Piper squeaked, eyes wide. Leo couldn't resist.
"He said twelve, princess, didn't you hear?" He teased. Piper was probably the one girl at camp that he could tease without getting gutted by a dagger, sliced by a sword, electrocuted by lightening, shot with an arrow, gagged with designer perfume that smelled like skunk, run over by a Pegasus (or a herd on one memorable occasion), strangled by various plants, or stabbed through with a spear, and he took full advantage of it.
Piper glared, "I heard perfectly fine Leo. It was more of the fact that he was only twelve years old when he went on his first quest!" She huffed and after a moment's hesitation, Jason put a comforting, just 'friendly' arm around her. Leo wondered if anyone in the entire courtyard was as oblivious as the two of them.
Annabeth, who had been relatively quiet after the incident with Nico, spoke up. "It was more of an emergency quest, and Percy was the only one that could go. It explains why in the book but he didn't have a choice in the matter." Piper still looked as if the age was simply inexcusable and Apollo (quite wisely in Leo's opinion) began to read again before she could have a chance to lecture the world on proper child-god care.
"Until a few months ago, I was a boarding student at Yancy Academy, a private school for troubled kids in upstate New York."
"Eurgh," Piper made a disgusted face and Leo and Jason both shot her sympathetic looks.
"One of the schools your dad sent you to?" Jason asked quietly, which Leo would admit, was more tactful than if he would have addressed her. Piper nodded.
"Disgusting little brats went there, there was this one girl, complete kleptomaniac," Leo made no attempt at pointing out the irony in the statement despite his extreme desire to do so. Pipes was his friend and he knew how sensitive she was about those times that her father thought she was a thief, "Threw her lunch all over everyone constantly! Ketchup and peanut butter! Ick!"
Grover, Annabeth's furry satyr friend, shot Piper an incredulous look.
"You knew Nancy Bobofit?" Piper nodded, and Grover's eyes widened. "When did you go to Yancy?"
"When I was thirteen," Grover mouthed the word before vigorously shaking his head.
"One year! I could've waited one year to go to Yancy and snagged Piper instead of Percy! Could you imagine how life would be? Piper wouldn't have made me go through all the things Percy did," he smiled dreamily and many kids laughed.
"Yes, but I don't think she would've been able to save all of Olympus either!" Annabeth stated, glaring at the boy. Leo didn't think that was very fair. After all, Piper had done a great deal to save Tia Callida when Annabeth was off sulking and Percy was the gods know where. Sadly, Annabeth terrified them all and no one dared to contradict her and the whole crowd fell into an awkward silence until Apollo spoke again.
"Am I a troubled kid?"
"Yes," several kids muttered surprisingly including Thalia and not even Annabeth contradicted it, a small half-smile, half-exasperated expression gracing her lips. Leo had to admit, when Annabeth wasn't pants-crappingly terrifying, she was almost sweet looking.
"Yeah. You could say that."
Leo and several others laughed at that. He could appreciate a man who know his own faults and could laugh at them. Where would the world be without the smart alecs of the world? He shuddered to imagine.
"I could start at any point in my short miserable life to prove it, but things really started going bad last May, when our sixth-grade class took a field trip to Manhattan— twenty-eight mental-case kids and two teachers on a yellow school bus, heading to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to look at ancient Greek and Roman stuff."
"Sounds like fun," Jason stated and Leo stared at him, shocked.
"Fun? Fun, Jason? Dear gods what has become of you?" He stood up and pointed an accusing finger at his friend causing an eye roll and a hand to reach out and push him back down to his seat.
"Yeah, it would be interesting," Leo mouthed the words, putting a hand to his heart and pretend fainting, as if the statement had mortally wounded him. Thalia rolled her eyes and pulled him back down into his seat. Leo shot her a grin.
"Can't resist me?" He asked half teasingly, reaching out to put a friendly arm around her. With time-honed reflexes, Thalia pushed his hand away and glared at the overly excitable boy.
"If you like that hand, I suggest you keep on your side, Flameo." She retorted. Leo grinned.
"Flameo, huh? Like a hot Romeo?" Thalia rolled her eyes and didn't deem him with a response, but Leo knew it was only a matter of time until she admitted her attraction towards him, he just knew it.
"I know—it sounds like torture."
"Most Yancy field trips are," Piper stated, earning a laugh from the campers and an odd but amused look from Apollo who couldn't quite disguise the amusement from his voice as he continued to read.
"Most Yancy field trips were."
Several people laughed at Piper's 'oh' face and one of the Stoll brothers – Leo didn't know which, jumped up dramatically, pointing a tanned finger at Piper accusingly.
"She thinks like Percy! It's only a matter of time before her brain begins to rot, we must save her brother!" He looked towards his brother who nodded gravely and together they approached her. Leo was too busy laughing to stop them but Jason, always a hair's width away from Piper, slid a hand between the tricksters and Piper.
"Pax vobis molesti fabri," he told him, voice accenting the Latin words. The brothers blinked in shock, outreaching hands falling to their sides as they tried to discern the language. Leo laughed again, hands reaching his sides as he doubled over. The Stolls, after confirming that Jason would not tell them and that Piper had no idea, rounded on him.
"Do you understand?" The way they said it made it seem that Leo was the last person to be able to understand but Leo had spent enough time with Jason (and more time irritating him that Piper) to understand what he'd spoken so he smirked at them.
"Sure I do, but I ain't about to tell you, that'd ruin the surprise!" He leaned back, hands crossing behind his eyes. The whole thing might have been more impressive if he hadn't leaned too far and landed quite smartly on his butt. The Stolls and all the other campers laughed as Piper and Jason took pity and helped him back up besides the laughing Thalia.
"He said 'Peace, you trouble makers' now quiet down!" Chiron stared disapprovingly at the campers, "I thought you'd be able to behave yourselves in the presence of a god," the campers muttered their apologies in tandem and the Stolls returned to their seats reluctantly.
"Culos tonto," Leo murmured, pouting slightly as he straightened up. Piper shot him a stern look.
"Watch your mouth," Leo stuck his tongue out in response and Apollo continued reading.
"But Mr. Brunner, our Latin teacher, was leading this trip, so I had hopes."
"Mr. Brunner? That's what Percy called Chiron at first isn't it?" Annabeth spoke up and Grover nodded.
"Chiron was your teacher?" Jason sounded surprised and Leo had to agree. It seemed like it would be difficult for Chiron to disguise himself well enough to not raise suspicions, no matter the all-powerful mist that fooled mortals.
"Yeah," Grover said, "He does so whenever it's a really powerful kid, like big three material," he explained. "Eases the process, monsters notice them more."
"Wait…" Piper said slowly, "If that's the case, why wasn't Chiron there when Jason was with us at the Wilderness School?" Grover shook his head and Chiron took up the question.
"Because my dear, by the time Jason had – uh- arrived at the school, Gaea's servant had noticed you and it was too late for my assistance." Chiron was careful not to mention how Jason had come to the camp but Leo knew Piper was embarrassed. It was still sometimes hard for both of them to realize they hadn't really spent all that time with Jason like they thought they did.
"Mr. Brunner was this middle-aged guy in a motorized wheelchair. He had thinning hair and a scruffy beard and a frayed tweed jacket, which always smelled like coffee. You wouldn't think he'd be cool, but he told stories and jokes and let us play games in class. He also had this awesome collection of Roman armor and weapons, so he was the only teacher whose class didn't put me to sleep."
"Ah, that's so sweet," one of the daughters of Aphrodite crooned and Leo couldn't tell whether they were joking or being serious but he still winced on behalf of the missing boy.
"I hoped the trip would be okay. At least, I hoped that for once I wouldn't get in trouble."
"Fat chance," Grover muttered bitterly and Leo wondered what had happened.
"Boy, was I wrong."
"That's not new," Thalia muttered and Leo shot her a surprised look. She generally left the scoffing remarks to him, he'd never seen her insult another person like that. She noticed him looking and rolled her eyes as if Leo should have known the characteristics of a boy he'd never met before.
"Percy's not exactly the smartest person in the world, obviously," Leo considered relaying the fact of never having met Percy, then decided he liked being whole and unelectrocuted.
"See, bad things happen to me on field trips. Like at my fifth-grade school, when we went to the Saratoga battlefield, I had this accident with a Revolutionary War cannon. I wasn't aiming for the school bus, but of course I got expelled anyway."
Leo and most of the other campers roared with laughter and even Thalia had an half amused – half disbelieving face. Only Annabeth seemed to be un-amused. She sat there, chewing on her lip slightly which Leo figured wasn't real good for her, as Apollo continued.
"And before that, at my fourth-grade school, when we took a behind-the-scenes tour of the Marine World shark pool, I sort of hit the wrong lever on the catwalk and our class took an unplanned swim. "
"I bet Percy was the only happy one," Grover smiled fondly, "You know, being able to stay dry and all, and not having to worry about the sharks nibbling on you." Annabeth rolled her eyes.
"Yeah, but he didn't exactly know that the sharks wouldn't eat him, did he?" Leo backtracked on the conversion, a dawning expression on his face as he realized something he'd missed.
"Wait… Percy can stay dry in the water?" Annabeth nodded and Leo pouted. "Dude, that's awesome! That's so not fair! I want to be able to stay dry in the water." Piper looked at him oddly.
"Leo," she started slowly as if trying to explain to a stubborn two-year old that B did, in fact, come after A and before C, "you are a fire-born child of Hephaestus, you could and have, you know, just kind of 'steam dry?" she tilted her head to the side slightly and Leo embarrassedly ran his hand through his thick curls.
"I – I forgot about that," he grinned sheepishly and Piper just rolled her eyes.
"Idiot," Jason told him fondly, grinning at his friend. Leo reached up and tried to smack him but Jason dodged.
"Shut up, you," he grumbled as the others around him laughed.
"And the time before that... Well, you get the idea."
"Jeez, how many things did Percy do?" Leo asked. Each one of those things obviously warranted an immediate expulsion and that was at least two schools.
"A lot," Annabeth answered, "Percy was expelled from eight schools." Leo whistled appreciatedly. Sure, demigods were trouble and a lot of them got expelled from a couple of schools over the years, him including, but from every single school from first to eighth grade? He'd acknowledge that.
"It's the sea you know?" Annabeth smiled fondly, "That's what his mother used to say whenever she started talking, 'The Sea doesn't like to be tamed. It doesn't like to bow down to anyone and raises its crest high in pride.' It's always been hard for Percy to accept authority and at school, when he didn't realize who he was or why everything was so difficult to him, he tended to lash out a bit."
Grover muttered something to the effect of 'a bit' was a little too small. Or quite a bit small, but Leo couldn't tell beyond the nervous chewing of a brand new coke can. Annabeth smiled amusedly, "A bit is a little small but Percy did calm down a bit. He's been going to the same school for the past two years now," Thalia muttered how he was cheating because his stepfather drew ties there but Annabeth continued on,
"This would – will" her eyes momentarily flashed with that fierce determination that Leo had grown accustomed to over their shared time, "be his third year." Silence followed her statement before Apollo began to read again.
"This trip, I was determined to be good."
Grover snorted.
"All the way into the city, I put up with Nancy Bobofit, the freckly, redheaded kleptomaniac girl, hitting my best friend Grover in the back of the head with chunks of peanut butter-and-ketchup sandwich."
Leo wrinkled his nose in disgust. He'd eaten his fair share of vile things, running away so many times and living out in the streets did that to a person, but he'd never stooped so low as to eat peanut butter-and-ketchup together, let alone on a sandwich. Judging from the equally disgusted faces around him and the camp's fair share of 'EWW's and 'Gross's, he wasn't alone.
"Grover was an easy target. He was scrawny."
"Really Percy, I wasn't that small," Leo heard Grover groan over the snickers of the description. Annabeth shot him an amused look.
"I don't know, you did seem smaller than all the other satyrs your age," Grover glared at her, telepathically telling her she wasn't helping.
"Yeah but I was bigger than Percy. If I was scrawny, he was a runt." There was a rumble of laughter around the camp that seemed to prove Grover's statement true.
He cried when he got frustrated.
Leo would have winced in sympathy for Grover, it mustn't have been easy hearing your best friend's less than flattering description of you, but he was too busy laughing along with all the other boys. Some of the girls had joined in with the laughter, including Thalia whom Leo decided had the most beautiful laugh when it wasn't directed at his expense, but most were glaring at the laughing people, going on about how 'sensitive' Grover was and how no one should judge him over it.
"Thanks a lot Percy," Leo heard Grover huff and it was hard to tide in his laughter.
"He must've been held back several grades, because he was the only sixth grader with acne and the start of a wispy beard on his chin. On top of all that, he was crippled."
"Way to put it to someone gently," Jason said, blinking his eyes in slight surprise. It would have never gone well in the Roman legions to talk to a partner in such a way. Leo just smirked at him.
"Gotta love honesty though," he stated happily, completely dismissing the half-hearted glare sent from Grover who had heard the entire conversion with what Leo assumed was super goat hearing.
"He had a note excusing him from PE for the rest of his life because he had some kind of muscular disease in his legs. He walked funny, like every step hurt him, but don't let that fool you. You should've seen him run when it was enchilada day in the cafeteria."
"Because that's not suspicious at all," the rude girl from the Ares cabin spoke up again and she looked at Grover with evident disgust, "If even Prissy noticed, it must have been bad. You need to work on your stealth goat boy." Grover harrumphed at that but otherwise said nothing. Leo took that as a sign of agreement to the statement and chuckled softly.
"Anyway, Nancy Bobofit was throwing wads of sandwich that stuck in his curly brown hair, and she knew I couldn't do anything back to her because I was already on probation."
"Why is that not surprising?" Annabeth sighed loudly as if Percy's past misdoings were causing her great sorrows now. Leo was quite the opposite; with any new hint to the trouble maker that was Percy, Leo was respecting him more and more.
"The headmaster had threatened me with death by in-school suspension-"
"Oh the horror," Thalia bemoaned sarcastically, "having to stay inside an office for a few hours instead of in a classroom," Leo looked scandalized at his love.
"You are wrong! In-school suspension is horrible! It's the worst thing in the world!" Leo shuddered to add to his point but Thalia just rolled her eyes in response.
"-if anything bad, embarrassing, or even mildly entertaining happened on this trip."
"What if it wasn't his fault?" Piper asked, picking up on the apparent injustice of the statement. Grover just shook his head.
"Even if Percy didn't do it, it would probably be blamed on him. Everyone in our class knew that he was always on thin ice. All they had to do was point a finger and Percy would be serving detention for a month, no matter what." Leo grimaced at that. He could sympathize with that, there was a lot of things that went missing in the cities and everyone was prone to throw their aspersions at the thin, battered Latin boy living on the streets.
"That's not fair," Piper stated and Grover shrugged, sending the proverbial message of 'life isn't fair' in response. Piper huffed but Leo understood. Life was a cruel mistress with a sick sense of humor and if the gods could send her to an eternal slumber (a better one then the one they put Gaea into hopefully) he would be quite thankful.
"I'm going to kill her," I mumbled. Grover tried to calm me down."
"Like that would work. Very few things calm Percy down," Thalia stated, earning a few nods from the older campers that had known Percy.
"It's okay. I like peanut butter."
"And that's not one of them," Thalia shook her head amusedly, eyeing Grover. "Really? Was that seriously the best you could do? How long had you known Percy, a year? And you honestly thought that would work?" Grover did not deem her question worthy of a response but from the seemingly pink tinge on his cheeks, Leo knew he was embarrassed at the truth.
"He dodged another piece of Nancy's lunch."
"Just let him hit her," the girl from Ares begged. Several of her siblings nodded their heads in agreement but from Grover's sheepish grin, Leo figured their wish wouldn't be granted.
"That's it." I started to get up, but Grover pulled me back to my seat."
"Eurgh, why did you stop him?" The same girl spoke, glaring at Grover. Leo silently agreed. He didn't believe in beating up on girls when they'd done nothing wrong but even he would have hit the girl to get some manners into her. Other people around the pavilion looked like they agreed.
"You're already on probation," he reminded me. "You know who'll get blamed if anything happens."
"Yeah," Piper fumed slightly, obviously not quite over the whole 'blame Percy for everything' thing, "the same kid that always did apparently," Leo slid a bit further from the muttering Piper and made a note about not pissing off Piper too much. All the heated sexual tension between her and Jason must have been addling her brains and setting her short fused anger burning bright.
"Looking back on it, I wish I'd decked Nancy Bobofit right then and there. In-school suspension would've been nothing compared to the mess I was about to get myself into."
"Oh great, that sounds really reassuring," Thalia scoffed. Apollo smiled at his little sister and made to read again but an odd look crossed his face. After a few moments of looking like he really needed to find a toilet or at least an non itchy shrub (in Leo's opinion) he stood up and closed the book, handing it back to Chiron safe-keeping.
"I apologize, dear campers, but my father Zeus requires my presence. I will come back tomorrow to continue our tale," he winked and was about to whisk himself off to where ever when Leo interrupted.
"Wait! Why can't we just continue while you are gone?" Leo was just starting to get his answers, he didn't want to be left hanging so soon. They had barely even begun and they were already stopping!
Apollo smiled amusedly at the boy. "Because I said I would read the first chapter and I will! Besides," he began as an obvious afterthought, "the book is hot off the muses, so to speak, and only a god can read it without getting heavy and crippling burns that would most likely be fatal to mortals such as yourself!" he smiled cheerfully but Leo had no doubt that he knew very well that he'd just ensured not a single camper would touch the books anytime soon.
With a heavy sigh he watched the poetic god of archery vanish of and resigned himself to another day of speculating the life of the lost hero. Maybe Annabeth would be in a better mood and let some information slip past her radar.
Sorry that it's not the complete first chapter but I'd taken a lot of time on this and I wanted to get something posted up soon. Hopefully next chapter will be the rest of the first chapter. Would also like to add the disclaimer of any foreign language phrases comes from Google Translate, so if it's horribly wrong, blame it, not me. I hope you enjoyed this and I will try to update as soon as possible.