Clouds circled the sky; the evening gloomy.
The air was still; it's light moisture creating beads of sweat on Alabaster's forehead as he trudged along, walking the empty street.
Not a single soul could be seen.
A weird day; an absence of everything. Light, people, even the wind.
The demigod had the feeling that something was wrong. A feeling that had been plaguing him for a while now.
He just couldn't place what was.
What was he doing out?
Some movement gathered his attention.
He approached the boardwalk, where he assumed it he saw it.
There was nobody around; no sign of life like the rest of the desolate city. Wasn't there?
He could see light ripples forming on the river's surface. Barely noticeable even from right next to it.
They shouldn't be catching his attention from the distance.
The ripples become more apparent, and he could even hear the water being displaced underneath.
His hand found the hilt on his hip in case of mischief.
A figure seemed to be coming out of it.
No one could stay in the water for long.
Unless…
Percy Jackson!
Alabaster pulled out the sword from his sheath. The charm on his hilt glowed a bright red kappa.
A head came out of the water; golden blonde hair sticking down on the side.
Alabaster frowned.
Percy Jackson had jet black hair.
But looking closely, there was a sense of familiarity with the young teen emerging from the water.
The boy grabbed onto the boardwalk and swiftly sat up on the wood.
"Maurice?" Alabaster asked, shocked. He returned the sword into its sheath.
"Alabaster?" the boy asked "I'm so glad you're the one I saw first, bro."
Alabaster's lip quivered. He did his best to hold in the tears threatening to flow out of his eyes.
The last he'd seen Maurice was in the battle of Manhattan, when Percy slammed him into the Hudson. Alabaster was filled with so much rage when he saw this with his own eyes.
It was such a relief to see him, no questions arose in the demigod's mind. He immediately wrapped his arms around his newly recovered brother.
"It's so good to see you again, Maurice."
"Same here, bro," came the answer as Maurice hugged him back.
The two sat down on the boardwalk, letting their dangle by the water as Alabaster caught him up to the latest events up to their loss against the Olympians. Even Alabaster didn't remember what he'd said.
"Percy Jackson is lauded like a hero; someone who can do no wrong," Alabaster said, "but we all know he isn't. He's a fraud. A murderer. He killed so many people in cold blood," Alabaster choked, "he killed you."
"Did he, Alabaster?" Maurice replied nonchalantly.
Alabaster looked at Maurice in disbelief. "Are you really asking me this? He almost killed you. He tried to kill you. Just because you didn't die doesn't excuse his attempts."
"No," the reply came swiftly, as calm as ever. "The question is: did he kill me?"
Now the older teen found himself dumbfounded. A chill went down Alabaster's spine.
What is he getting at?
Maurice dipped his head, watching as his foot swung left and right, lightly striking the surface of water.
"Remember Alabaster," Maurice's voice grew raspy, "wasn't it you who asked me to join Kronos?"
"Yeah?"
"Why did you, brother?"
Alabaster hesitated. Why is he being weird? "B-because we needed to overthrow the Olympians, Maurice. To end their unjust rule."
"Be honest here with me here, Alabaster. That wasn't the real reason. Both of us know it"
Alabaster's left eye twitched. He knew what Maurice meant. The demigod sighed, giving in. "I wanted to do it for mo - Hecate. We wanted to restore her honour on Olympus."
Maurice chuckled. "Don't say 'we'," he sounded smug; so unlike the brother he knew. "Say 'you' wanted to 'honour'. It was you who wanted us to join. It was you who expected us to side fight. It was because of you that I died, Alabaster."
"W-What?" Alabaster sputtered indignantly.
"Our mother's honour has finally been restored. That's what we wanted, right?"
"No," Alabaster seethed.
"Did we not?" Maurice asked assertively.
"She abandoned us," Alabaster defended himself. "She took pity from Percy Jackson! She forgot that he killed many of us. That's not 'honour'. That is accepting defeat."
"So this is about your pride?"
Alabaster's blood began to boil. "What's gotten into your head, Maurice?"
Maurice laughed, in a voice too rich to belong to the teenager. He pulled his head up from the water and looked Alabaster straight in the eyes.
Alabaster gasped.
The eyes were orange, with dark vertical slits for pupils.
Lamia's eyes.
Alabaster's expression turned into a snarl. A monster's illusion. Playing games with me now.
You'll pay.
Alabaster unsheathed his sword in a blur and struck the impostor playing his brother.
The body didn't disintegrate like he'd expected. It went limp; no blood pooling over or even the sign of a gash.
But life left it behind as it dropped to the floor.
Alabaster couldn't look away. The eyes weren't orange any longer. They were brown. The same as Maurice's. But lifeless.
Alabaster's eyes went wide; emotions threatened to overtake him.
What is…
"What did you do Alabaster?" a female voice cried out. One Alabaster recognised.
He turned his head to see what was a fifteen year-old girl with pale blue eyes and raven hair with green streaks. Lou Ellen Blackstone; his only sibling still alive. She looked at him in betrayal and anger, tears freely coming out from her.
"This wasn't- that wasn't Maurice," he defended himself. "An impostor. A monster."
"You killed Maurice!" she shouted.
"I - I didn't," Alabaster could barely speak out. "It was going to kill me. I… I defended myself from an attacker."
"How could you kill your own brother?" Lou continued, not taking his pleas into account.
"Sis, please…"
"You're no brother of mine," Lou's voice broke, "I hate you!"
"No, Lou, please, listen to me!"
Paying him no heed, Lou sprinted back; soon out of Alabaster's sight. The tears on the floor were the only indication left of her earlier presence.
The demigod was devastated; he'd lost a brother and a sister on the same day.
He collapsed to his knees. A lone tear trickled down his pale face, slowly and steadily.
The world around him swirled round and round.
He wanted to die.
Maybe he wasn't meant to be alive.
He should have died that day. The day of the battle. He wasn't built to deal with the failure.
His ears reacted to something. His attention returned to the present.
It was loud. Noisy.
Alabaster looked about. Monsters. Hellhounds. Empousai. Dracanae… so many of them.
There were demigods too. All of them getting hunted by the monsters, one by one.
He couldn't move his feet or his hands by his own volition. Alabaster shook with fear at all the ungodly sights.
A distant hurricane moved closer to his position. It lifted from the ground up, and made its way to the son of Hecate.
The hurricane dissipated, leaving a familiar sight in front of him.
Percy Jackson, the son of Poseidon.
But it wasn't just him. The eyes were orange, like Maurice's. Like Lamia's.
"You wish to die Alabaster," he asked coldly. "I can arrange that for you. Just like I did for Maurice. And Kyle. And Lily," a smug smirk appeared on the hero's face, "Enjoy the Fields of Punishment with them. You all deserve it."
Alabaster didn't see the sword that stabbed him through the heart. His eyelids clenched tightly.
And they opened to the ceiling of his current home.
The son of Hecate didn't leave the house again. He hadn't dared to spend a minute without his sword close by and the protections he'd surrounded himself with.
Lamia had done it. She'd instilled paranoia in him.
He would find a way to get rid of her. Permanently.
How she came back every night was a mystery to him. The first step was to figure out the nature of her return from disintegration. There had to be something he was doing wrong.
He'd prepared his charms by chanting the spells throughout the day. Maybe some extra power behind the soul would kill her for longer. He planned for every possible contingency, though he didn't know what Lamia could do. Or even wanted to do.
As Artemis took the reins from Apollo, Alabaster awaited the sorceress for another encounter. He was positive she would come back.
As he had predicted, Lamia entered the house again. The kappa charm on his sword glowed a bright red.
"Hello again, Alabaster," she hissed pleasantly, "I see you were expecting me. Quite flattering to see all the preparations you have made for me," she said, gesturing to the walls of the room which he'd filled with power.
"Hello to you as well, monster."
The sorceress pouted her dark purple lips. "You still refuse to acknowledge our relation, brother."
"Yes," Alabaster replied through clenched teeth, "Your games wouldn't work on me."
She laughed. Was she younger than before? "What games, dear brother?" she asked, feigning innocence.
Alabaster's nose flared in anger. "Your dreams don't affect me, Lamia. The attempts are useless."
Lamia's head tilted to one side, cocking an elegant eyebrow at him. "I beg your pardon. What dreams?"
She truly seemed to have no idea. This made Alabaster even angrier, "Doesn't matter," he menacingly wagged his sword in her general direction, "now tell me. What do you want? You show up here every night. Why?"
Lamia smirked, "How little you understand, dear brother," she said as she licked her lips. She looked at her hand, stretching it out as the silvery nails elongated. Alabaster mentally noted to be wary.
"But regardless-ss of all that," she continued, "let's get this over with."
In one swift action she lunged at Alabaster with her newly elongated nails. The demigod evaded the attack by jumping back. He slashed.
Lamia defended with her nails, which now seemed like silver claws. She let out a hiss at the contact. The two parried attacks back and forth. Alabaster tried slicing the nails, but there was no effect. The charm glowed brighter at each hit.
"Why even resist, Alabaster?" she asked with humour, "You know I'm going to be back tomorrow. How long can you last?"
The sorceress maintained eye contact with his dark green ones.
"Not until you tell me what you want," Alabaster snarked. He slashed once more, the strike managing to deflect her hand away.
"Hmm… I'm not in a rush," she cackled, "I have all the time in the world to tell you what I want, brother."
"Well, you won't have the chance today," Alabaster replied coldly.
He stepped back a bit, keeping a distance from the snake-lady.
"Big wordss, for someone so cowardly," she hissed.
"Hmph." Alabaster pointed his sword towards his opponent. The kappa charm emitted a red glow that was too bright; almost blinding. It sent a blast of fire towards the woman.
Lamia was knocked back, smashing into the wall. She chuckled as she recovered her bearings.
"Look at that. Not wanting to play fair against me?"
"I just want you gone. And never see you again."
She laughed again, mockingly and making Alabaster feel useless, weak and pathetic.
In his rage, he sent another blast. Slight murmuring could be heard from under his breath. Yet another blast.
Lamia didn't attempt resistance; only choosing to smile at him. "I'll see you tomorrow, Alabaster," she stated with certainty while her body turned into specks of sulphur dust before his eyes.
Alabaster suddenly felt like an earthquake hit him. His grip on the sword weakened to the extent that he let go of it. It clattered to the floor.
His knees also gave way again.
I'm not that weak, am I?
He needed to find a way to prevent her from coming back. There had to be a way.
Alabaster checked his backpack. He always had a few books on hand for better spells. He needed a solution to kill her permanently.
But Alabaster lacked a lot of information. Most important being how Lamia could return so frequently. A powerful monster like her couldn't regenerate every day, and definitely would not look so dangerous every time like she did.
And that made searching for the correct spell a bit tricky.
He needed to hit the books again.
Percy Jackson's eternal torture could wait. Right now, his focus was on his darling sister.
He inverted the backpack in the air, and let everything drop to the floor. Canned foods, a cell phone, a water bottle, and a few books flew out. He sorted them through.
Something caught his eye. Something… unfamiliar. He glanced at a book of medium thickness with a black hardcover.
Death by Dr. Howard Claymore.
Alabaster's brow furrowed. He couldn't remember reading this one. He picked it up, and rifled through the contents.
It was… interesting. Certainly useful, if Alabaster could think into it.
He checked the book from the start. There was a page dedicated to detailing ways to contact the professor. A phone number.
"Let's see…" Alabaster mused as he typed in the numbers on his phone. …Three, Five, Eight; there we go…
Ring… Ring…
Hope you enjoyed the chapter. As always, please review.