Hey everyone. As I already said on Knowing Leo, things haven't been so great for me lately, but I'm back in business now and I'm sorry for how long it has taken me to continue writing. I hope you all enjoy the story, and thank you for your continued support of my writing. A quick warning, this chapter will include violence and memories of child abuse. Italics signal a memory.
Madwamoose: Thank you for being so understanding And I don't know why, but I'm naturally inclined to end chapters on cliff-hangers, I guess I'm just naturally sadistic.
Skyfir3S4kur4: I ended it there because I am a cruel and unusual person. I am sorry for how long it took me to update though.
Elephantlover123: I thought it was fun to have a theme that matched the time of year, though I guess it's a little off now. I'm glad to hear that the twist worked, it came to me as I was thinking up ideas for Teresa and Cormac that their hatred of Leo could make a relationship between them interesting.
Melancholy's Sunshine: I wonder sometimes how any of Nemesis's kids could function at camp with the amount of unavenged bad things that happen to the demigods. I do think that everyone in camp (especially Jadon) would enjoy poking those two with sticks, I certainly would and I created them! And was that a nice Undertale reference there, because Megalovania would definitely be playing in that situation.
Alvin6299: Thank you so much for your patience. I hated making you all wait for me to update again, but life is unpredictable. And for your second review, the demigods will not be happy if anyone harms Leo, there will definitely be Hades to pay. I hope that it's still worth waiting for.
Guest: Thank you
SunlessShipper: Because making Leo suffer then resolving his issues makes me happy.
Mondmaedchen: He does indeed need their help ;)
A23: I'm delighted that you enjoyed it so much, to hear that my update made your day gives me an amazing feeling (and that you appreciate the Halloween theme). Though I owe you an apology as I took so long to update again.
Guest: It took a while, but life did start getting better so I'm able to write again! Thank you for saying that I have talent, I love writing so it's nice to hear that people actually think that I'm good at it.
Hi: Hello! That's why Leo is my favourite character as well, he has hidden depths that a lot of people dismiss, but I loved him from the start. I knew from the beginning that there was more to him than meets the eye.
Sidda: Please don't kill me, even if I am evil for taking so long to update. I think Harley and Joker are some of DCs best villains, though I love Deathstroke for the Dick Grayson angst he causes. Sebastian is awesome two, my second fave. And I'm glad that you made a good friend Life was hard but I kicked it in the gut and now I'm back to write.
FuzzyElf24: You're very welcome! And I'm sorry for the wait.
Dawnbreak55: It took me a while, but I'm continuing it now. Jason has to decide what to do right now.
Childofdeath2: I hope that you didn't die due to the wait. Stay with us, updates are happening again!
Guest: I'll take that as 'what do you think you're doing leaving the story there?!' what. To answer, I was being evil
Guest: I am, and I will never give up on my stories.
Guest: What a polite review, of course I don't mind writing more! Thank you for wanting me to. And I believe it counts as a cliffhanger as everyone else thinks I'm evil for it.
Weeziewoo: My good sir, it's always nice to welcome a member of the undead to the party, did you take the Physician's cure too? And as it took me so long to update I guess you must have flipped. I must know, was it a front or back flip?
Ninjacook123: Please don't feel obligated to review, I love reading them all, but don't inconvenience yourself. Thanks for asking about how I am, things are a lot better now. Teresa and Cormac will definitely be punished for their actions.
'Mcshizzle: You may have to get your heart checked out if it's clenching ;) Here is the conclusion to the Teresa/Cormac section of the story. I apologise for the wait.
Guest: Please tell your first half not to cry, Leo will be fine… or will he? Mwah hah hah. To the second half, no promises.
Puppy 17: I guess you could say it was fate.
YolkyGoblin: Your magical energy is greatly appreciated, though it took a while to reach me, and I'm able to write again now!
Oliviadbell: I'm updating now, but I am sorry for the time it has taken me.
Irene2005: Thank you, both for saying that you like the story and for the compliment. I'm definitely going to continue; I love the story too much to give it up.
Flaming eyeball: Glad to see another Ao no exorcist lover. Can I guess from your icon that you are a Rin fan? My faves are Yukio and Shima though both are being problematic right now…
Smurf: I may do another follow up chapter for that segment (like I did for Jadon). Thanks for bringing it up, I had forgotten that the nightmare was never really discussed.
Disclaimer: If wishes were horses then beggars would ride. But, alas, wishes are not horses and I do not own Percy Jackson. On a side note, I don't ride either.
Leo's P.O.V
Leo's friends had called him brave many times, and a few of those times he had even felt it. One of those moments was when he had allowed himself to be killed for the greater good. Sure, he'd had the Physician's cure handy, but his plan was still shaky so he had permitted himself to be called brave for what he had done. After his first quest, Piper and Jason had both called him courageous, and after the whole… debacle with Hera showing off his deepest darkest secrets all of his friends had agreed that he was a strong person.
Leo wasn't feeling brave, strong or courageous right now. His animal namesake may be praised throughout the world for being a symbol of valour, but Leo wasn't really getting into the Gryffindor spirit right now.
Helpless tears dripped from his chin. No matter how hard he tried to choke them back, they just kept coming, and obviously neither of his hands were free to wipe them.
His captors weren't exactly stepping forwards to dry his eyes either. Another whimper was torn from his throat as a new red line formed on his chest.
Teresa wasn't even using a knife to cut into him. In her hand was a sharp black heeled shoe. The crazy bruja used to just stomp on him in her heels, but now that she had him tied up her twisted creativity was running wild.
The point was digging into his shoulder, a drop of blood oozing up from where it pricked his skin as she loomed over him, wine glass in hand. Face impassive, the red liquid was tipped over him.
'Now look at the mess you've made?'
He was snapped out of the memory by the reappearance of Cormac. The ex-police officer had gone to make a cup of coffee, as if this was all completely normal, as if he didn't have a teenager tied up in his living room whilst his wife drew insults on him with a heel.
Because degrading comments were appearing on his tanned chest, the red blood streaking across his stomach. Liar spread across his collarbone, stupid was sprawled diagonally across his front and she was just starting to mark brat over his hip when she was handed the tea by her husband.
Teresa stood up, temporarily dropping her heel in favour of taking a sip of tea.
Leo had panicked when the armour that made up his costume had been yanked off and the black top worn under it was tugged up. Now he knew that he was right to worry. None of the cuts were deep, to be honest they barely drew blood, but the shame he felt at seeing the hurtful words on his skin made him feel sick.
It didn't help his nausea to see Cormac take his wife's place as she danced back to the kitchen. The woman had always been loopy, but now she was completely unhinged. Cormac was sane. An asshole, but a sane one, and an ex man of the law to boot. He'd never been a good policeman, but surely even he should see that this was going too far. A quick beating was his usual tactic, not an actual kidnapping.
Evidently the man's morality had declined even more after meeting Teresa as a fist found its way into his stomach, catching the slashes that formed the word stupid and causing more blood to spill.
The tall man raised his fist to Leo's face. Traces of blood marked his knuckles.
"You don't know how many times I've wanted to punch you, the little orphan runaway extraordinaire. Sure, I got a few jabs in every now and again, but not nearly enough to make up for all the reprimands from my boss for letting you get away. Did you know that I always wanted to be a police officer when I was younger? It was my dream job." Leo frowned.
"If it was such a dream job, why did you quit? Did it occur to you that your real dream was to find a wife even crazier than you so that you could audition to be in a DC movie as Gotham's most Arkham worthy couple?" It seemed like Leo did have some bravery left. Though this could have possibly been classified as stupidity instead as Leo was once again backhanded.
"I told Teresa that I had quit but that wasn't exactly true. You got me fired. Even though I had finally caught you like the rat that you are, you still ruined my life. Someone suspected that I had hurt you. There was no evidence, but the higher ups found a ridiculous excuse and discharged me!"
"Gee, I wish that I could say that I'm sorry, but I feel like I should be getting a medal for public services right now. Surely the streets are safer without you patrolling them." Cormac's eyes darkened.
"It was my dream!"
"Well, sometimes dreams aren't meant to be followed. Unless you dream about jumping off of a bridge, in which case I fully support…" Wow, it was really hard to complete a witty remark when a hand was entangling itself in your hair and slamming your head into the back of an oak chair.
"I bet you used to dream of getting your mommy back, so I guess you destroyed your own dreams as well. After all, you must have been the one who set the blaze." Leo stiffened. That had hit too close to home. Way too close to home. Cormac obviously sensed the weakness, sniffing it out like as shark in bloody water.
"Of course, there was no real evidence for that either, but it's the most logical conclusion, isn't it?" Green eyes focussed on Leo's flexing hands.
"That demon murdered my sister!"
"You're a murderer." Teresa remarked as she entered the living room. The son of Hephaestus was shaking. It wasn't true. His friends had told him that it wasn't his fault.
"We may have hurt you, brat, but neither of us has ever killed somebody." Cormac pressed the point. Leo tried to withdraw into himself, but his restraints prevented him.
"Your own mother to boot!" Teresa laughed out, mirth radiating from her psychotic blue eyes.
"I DIDN'T DO IT!" Exploded Leo, rage filling him. His fire licked at his insides, begging to be set free, to burn the ropes around him. But he couldn't do it. What if he lost control? His anger could overwhelm him. The gruesome twosome wouldn't kill him, only bang him up. He could take that. He'd taken worse. There was no need to risk burning them. Like he had burnt his mo… Leo violently shook his head.
"It was an accident." He murmured, more to himself than to the adults. All of a sudden, a dish towel was shoved into his mouth and tied around the back of his head.
"No more lies." Teresa hissed.
"Liars don't get to eat. Liars get to stay quietly locked away."
Shuddering, Leo attempted to stop himself from falling down the rabbit hole that was his memories. Not that the present day was much better, with two of the cruellest people he had ever met staring down at him.
He wanted to scream at them to pudrete en el infierno (rot in hell). To use sarcasm and jokes as a way of showing them that they didn't scare him.
He couldn't. A new wave of helplessness washed over him. It was as if he was a child all over again, left at the mercy of adults who wanted to hurt him, with no one to be his saviour.
Why hadn't Jason found him yet?
Jason's P.O.V
The son of Jupiter stared at the white helmet and blue lying on the sidewalk. It was hard to miss, even in the dark.
Leo was in trouble.
There was no way that he would not be able to see the missing part of his costume, and all jokes about his attention span aside, Jason knew that Leo would never just ditch his little brother for twenty minutes. He also hoped that they had reached a point where Leo wouldn't ditch him for such a concerning length of time without an explanation.
Add in the fact that they were meant to be trick or treating which was something that Leo had clearly been enjoying earlier and there was just no fathomable reason why Leo could have been distracted.
Harley tugged his hand.
"Leo needs our help, doesn't he?" The young boy was clearly trying to keep a brave face, and as he had seen plenty of his siblings fighting dangerous battles he was doing an admirable job, but the tremble of his lower lip gave away his worry.
"It looks like it." Jason was torn. He desperately wanted to start the search for Leo immediately, but he'd promised Leo that he'd look after Harley, and that meant taking the boy back to the meeting spot so that they could bring him back to camp.
Either way, the others would have to be informed. He hated spoiling their night as well, but Leo's safety was far more important than letting them stay in a party mood.
"Harley, I'm going to Iris message the camp and let the others know what's happened. We'll decide what to do when they get here, okay?" Harley nodded forlornly and sat down on Leo's helmet. Instinct from being around Leo caused Jason to lean forwards and rustle the boy's hair which was sticking up like he'd received a shock due to him tugging his lion hood off earlier.
"We'll find him." The young boy's sad eyes locked onto his.
"But will he be okay when we do?"
Percy's P.O.V
Preparation for the party had ended a short while ago, and now everyone was waiting for the campers who had gone trick or treating to return in order to get the party started.
Percy smiled as he recalled how excited everyone had been. Apparently even Jason had gone with Leo to knock on doors for candy. The son of Poseidon was glad to hear that Jason was going with Leo, the other boy sometimes needed to just loosen up, and dealing with Leo and his little brother on a sugar rush would probably do the trick.
Speaking of the Latino boy, he was the reason why Percy had been forced into spraying part of his hair white for the night. The younger demigod had been so enthusiastic about the group costume that Percy had agreed be the black paladin, but he had hoped that he would be allowed to wiggle out of the white hair part. Yet Leo had been adamant, and when Percy had realised that Piper, Frank and even Annabeth had been persuaded into joining in as well, Percy had relented.
It was also nice to see the truly happy smile on Leo's face. All of the seven had been more attuned to Leo's emotional state after the boy had miraculously returned from the dead. For a while after crashing back into camp, the younger boy's smiles had held a haunted quality that Halloween had ironically chased away.
Percy was currently making his way over to the Hades cabin where the gang (plus Nico and Will, minus Leo and Jason) were gathering before the party. Somehow, Will had convinced Nico to dress up as a devil and the son of Apollo was going to be an angel.
Percy was looking forwards asking just how the healer had managed this feat.
The door of the cabin loomed before him, and he pushed his way in with a big smile.
"Hey!" He greeted cheerfully, only to pause when he noticed the strange atmosphere in the room. Frank, who had been partway to his feet, collapsed back down to the ground.
"I guess that saves me going to hurry you up." Every face in the room was sombre, though in a different way. Annabeth, Piper and Nico were all a variation of angry, Will looked shocked, Hazel tearful and Frank deeply troubled.
Flickering in the middle of the circle that they had formed on the cabin floor was an Iris message from Jason.
The son of Jupiter seemed to be displaying a mixture of all of the other's reactions. Behind him, sitting on a white and blue helmet that matched the white and black one under Percy's own arm was Harley, kicking at the ground with two bags of Halloween candy abandoned beside him.
The son of Poseidon instantly spotted who was missing from this scene.
"What's happened to Leo?" The helmet left on the ground was a clear indicator that something was up.
"We don't know. He dropped his helmet, and we split up for a few minutes so that he could double back and grab it. We waited for a bit, but after a while it was obvious that something was wrong so we came to look for him. We found the helmet out in the open, no sign of Leo."
This deeply unsettled Percy.
"Nothing that would point to Leo running?" Little Harley rocketed to his feet, a look of indignant rage twisting his features.
"Leo would never run away and leave us behind! He promised. He promised Nyssa and Jake that he wouldn't shirk his duties as counsellor of Cabin nine." Hastily, Percy raised his hands in an attempt to stave of the incoming fit of tears.
"I didn't mean that. I trust Leo to stay with us even when things get tough. That didn't come across how I wanted it to at all. I meant, did it look like Leo had ran to draw a monster away from the residential area?" Harley's cheeks coloured and he sank back down onto the helmet, looking away.
"There was nothing that I could find Perce." Jason's voice was fraught with worry.
"Okay, I'll shadow travel us over to where you are if you can describe it to me." Quickly, Jason summarised his location, and Percy decided it was his turn to step in.
"Alright, when we get there, one of us will take Harley to the drop off point and the rest of us will start searching for Leo."
"No." The single word was uttered with a complete confidence that the speaker would get what he wished. Percy stared at Harley in disbelief.
"I'm going to help bring Leo back." The son of Jupiter turned towards the young boy.
"Harley, Leo wanted me to keep you safe. We don't know what happened to him, there could be monsters attacking him and I don't want you in danger. I don't think that Leo would want you to be either." Harley stared back at Jason coolly, arms folded across his chest. An unexpected maturity radiated from the boy's stance.
"I'm a demigod, my life is always in danger. And a lot of you demigods seem to forget that I was there during the war too. We all fought together." All of the older demigods observed the younger boy in a new light. It was true that everyone had done their part during the previous battles, no matter how young they were.
"Also, I've got a way to track Leo."
"WHAT!" All of the group yelled as Harley smugly gazed at them.
"Why didn't you mention this to me earlier?" Jason's voice was part exasperated, part hopeful.
"I forgot." Harley had the good grace to look embarrassed about forgetting something so important, but his forgetfulness wasn't important right now.
"Did you build a tracking device for him or something?" Annabeth interjected. The little son of Hephaestus nodded sheepishly.
"It was when he was… dead. I always thought that he was still out there. I never got to complete it before he came back, but Nyssa found it afterwards and helped me complete it. She said that it was a good contribution to keeping our cabin sane. It should be with either her or Jake right now." Percy was divided between being impressed at Cabin nine's foresight, and disappointed that he hadn't thought to request a tracker for the trouble-magnet himself.
Will and Piper rose from their sitting positions, stating that they knew where Nyssa and Jake where respectively before sprinting off to ask for the tracker.
The others took a collective deep breath.
"You'll let me help now, won't you?" Harley's voice wavered, some of the confidence from earlier draining out of him at the realisation that Nyssa and/or Jake was going to be brought in because they would both understand that Leo would be in trouble if people were asking for the tracker.
"I don't think that we could stop you. However, if there are monster problems, I want you to stay back as much as possible. Leo would never forgive me for letting you get injured." Harley seemed to agree to this condition.
"Shouldn't you alert the other trick or treaters that your trio won't be making it back to the bus in time?" Hazel spoke up for the first time and Jason appeared to realise that it was coming awfully close to the designated meeting time.
"Okay, I'll call them now, See you all soon." The Iris message disintegrated, leaving the cabin silent.
Percy hated sitting in such an oppressive atmosphere, but he couldn't think of a way to lighten the mood. Leo was the team's little brother, alongside Nico, and they were all admittedly overprotective of him in some ways.
He recalled the numerous times that they had promised that anybody who hurt Leo would answer to them.
The water wielding demigod was willing to stick to this promise.
All of a sudden, the door was flung open and Piper and Will tumbled in, with Nyssa and Jake followed them with fire in their eyes.
Nyssa was clutching a strange contraption that could only be the Leo tracker. Jake moved forwards.
"Let's go get our little brother back."
I really hope you enjoyed this chapter. I know that some people may have preferred it if only the seven went to find Leo, but I think that he'll need all the moral support that he can get when they find him. See you next time.
