I put pressure back into my left foot, ready to leap at the man, the others had stiffened at what he said but I did not see why the others would react like they did, it was obviously just a death threat, it's not like we haven't had those before. They know my father is dead. So why on Earth would they react like they just did?
No matter, there are other times to ask them about it. But for now, I need to focus on the most important matter-and that was to brutally murder the man in front of me. I was thinking more like the gun to the forehead type of way, like he did with my father, but the idea of cutting him up into little bits seemed tempting just as much.
The man stepped forward just as something came up behind him-it was a man who wrapped his hand around the guys mouth and twisted his neck enough for me to hear the snap of the neck. The man threw the guy to the ground and I relaxed slightly as I saw Annabeth and Hazel coming into view. Whoever the guy was, he was a good guy.
As the man came more into the light, I saw the man had a big muscular build, and had greying brown hair and dark green eyes. Though I took notice of Jason's and Leo's quick intake of breath, I had tightened my grip on my sword, ready to leap and maul the man to death. I knew him, of course I did, but why he is helping us, I do not know. Suddenly Annabeth was by my side, placing her hand on my wrist, as if silently begging me not to attack him. Though how she would know I would, I would not know, perhaps he's mentioned something to her to give her a reason to think I would attack him. That's probably it.
The man looked at me, with slight anger in his dark eyes, and Jason stepped forward, not taking any notice of our little meeting. "M-Mr. Mclean! I didn't realise you'd be visiting us anytime soon." He said with a quick glance at Hazel and Annabeth, Annabeth had been keeping her eyes on me so she took no notice of this, but I doubt she didn't see it but Hazel looked away guiltily. But what brought my attention was his name, Mclean, Piper's father. But it can't be true, could it? I never thought it could be possible.
"Well my daughter's death was something important, was it not? Especially if he's here." He said jerking his chin towards me and I stiffened, locking my jaws together, slightly angry at the man in front of me, I did nothing to him and he treats me like dirt. Ok I sound like a hypocrite there but at least I had a reason to do it. Annabeth moved her hand to my bicep holding me tighter, already feeling that was I about to push her away and stab the man in the chest. Not like I wasn't going to.
"You know Will?" Percy butted in and Mr. Mclean looked at me frowning.
"I...met him briefly."
"Met? You barely said two words to me!" I snorted and he glared at me. "Look, I'm sorry for your loss and everything-I really am. But I intend to not go speaking to the people who caused me pain in the past, and you, unfortunately, was one of them. So either you leave us alone, or I'll be the one leaving."
The others widened their eyes at me and Hazel opened her mouth to speak but Mr. Mclean beat her to it. "Just like your father. Always looking for revenge on the people around you or running away from it. And when something does come up you can't run away from, you always switch it around against the other person. You Mr. Cliff are a selfish, arrogant, cowardly bastard."
I shook Annabeth off stepping forward. "Do not insult my father. Insult me all you want, but don't bring my father into this! He was a good man!" I said through clenched teeth and the others looked away and Mr. Mclean raised an eyebrow at me then looked at the others and burst out laughing and I opened my mouth slightly surprised by this but this quickly formed into me clenching my teeth.
"This just proves you never knew what kind of man your father was, look back onto your life with him, how did he raise you? What childhood did you have? That's right, you had no childhood!" Mr. Mclean said jabbing my chest with his index finger; suddenly Percy was stepping in between the two of us.
"That's enough, Mr. Mclean." He said through clenched teeth and suddenly the surroundings seemed to bend as I stared at the man in front of me and people stumbled as if the world was spinning around in circles.
"Like you were there watching, you might have known my father once, but he changed, he was no coward." I snarled as the sky began to burn out and Annabeth was suddenly at my side-again- whispering for me to calm down as everyone realized that the mortals in the crowd couldn't see what was happening and that the metal towers holding the lights up were crashing down and the sky began to turn black, as if it was night.
"Losing your temper, Mr. Cliff? Look around you, boy, this is what your father did to you, your father made you a weapon, he made you a pawn, didn't he-."
"Enough!" I roared as the world disappeared and was replaced by a black landscape and I was already shaking in anger, the other people clenched their fists as they gazed at their new surroundings and Annabeth's grip loosened, unsure of what to make of this. "Enough, what do you gain by this?"
But it was then that Mr. Mclean went quiet as a small boy ran past the group. I stiffened, recognizing the boy as no other but myself, the others easily caught on as they had seen me in the photograph. The dark surroundings vanished eventually to show a dark warehouse, the only light in the room was blocked by tall cardboard boxes and the younger me was crouching at the bottom, craning his neck to listen to something. Probably a conversation.
"Oi, Will, this ever happen to you?" Leo whispered to me and I fell silent as I thought back, with the appearance of Mr. Mclean, this could only be one memory. My one memory of the man himself, the conversation? The one I overheard of him and another man speaking of me.
Sure enough, when we looked past the boxes we saw a younger version of Mr. Mclean speaking with a tall man, with dark brown hair and small stubble, nearly onto the verge of being a beard, the man was tall, easily towering over Mr. Mclean. The others glanced at our Mr. Mclean who looked away slightly.
"We have to find the boy and kill him!" The younger version pressed and it was obvious they were talking about me. "If not…who knows what would happen to the mortal world…or Piper." He added on as an afterthought but still the tall man looked hesitant. "You heard the fates! 'The daughter of Aphrodite will die by the son of the Void,' we both know who the children are…and I can't let that happen to my little girl…the boy must die."
Annabeth had tensed up and was already giving Tristan the evil eye-though she hasn't seen what he did-but I guessed that she didn't need to see the actual part of following out his threat to hate the man…just for threatening me. I brushed it off and rolled my shoulders, not liking the event that is about to play.
As if on cue, the younger version of myself finally got the note that they were talking about him, and being as ADHD as I was, I managed to make all the boxes topple over when I had begun to freak out. That got their attention.
I felt my hands close into fists as I watched the scene play out, this brought it all back. Being captured, hearing them talk about my life right in front of me. I hated it. And that man is Piper's father. I felt disgust churn in my stomach and Annabeth looked away as the tall man injected a fluid into my neck, knocking me out instantly.
The scene blurred and cleared to show a ship, an iron ship filled with kids, around the age of ten to fifteen, and every single one of them was burly, except Will. They were all sold to the ship as slaves and they had set off to be sold in a market-or that's what Will guessed anyway. The captors never said anything to them about their fate, Tristan and the man had left him with them, hoping that they would get Will out of the country and starve to death because it was obvious enough that the other kids would beat me to death.
Days passed and the others continued to watch me being beaten by kids, have my food stolen every single day and I began to get bad anorexia, I got seasick every day and was always throwing up over the side of the ship when the others weren't picking on me. After a couple of months a huge storm came by, toppling the ship into the sea and I was washed up on Camp Half-blood's beach, with Chiron and Annabeth looking over me surprised.
Suddenly everything snapped back to the stadium and I fell forward exhausted and Frank jolted forward holding me up. There was a minute of silence with everyone just looking at Tristan Mclean who looked away frowning.
"I admit…that the day I sold you to the slaves was not my best choice." He said with a shrug but it did not stop Percy from taking out riptide and leaping at Piper's father, ready to kill the man who sold me to be a slave.