WITHIN the first few moments after impact was made, it was if Pontus himself had awoken and decided to reclaim Ogygia for the sea. Towering waves surrounded the island, as the wine-dark sea unleashed Hades on her isle. Calypso was glad she was not yet to the shoreline and instead a minute or two away, as the sea surrounding her slowly, much to her horror, reclaimed the shoreline. Reaching out, she hurriedly tried to calm the waters, but it proved to be futile. In fact, if possible, her attempt at intervention had exacerbated the issue tenfold.
Multiple waves quickly began crashing into one another to form even larger ones, the larger ones following suit and colliding with others to become taller than she. Calypso feared for her life, for perhaps the gods had found her existence no longer worth the entertainment they received upon her curse activating.
Is this how I fade? The heavens collapsing as the sea reclaims my home? For my curse to end by my own death and to be forgotten?
Pontus raised his arms, and the wine-dark sea listened as a monstrous wave began to build. Calypso could almost envision the wave wrapping around the island completely, raising to the titanic height that the immortals wore during the Titanomachy, before drowning her isle whole. Instead, the towering wave began speeding towards Ogygia with an alarming power, beset with foaming tendrils, reaching outwards like the hands of desperate and hungry beggars. The gigantic wave drove itself against the shoreline of Ogygia behind Calypso, near one of the cliff faces. Ogygia shook with the force of the wave, sending tremors through the ground. Birds cried out in the distance as their homes were violated by the once calm sea.
Calypso turned hastily in worry as the island was slowly drowned. Another, even larger wave was present above the already cacophonous sea, a high point so far above the jagged waves. The rate at which it grew made Calypso far too aware of its current pace, with just how little time she had before her apparent reckoning. Suddenly, another explosion went off behind Calypso, in the direction she was originally running to. She jerked her head to look back, and with it turned her body around to run back to western Ogygia. Another geyser was present in the sky, spewing forth a great amount of water continuously, as if the sea were signaling a waypoint for Calypso telling her where to go.
She saw no reason to not listen.
Resuming her charge, Calypso reached out to the sea to gain an idea of whatever the sea was feeling. Immediately after doing so, the sea suddenly began to exhibit a new emotion: anguish and sorrow. She felt the currents in the water surrounding the ocean rushing towards the location of impact, carrying with them hundreds of pithoi worth of water. As the currents raged, it felt as though it brought with it all the anger the surface had. Calypso could feel the surface calm, quickly, and before Calypso knew it, the water was silent to her, bar for the currents raging underneath. It felt to Calypso as if the sea was mourning for something deep beneath its waves — or perhaps it was mourning for someone.
Almost two minutes had passed before Calypso was finally able to reach the shoreline from her cave, and in that time the water had completely calmed down. However, where before the sea that surrounded her fair isle was calm with tiny rolling waves lapping gently at the shore, now that same very sea was placid. Surrounding Ogygia was no longer that comforting sea but a mirror stretching to the horizon, the sky reflecting without any imperfection as the sea turned dead still.
Tentatively placing a step onto the white sand beach, Calypso began to head to the water to try and locate the submerged object. However, the mirror gave nothing away. It held no imperfection in the silver beneath it, betraying not even the sand beneath its still surface. A minute passed, and a small collection of bubbles rose to the surface, popping quietly. The quietness that ran through Ogygia amplified the popping by an extreme amount. The currents that were rushing around the island were suddenly filled with hundreds of thousands of pockets of air in them, all heading in the same direction: west.
Calypso's head jerked towards the area in which the bubbles arose, locating it immediately. It was a singular location, maybe a minutes swim away. Bubbles suddenly started to rush to the surface of the water, a constant stream, releasing from within steam whenever one would breach the surface. Slowly, an oblong shape began to slowly rise from the bottom of the sea floor, carried by the stream of air. Calypso sucked in a harsh breath upon seeing the object.
A bone-thin man slowly washed upon the sands of Ogygia, laying prone atop a piece of wood that served his only respite of the waters.
Calypso gasped and ran towards the man. Finally, someone had shown up to Ogygia, someone visible and real and — she gasped upon finally reaching him. He was a mortal.
The person rose elegantly out of the water, floating supine on the surface. Golden rays of sun illuminated off his slick body. Slowly, he was brought to the shoreline not too dissimilar to how a dead soldier would be carried atop his shield. Gasping, Calypso realized immediately the condition of her new hero. His skin was a bright and vibrant light red, with sections peeling off his body in white, flaky sheets, with large blisters covering every possible location. If he was wearing any clothes, they had but long since burnt away as tattered black strips barely clung to his body, his only form of modesty. Had he lost a battle with a basilisk or a drakon? Knowing the kinds of heroes that washed ashore on Ogygia, perhaps even the Chimera…
His raven locked hair was singed and burnt at the edges, whilst his face was missing the grace of eyebrows — Calypso assumed the same for any and all of his body hair. She cried silently to herself. Odysseus was the first, and he came malnourished and on Thanatos' doorstep. Then comes Drake, bleeding profusely from an impossibly round wound in his chest, body as pale as any of the underworldly gods. She was content with assuming the first two heroes who had landed on her island were both simply near death by coincidence, but a third hero washed ashore who was obviously clinging to life made this part of her curse no coincidence.
The water began to churn again, and started lapping at Calypso's feet, which had now come to rest at the edge of the water. Calypso stepped back tentatively as the sea began to creep forward even more, rising slowly. This continued for almost thirty backward steps before the sea stopped, having risen at least the length of Calypso's finger.
At this, he currents stopped carrying the boy, and he stilled, floating an arm's length away from Calypso. She wanted to reach out and touch his skin, desire burning deep in her chest. She wanted to feel how injured his skin really was, and to memorize each and every injury that mapped his whole body so that she could better heal and care for the boy.
Calypso's mind was screaming at her to not go down this pathway again.
"Must you leave, Francis Drake? You can stay here, with me. You will have want for nothing, need for nothing: a life of peace and happiness for eternity."
"I suppose that I can admit to saying that I am indeed still considering that option, Calypso."
Calypso's breath hitched, and one hand went to cover her mouth while the other clasped over her heart.
Drake sighed, "Calypso, you are a wonderful, kind, and caring lady, and being brought here makes me wish greatly that you could be freed from this prison." He chuckled softly to himself, a smile gracing his face. "As beautiful as this prison is."
"But?" Her voice was hoarse, eyes filled with the potential of tears, and her heart dropped. It was happening again.
"But I must return home, Calypso. My men are currently laying siege to Spain and her ships, and my dear Elizabeth would be terribly distraught. Even now, King Philip is ordering plans for a continuous attack on my homeland. He will lose — he must — because I will be commanding my Virgin Queen's fleet. I am no son of the sea god, but even the greatest warriors have fear over a wise son of War."
Drake covered Calypso's now shaking hands with his own.
"I will never forget your hospitality, Calypso, and I swear on the Styx that I meant I wished I could stay." Thunder boomed overhead, "but I have a duty to my Queen and my country, a duty to my wife, and especially a duty to the men who I am commanding."
He wiped a singular tear that rolled down Calypso's cheek. "Goodbye, Calypso. I hope you will find someone who will not have such a call to duty as I."
It was Odysseus all over again.
With the funeral procession over, the water dropped the boy onto the submerged sands below and began to pull back to the sea once more. Her body betrayed her, as she reached down to gracefully touch at his burnt, raw skin that she so desperately wanted to see healed immediately.
Gasping, her hand retracted quickly as Calypso was startled to find that, even after being in the sea for as long as he was, his skin was painfully hot to the touch. His body radiated like a warm fire; Calypso having been too entranced to ever notice. She was aghast at the condition he was in, as it was the worst Calypso had seen a hero yet. Odysseus was on death's door as well, yes, but this boy had been ablaze. The only aspect of his body that differentiated him from the newly deceased was the very faint rise and fall of his chest.
Her hands continued hovering his skin, taking extra care not to disturb any of the burnt or peeled skin, and to not touch any of the blisters. They moved with grace from his arm to his chest which, while not marred by as much peeled skin, was covered by hideous and grotesque blisters.
"You poor thing," she breathed.
Calypso moved from his chest, not wishing to risk disturbing any of the blisters yet. Her hand made refuge on his cheek, which she softly and slowly caressed. She steeled herself before her eyes could have the chance to betray her and tear up. Carefully, she placed her arms underneath the boy's knees and near his armpits. With ease, Calypso lifted him up in her arms as she stood, took a few shaky breaths to calm herself, and began to walk back to her cave, doing her best to ignore the painful heat he radiated.
/ / /
"What has…" Calypso faltered, she had never seen such a being, much less a mortal, have an appearance such as this one before her.
His ribs were fully visible underneath his tanned skin, as veins pressed out against the skin, the most prominent ones running from his shoulders down each of his arms. The flesh sunk down, highlighting the man's collarbone. Her hand could have wrapped neatly around either of his arms. They were not bone thin but had so little mass on them that what was left was simply residual tissue. He was a warrior, that much was obvious to Calypso. Battle scars crisscrossed his body in various places, and she could tell even with the malnutrition that he was a fit and muscular person.
She mentally slapped herself; now was not the time for any form of question, much less hesitation. Calypso reached down to grab him and hopefully move him out of the water. Placing her hands under the man's armpits, she slowly pulled him up into a position from which she could drag him backwards.
She paused to change positions, about twenty podes from the shoreline, and laid him down on the sand which was now slightly wet from his dripping skin. Buckling his knees so that she could get a better position to lift him in the air —
Calypso screamed as the man sputtered awake and grabbed her wrist.
"Who…" He coughed, moving his head to look her in the eyes, dirt-dark gazing into chestnut. "Who are you?"
"I…" she took a shaky breath to calm her nerves, "I am Calypso, my friend. But that matters not. The better question to ask would be: who are you, and how did you come to find yourself on my island?"
"Odysseus… We were…" More coughs wreaked throughout his body. Calypso gave a few hard pats to his upper back.
"You are malnourished, that much is obvious."
"Starving… Helios' cattle… slaughtered…" He — Odysseus took deep breaths, as Calypso slowly ran her fingers through his long and curly black locks attempting to soothe him. The information startled Calypso.
"I see," she mused. "This certainly makes sense then. A befitting punishment for killing divine property." Odysseus looked almost offended at the claim.
"Did not… consume… Others perished… Zeus… Poseidon?" Odysseus was getting more and more confused and frantic as he talked.
"Calm yourself, dear Odysseus." Calypso saw a silver tray in her periphery, on it resting a chalice of water. "Drink" she commanded.
She positioned the chalice at his lips, tilting his chin up with her other hand while tilting the chalice to allow the liquid to run through Odysseus' open mouth. A soft moan escaped him.
Odysseus sighed contentedly when she removed the chalice from his lips. He looked Calypso in the eyes again, leaning his head into her arm. Gone was the hysteria, replaced now with the glazed appearance of tiredness.
"Thank you, Calypso." His eyelids began to close, teetering on the edge of consciousness once more.
"I promise to protect you, Odysseus. Sleep now, brave one." Odysseus slumped into Calypso's arms, slowly laying him back down, fast asleep.
"I will not let any harm come to you, for as long as you stay here. This I swear."
Calypso was brought out of her thoughts, her healing magic interrupted as the boy suddenly awoke, groaning as he tried to lift himself off the ground by his arms, most likely attempting to sit himself upright. His will-power surprised Calypso — he was old enough to be a man, but right at the cusp. To show this much strength and vigor, at this age and in that body, it was impressive.
He groaned out in pain as his arms collapsed underneath him, the act causing him to once again writhe in pain. Calypso grabbed a piece of fabric hurriedly and began soaking it in the cold watering pot next to her. He spoke, but it was unfortunately not a language that she understood. It sounded eerily similar to the one Drake used before he realized he had landed on Ogygia, however.
"Stay still," said Calypso. "You are too weak to rise."
Wringing the fabric to get the excess water out, she placed it across his forehead, hoping to ease the heat still present throughout his entire body. It was no longer painful to touch, akin now to holding one's hand just too close to the flame of a candle: uncomfortable yes, but tortuous no.
One of Calypso's servants had brought along a bronze bowl full of nectar, as well as a spoon to help serve it to the demigod in front of her. Grabbing the bronze spoon, she scooped up a small amount of the golden liquid and slowly drizzled it into his mouth, taking care to avoid touching his facial burns now that he was conscious. She was glad this boy was a demigod; it would make the healing process much smoother than that of Odysseus'.
Calypso allowed the hero below her to view her, seeing as he could not move his head without feeling immense pain, judging by the strained moans coming out of his mouth. Positioning her head above his so that they could lock eyes, Calypso's thoughts were confirmed upon gazing into them — the boy was indeed Poseidon's. It could have been no one else, besides Hephaestus based on the fact he had survived the burning, but she needed to see the eyes to be sure.
With this realization, Calypso knew one thing for certain. She could never allow herself to fall for this hero, and if he stayed Ogygia and her sanctuary would be at risk, even with it being so far away from any divine power. The seas would show no mercy as Poseidon himself would terrorize her isle, making the display upon this boy's landing look like mere child's play.
Putting her traitorous thoughts aside, Calypso carefully moved his head so that he would not be blind to her before he fell back into Hypnos' domain. His head now tilted to the side slightly, Calypso kneeled on the ground near him, held her arms out, and began to sing, imbuing the best healing magic she could conjure. Sleep would be something only her visitor would be allowed to receive, at least for the first night he was here.
He again said something undecipherable and foreign, and locked his eyes on Calypso, his face showing hints of confusion and anxiety. She looked at him closely, and his face that, still marred by whatever burnt him, held tremendous beauty. After Drake, Calypso had sworn never to fall for another hero, but it never was to the Styx.
"Shh, brave one," she said. "Rest and heal. No harm will come to you here. I am Calypso." With that, his eyes slowly closed, and his consciousness slipped away. She let loose a breath she had not realized she had been holding.
"Well," she whispered, her voice pained, "here we go again."
If you're curious as to why colors are odd, and why I didn't just call Odysseus' eye color brown (I'm also taking my own liberty with his appearance since afaik there is no description of his looks in canon), I suggest you look up Tom Scott's "All The Colours, Including Grue" video on YouTube for a 3 minute synopsis on linguistics and color. TL;DW I really can't use any color names outside of black, white, red, green, yellow, light, and dark. Homer calls the sky bronze or brazen and the ocean wine-dark instead of simply calling both blue, as Greek didn't evolve to the point of needing a word for the color blue. Percy's eyes are a particular issue since while sea-green could possibly be a color Calypso recognizes, but since the sea is the color of "wine-dark" then Percy's eyes cannot be equivalent, at least in my opinion.
Next chapter sees the BotL timeline start for real.