PJatO || Tritercy || PJatO || Tritercy || The Sound of Laughter || Tritercy || PJatO || Tritercy || PJatO
Title: The Sound of Laughter – Writer's Month 2023
Fandom: Percy Jackson and the Olympians / Heroes of Olympus
Disclaimer: All rights reserved to Rick Riordan. Aside from the Gods, they belong to the old Greeks. This fanfiction and its OCs on the other hand are entirely mine. No money is made with this, though reviews are more than welcomed.
Tags: m/m, merpeople, alpha/beta/omega dynamics, fluff, established relationship
Main Pairing: Triton/Percy
Percy Jackson Character: Perseus Jackson
Godly Characters: Triton, Triteia, Pallas, Calliste
Own Characters of the Next Generation: Attina, Fabius, Alana, Aquata
Summary: Prompts: seashell + at a festival. Percy and Triton take their children to a festival and it reminds Percy of their first date.
The Sound of Laughter
Writer's Month 2023
Today was one of those days where Percy felt like every decision he'd ever made had been the right one. Because today was the Festival of Feronia – a minor Roman goddess of water, freedom, abundance and traveling. The perfect goddess to have a traveling festivity, and the merfolk loved it. There were balls, circuses, fairs. Atlantis, in particular, had a wonderful large fair just outside the city's limits, with rides, food and games to win prices.
The perfect place to go to with one's family. The perfect place for a first date too. Percy smiled, flushing just a little as he remembered his first date with his husband that he'd had here twenty years ago. The wars had laid behind him just a year or so. Something that seemed a lifetime ago now, yet had been fresh wounds on his mind back then…
/flashback – 20 Years Ago\
He'd been living in Atlantis for only a couple of months. A fresh start, distance from the mortal world, from the godly world – well, more or less, he supposed, considering King Triton and the proximity of Poseidon and his family. But Olympus seemed farther away here and under the sea, with a sleek blue tail of his own, it truly was a new start for him and helped him get over his trauma. And it was good. It was good. He had a beautiful little home amid the coral reef.
He'd found work at the summer camp, as a trainer and instructor during the summer. And when summer had ended, Aphros and his brother Bythos had been so impressed with his work and grown fond of him, so they'd recommended him to the local school. A teacher on the mortal world, who was an actual mortal. Much better than the whispered hear-say from merfolk who'd only watched humans from afar. And so, Percy Jackson had become a teacher in Atlantis.
It was the first Festival of Feronia since Percy had moved there. His students this summer had told him all about it, were so excited about it. So, naturally, Percy had to go too. Though he didn't have friends yet, so he went alone. Not that that stopped him from having fun!
"Oh, Percy! Percy, hello!"
The call broke the sound of laughter around him, so Percy turned to face whoever had just called to him. Calliste, one of the other teachers at camp. She was a very worthy sparring partner and a lot of fun to talk to. She was also Triton's daughter, and thus princess of Atlantis. And technically Percy's niece, he supposed. Though he thought these things required more than blood, at least when it came to the godly side of the family – they required a bond. And he'd never thought of Triton as a brother.
"Hello, Perseus."
Percy's eyes wandered from the red mermaid toward her companions. Two other mermaids, one with blue skin and big glasses on her nose, her dark-blue hair in a bun, and the other taller and with rose-pink skin, wearing a white shell crown. The last in the group was the one who had just spoken. Triton, in all his green-skinned and scaled glory, beard on point as always.
"Tri," Percy grinned at him, cheeky and carefree.
It was mostly playful nowadays, Triton's scowl. Over the past months, they'd talked a lot, grown closer. Not like brothers though. Percy had noticed that. With Tyson, he had grown so instantly attached and he loved Tyson like a brother. Triton, however, he… didn't. Though he might have come to love Triton, in a very different way.
"It's good to see you," Pallas, the blue mermaid, came to hug him. "How are you?"
Calliste, Pallas and Triteia – their oldest sister – were the daughters of Triton. Though Percy had mostly met Pallas and Triteia in their function as Calliste's sisters, whenever they visited Calliste at camp. He got along with them pretty well, better than he used to with their dad. But then their relationship had changed in the past months too.
"We were just about to head to the seahorse ride," Triteia commented, her eyes wandering slowly between Triton and Percy. "But father doesn't fancy that one, would you mind keeping him some company, Percy?"
Before Percy even had a chance to answer did the three daughters of Triton swim away. Subtle, that one. She'd picked up on whatever was going on between Percy and Triton first, Percy knew that. Though she hadn't said anything outright, she'd made a couple subtle comments. Asking Percy if he had met any 'handsome alphas who caught his eyes', and things like that, in a special tone of voice, followed right away by her bringing up her dad.
Alphas. That was one of the biggest things to get used to, aside from the tail. That merpeople had a secondary gender, either alpha, beta or omega, and that each of them had special pheromones that Percy could somehow smell through the water. He himself had turned out to be an omega, after he'd taken his merman form. And there was a special kind of pull, between alphas and omegas.
Yet none of the alphas he'd met ever since moving here had the kind of effect on him that Triton did. The king oozed authority and power and he smelt so good. Made Percy want to roll around in it and be fully surrounded by it. His tail wagged just a little bit as he stood close enough to Triton now to smell him. Damn that tail, it was still too new, Percy was still learning control.
"Well," Triton cleared his throat. "Would you… mind the company?"
"No. Not at all," Percy grinned. "I was a bit frustrated about being here alone, to be honest. This is so much fun, you should go with someone else. Friends, family… a lover."
He caught his lower lip between his teeth at that. More bolt than he was used to from himself, honestly. At least when it came to romance. Facing titans and gods in a fight? Hades yeah. But asking someone out on a date? No, please bring back the giant army.
"Very well, where did you want to go next?"
Triton held out his arm for Percy and Percy gladly accepted it, even if it was cheesy and old-fashioned. It was also kind of cute. Percy's heart was hammering against his chest as the two of them swam through the rows of stands. Every now and again, they'd buy something. Sushi that they shared, something that was surprisingly similar to cotton candy, Triton even won a stuffed toy for Percy. A round yellow fish holding a purple seashell in a fin, reminding Percy a lot of Flounder which had made him smile. Apparently, Percy's smile was enough to make Triton want to get it.
"Thank you," Percy hugged the stuffed toy with a pleased look on his face.
"Dad, Percy!" Calliste called out as the three sisters headed toward them.
"Did you have fun, girls?" Triton turned toward them with a smile.
"Yeah, it was fun," Pallas whipped his tail back and forth. "Sorry we disturbed, but you do have other obligations as the king and Triteia said we have to get going."
Triteia nodded her confirmation at that, though she looked apologetic. A disappointed sigh from Triton as he turned toward Percy. There was something hesitant to the alpha and Percy found it very charming, that he was capable of flustering the king of Atlantis. Smiling at him encouragingly, Percy took Triton's hand and pulled him down to peck his cheek.
"This was a nice first date, for being improvised, but I expect to be the center of attention, with no court calling you away from me on our second date."
Triton's eyes were large as he blinked at Percy, nodding sharply. "Yes. Of course. Yes."
/flashback|end\
"Daddy, daddy, daddy! Stop daydreaming! I wanna go on a ri—ide!"
Percy shook his head and turned toward his youngest children. The twins Alana and Aquata stood before him with matching pouts on their lips as they gave him the biggest puppy-dog eyes possible to make him do what they wanted. Aquata had the same soft-grown curls as Sally, reminding Percy of his mom in a way that made it hard to deny her anything, while Alana had the black hair of both her parents. Each girl had a braid, but thrown over the other shoulder respectively. They were wearing the same fluttery dress, Alana's in a dark purple that matched her purple skin and tail, while Aquata's dark yellow dress matched her yellow-orange tail and skin. The twins were already nine years old and it felt like yesterday him and Triton had held them for the very first time, just tiny little babies. It was strange how fast time passed sometimes.
"Sorry, girls," Percy smiled at them, resting one hand on each head to ruffle their hair. "I just had to think of the first time your dad and I-"
"Went on a date," Alana rolled her eyes. "We kno—ow. You tell the story every year!"
"We don't want a story, we want to ride the sea-ponies!" Aquata pointed. "Ple—ease?"
"Where are your dad and your siblings?" Percy looked around, even as he led the girls.
"Atti wanted a snack, and you know what Atti wants, Fabi wants," Alana rolled her eyes again (and Percy needed to investigate who was being a bad influence on his nine-year-old). "So they went to get food for us all! But we can totally ride sea-ponies until they get back!"
"How about you let me be the judge of that?" Percy raised an amused eyebrow. "Okay, okay, you can, put the puppy-dog eyes away, that's really hard to deny."
The girls high-fives and Percy exchanged some seashells with the ride owner, allowing the two to swim up to the sea-ponies to ride them. Percy sat down in front of the ride among other parents, who all bowed a little before him. Though he was the queen of Atlantis – the omega mate of the alpha king – even after twenty years, he still didn't get used to that.
"Hello, my love. I come bearing some of your favorite treats."
Tilting his head back, he offered a gentle smile to his husband. Triton still looked as handsome as he had on their first date. Getting up, Percy wrapped his arms around his mate's neck to pull Triton down into a slow, deep kiss. Triton hummed curiously but was happy to lay his own arms around Percy's waist. Their kiss only ended when the giggling and laughter of their children interrupted them. This was the sound Percy loved about this place, but even more so coming from his kids. When they parted and turned toward them, their two teens – their oldest, Attina, green like Triton, and their only son, Fabius, blue like Percy with a golden tail – were grinning at them.
"Look, dad won me a seashell necklace," Fabius motioned proudly at his neck.
Percy leaned his head against Triton's chest, a content smile on his lips as he looked at his family.
~*~ The End ~*~
Author's note: Third one in a row to immediately speak to me in terms of ship! And again, it has been too long since I wrote this ship that I love! Look, Tritercy happy family :3