(A/N: Hello everyone, Happy Monday! Few changes to the script today: firstly, these are sort of background scenes from Leo's time on Ogygia in HoH so it deviates from the book a little. Keep in mind, not a lot but a little. The real changes happen later :D

Secondly: I've gotten a couple of people who aren't really happy with how close to the book this is sticking. I'm really sorry you feel that way guys but I can't really continue this fic without finishing the HoH Calypso POV chapters. I'd say, wait a couple of updates and see if you like the upcoming chapters where things do change but it's your choice.

Thirdly, to wisdom-of-the-sea, that's a good idea, I get sort of sick of having the replies section being as long as the chapter itself.

So for this week, I'll try PMing my replies to you lovely reviewers instead of writing them here.

I'll try it this update but any Guest reviews will be answered here, for obvious reasons.

And lastly: WARNING THERE BE SMALL AMOUNTS OF FLUFF AHEAD.

Phew, now that that's over:

THANKS FOR READING GUYS!)

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

The first time Leo talked about his adventures, Calypso suspected he didn't even realise what he was saying.

While working in silence had suited them fine the first day, Leo had an indeterminable amount of energy that made a quiet working environment unbearable for him. So he talked instead and after a while, Calypso began asking questions. She always asked the men who appeared on Ogygia questions, about themselves, their friends, their families, their histories, their adventures, their quests. She enjoyed hearing fresh tales from the outer world. She'd thought over Percy's stories inside her head for weeks, imagining an enormous metal city where people could not grow gardens. Leo's stories skirted around anything truly revealing but she didn't take offense. Leo Valdez did not strike her as a person who revealed his inner thoughts to just anyone.

Instead, he told her about his friends, daughters of Pluto, Aphrodite and Athena, about sons of Jupiter and Mars. He didn't say much about Percy Jackson but the more he spoke, the less Calypso felt as though her heart was being squeezed by the mere mention of his name.

Leo told her about Rome, how Annabeth had gone looking for her mother's statue and as a result, had fallen into Tartarus alongside Percy. He grew quiet then and Calypso gently nudged her last coil toward him, trying to take his mind away from it. She had never been near Tartarus personally but her parents had always spoken of it with a healthy dose of horror. To think of mere demigods against the literal hosts of hell was horrifying.

The subject moved on to his Roman friends Frank and Hazel, their quest to set free Thanatos, god of Death. Leo explained in vague, cryptic terms that the pouch she'd woven would help Frank Zhang immensely and went on to described Hazel, who was actually from the 1940s and a daughter of Pluto, of all things. Calypso thought she must have heard him wrong until he mentioned Festus and realised Leo Valdez was quite probably a lunatic.

"A dragon?" Calypso usually stayed quiet during these conversations but that was too much. "You made a dragon? Are you mad?"

"Hey, Festus isn't just a dragon!" Leo complained as he began to weld another part together. "He's so much more than that!"

"Dragons are bloodthirsty, uncontrollable beasts of rage and fire!" Calypso replied, eyes wide in shock.

"Festus is not bloodthirsty. He's just…moody. Besides, I didn't make him, some other campers did ages ago. I just polished him up and made him work right." Leo countered, irritably.

Calypso shook her head, helping him shape the pieces correctly with her nimble fingers. "I cannot believe you fly a dragon, Leo Valdez."

"You'd like Festus if you met him." He assured her. "I mean, at the moment, he's just a head on the Argo II but when I get back, he'll be flying in no time."

"A dragon head is still as dangerous as a dragon." She muttered before changing the subject. "The Argo II…that is your ship? Like the old hero Jason?"

"Yep. And we have a new Jason." Leo added, absentmindedly. "He's pretty much my best friend but he's in charge of the Argo II while I'm away so if he screws with her, I'm gonna have to hold auditions for his replacement."

"Your ship is quite important to you." Calypso hid a smile. Leo was a lot like his father in that way. Machines were equal if not better than people.

Leo's eyes took on a dreamy look. "She's more than a ship. The Argo II, I've been working on her since I was a kid." He explained about his crazy Tia Callida who had turned out to be Hera and the goddess' plan to reunite the two camps. Calypso's gaze sharpened slightly.

"Hera was my foster sister for a long time." Calypso scowled. "I can imagine her doing such things."

"Wait, what?" Leo paused, confused. "I thought your dad was a Titan?"

"My mother is Tethys." Calypso explained, shortly. "She fostered Hera from a young age, groomed her to be queen. If there was one lesson Hera mastered it was my mother's patience for scheming." She could easily recall the Queen of the Gods' haughty glances and coy remarks when she wanted something done. Her mother had told her once that she intended for Hera to rule Olympus alongside Zeus, who couldn't possibly be expected to manage the day-to-day trivialities of an empire.

"No, Hera will rule the world through him." Tethys had said, carelessly waving a hand toward her daughter. "She will remember you fondly, little Calypso. Perhaps she might take you on as a handmaiden when she takes the throne."

The words sounded as clear and sharp as the day they'd been said inside Calypso's head but she forced them to the back of her mind.

"Man, I hate godly ancestry," Leo sighed, tiredly. "Everyone is each other's cousin's daughter's brother's doctor's mother twice removed."

"This Argo II, she must be quite a ship if Hera took note of it." Calypso tried to steer the conversation back on topic and it worked. Leo cheered slightly.

"She's great." He rattled off the mechanics of the ship, the number of oars, the technology that made the rigging function, the pegasi stables in the glass bottom.

"I can't imagine a pegasus appreciating a stable encased by water." Calypso interrupted, thinking back to the pegasi she'd known of over the years who had always enjoyed being able to roam free.

To her surprise, Leo began to laugh. "The Argo II isn't an ocean ship." He explained, his eyes focused on the console though he still snickered. "She's a flying Greek warship."

"What is it with you and flying creations?" Calypso rolled her eyes, her mind unable to picture such a thing. An ancient Greek ship with sails and oars belonged on the ocean. Not half way up to the heavens. Zeus must hate it, she thought, privately.

Leo shrugged. "I like being in the air. It's great."

"It's not safe." She pressed in a mutter.

The demigod merely laughed. "It is if I build it, Sunshine."

The more they worked alongside each other, the easier the conversation flowed. Calypso was caught between bitterness that she had forgotten how pleasant conversation (with someone who could talk back) could be and surprise that Leo could be pleasant when he wanted.

Between threading wire into spools and trying to retrieve misplaced tools Leo needed from around the workshop while he muttered nonsensically to himself, Calypso enquired as to what the gods were doing about the threat of Gaea. When Leo tried to explain the split between the Roman and Greek aspects of the gods, Calypso tried not to let the idea find any sort of traction in her head. Her aspects were incredibly similar, but she was more Greek than Roman to be honest. Regardless, she didn't want this kind of talk stirring them apart.

"It's dangerous," she told him as they worked. "The gods' aspects should function together. It's not natural for them to be at war with each other."

"Tell me about it," he huffed. "I thought regular Hera was irritating. Roman Hera-"

"Juno." She corrected, absently.

"-is a pain the neck." Leo eyed her, suspiciously. "What about you, Sunshine? Why haven't you gone off the deep end like the others?"

Calypso shook her head, as though trying to rid the thought from her mind. Just speaking about them seemed to jostle the different sides of her slightly, as though reminding them they were indeed different. "I-I am Calypso in both Roman and Greek, as is my father."

"So it doesn't affect you at all?" Leo rolled his eyes. "Figures. Aphrodite, Mr D, Nemesis and you are the only ones not loco and none of you can help."

Calypso shoved him with her elbow hard in the stomach. "And what do you call this?" she asked, indignantly.

He winced, rubbing what was sure to become a bruise. "Fine, you're helping. Still, it figures all the Olympians would go nuts when the world's about to collapse."

"They always did have terrible timing." she agreed, grimacing slightly. If the Roman sides were beginning to dominate most of the gods, perhaps hers was too? Perhaps that was where her short burst of temper had come from when Leo first arrived?

Leo continued his fidgeting while Calypso shivered all over, the thought more than a little disturbing. She'd never had problems with her aspects before. They were practically identical with only minor changes. She didn't like the idea of the Roman side taking over without her knowing because to be honest, she disliked her Roman side.

Calypso, like most of the gods, had her origins in Greece and it was her Greek side that took precedence for most of the time. Greek gods were lovers, thinkers, gentle at times and tempestuous at others. They enjoyed indulgence and beauty and inspiration. Romans, in Calypso's opinion, were far less imaginative.

"What are your Roman friends like?" she asked, distractedly.

"They're pretty normal. A little uptight but then again, they've got me around so maybe that's a good thing." He winced suddenly. "Although Camp Jupiter doesn't like me all that much right now."

"I cannot fathom why." She muttered to herself.

Leo tossed her a dirty look and yanked the final coil from her hand. "It's not my fault!"

"What isn't?"

He looked away, shoulders hunched defensively. "Casper made me sort of…open fire on the Roman camp."

Calypso paused, her brow furrowed. "What was that?"

"I was possessed at the time," he explained, haltingly. "By Casper the Pushy Eidolon."

"I do not understand that phrase but did you say eidolon?" she tilted her head, confused.

He shivered, scowling. "Gaea sent them after the Argo II and when we arrived in New Rome, it started the war between the camps."

"Gaea has…eidolons?" Calypso could hardly believe her ears and despite herself, she leaned away from him a little. "Is it- is it still with you?"

"Of course not." Leo grunted, not looking at her. "Piper kicked them out. But not before I accidentally declared war on Rome and Jason and Percy tried to kill each other."

Calypso still looked wary. "If the eidolons have sided with Gaea, the situation is worse than I thought."

"You're telling me." He muttered back. "It was creepy as Hades, having someone else pulling my strings. Leo Valdez is a one-man show."

Calypso appeared troubled. "Can they enter you…again?"

"Piper made them swear on the Styx not to." he glanced at the goddess who had unconsciously edged away from him and rolled his eyes. "I'm not going to attack you Sunshine."

"I know!" she said in a higher pitch than normal. Leo might despise eidolons but they petrified Calypso. The dead are dead, her mother had always told her. And the living are living. That is the natural order of things.

Her father had been far less strict and frequently dabbled in skeletal warriors, resurrection and summoning spirits for his own bidding. Not magic per se, at least not the magic she practised.

"Do you?" Leo questioned, raising his brows. "Cause you're giving me a look like you want to defend yourself with that wrench."

She hadn't even realised she'd gripped the tool until he pointed it out. She dropped it, reluctantly. "My father used to use eidolons." She admitted, quietly. She described one of her earliest memories of visiting Atlas as a girl and catching sight of him training eidolons to flit between enemy bodies, forcing them to fall on their swords or slaughter their fellow soldiers. After that, she hadn't visited him for a long time. Calypso disliked the idea of having something dead among the living, but she hated the idea of letting them inside the living even more.

Leo let out a low whistle. "Okay, no offence or anything, but your dad sounds like a psycho. And I'm an expert on psychos."

"Titans and gods shared that in common." Calypso murmured, sourly. "Absolute power and all."

Leo looked uncomfortable. "Are you sure you won't get struck with lightning for saying stuff like that?" he asked, cautiously. "I mean, demigods at camp are strongly encouraged to mind their mouths before they talk trash about their folks."

"And yet, you've managed to survive this long." She drawled, wryly.

"Hardee-har." He shook his head. "But if you get smited, I've got twice as much work to do."

"I'm immortal, Leo. If Zeus tries to 'smite' me, I'll yell his name so loudly he'll have a headache for a decade." Calypso declared, flippantly.

"Hm. Well, let's call that Plan B." Leo said.

By the end of the next day, Leo was nearly finished and still trying to explain exactly what the guidance console was to Calypso. She was rather unimpressed by the whole device.

Leo tried to think of terms that would make sense to someone who'd missed out on most of the development of western civilisation but he was coming up short. "It's like a compass but bigger. It uses signals from GPS satellites-"

"I still cannot believe you mortals have been throwing things into the sky." Calypso rolled her eyes, handing him a pair of pliers. "And what's more, Zeus allowed it."

"We don't throw them into the sky," Leo explained, impatiently. "We launch them. A lot of time, money, resources, work goes into it."

"So you throw- oh, I'm sorry, launch- these machines into the sky-" she corrected when he threw her a dirty look. "-and it connects back with this?"

"Kind of. And then it works out to what angle to steer the boat to set the course." Leo replied, grinning.

Calypso raised her eyebrows, unimpressed. "It seems like an awful lot of effort."

"Well otherwise I wouldn't know where I was, Sunshine." He mumbled, unhappy about her lack of appreciation. Were a few 'Wow Leo, you're so clever's too much to ask? Maybe a 'what a brilliant idea' every once in a while? What did a guy have to do for a little recognition around here, anyway?

"Sailors have been using maps and compasses for centuries and they made their trips just fine." She pointed out as the late afternoon sun began to dip into the ocean horizon, a sphere of fiery orange bobbing against the waves. Looking at it, Leo could understand why the Greeks believed Apollo was bathed down by ocean nymphs every evening. It looked like the sea was swallowing up the sun.

"Sure, trips to the right continent maybe. With this, I can sail to an exact point on a coastline." He argued.

Calypso looked as though she wanted to roll her eyes some more. "It makes no sense to me but if you think it is necessary, then I hope it works."

"It is necessary." Leo shook his head. "I don't get it. The gods are always such…know-it-alls. Shouldn't you know these things?"

She snorted in a particularly un-goddess-like sound. "I know plenty of things, Leo Valdez. Ask me how to make floods or bring in the tide. Ask me about the stingray in the bay and where she came from. Ask me how to create tidal waves or new islands. Ask me about Titans or the gods, ask me what Atlas' strategy was for the first assault on Olympus. Ask me why it failed. Ask me about the time Artemis nearly killed her brother because he tried finding her a husband. Ask me about the time Ares managed to skewer himself with his own spear when he was a child. Ask me why Demeter likes wheat better than barley but for heaven's sakes, don't ask me to understand this nonsensical gadgetry!" She finished in a huff.

Leo blinked, startled out of his comebacks and witty retorts. "…Apollo tried finding Artemis a husband?" was all that came out.

Calypso looked as though she wanted to lecture him some more but a smile began to grow on her face reluctantly. "He thought it might loosen her up." She added with a small snicker. "And she ended up breaking nose so badly it didn't heal for a century."

Leo couldn't stop sniggering for nearly an hour.

When he actually finished the console, Calypso didn't realise. He held it up for inspection in the light with a thoughtful look and she sighed.

"I'm sure it will function perfectly." She told her, dryly. "You've spent enough time on it, I'd half expect it to be capable of turning the earth backwards."

"Ha-ha." He muttered back, absently. "Sunshine, you crack me up."

"See, I'm funny." She mimicked his comment from the previous day and he sent her a flat glare. "Honestly, what else are you going to do to it? Make it sing your praises? Is there a tool in that magical belt that will turn it to gold as well?"

"Hey, don't knock the belt, Sunshine." Leo adjusted the hardwearing leather tool belt. "This baby has gotten me out of a lot of tight spots."

"I'm sure it has." Calypso replied, indulgently.

"It has!" he complained and began to describe an encounter with a particularly bad tempered group of Cyclopes, which he managed to escape from with his friends using machines called 'crane' and 'conveyor belt' he adjusted with that oh so wonderful tool belt.

"You speak of them kindly." She blurted out when he took a breath.

"Well…yeah, they're my friends." Leo scratched his head with the pliers. "It's sort of required, right?"

"I've rarely heard heroes recounting their adventures without bravado and unearthly praise for each other's deeds." She explained, looking down at the final coil in her hands. "You talk about them like they are people, not legends."

Leo shrugged as he gently arranged the last few wires. "They're great and all, but they're still my friends. I know they're not perfect."

"It's refreshing." Calypso told him, hastily with a small smile.

"I probably don't tell it right," Leo muttered, absent-mindedly while he worked. "I'm better with machines than people. Hand me that piece, will you?"

She dutifully handed over the final wire and he installed the final part in the perfectly sized gap. Leo let out a whoop of success when the console began to hum. "Your mechanical map is born." She admired in a slightly impressed tone.

"Argo II, here I come." Leo grinned, whole face lit up with excitement. Infectious though it was, Calypso still felt a tiny seed of reluctance take root in her gut. Because now that he had his path laid out before him, nothing was stopping him from taking it.

(A/N: I think she liiiiiikes hiiiiim…

Anyway, thank you everyone who reads, favourites, follows or reviews, those little notifications light up my day :D

Now, to the Guest Reviews-

Tara Luna Apple: I kind of like the cuteness of these chapters too, there's something adorable about these two crazy kids ;) Thanks for reading!

Piper fan: My copy of House of Hades says otherwise. Sorry.

Guest: Thanks for taking a second to send me a review. I think it's great you like it and your review made me smile for like, an hour.

My goodness, this is a short replies section. Alright then, on to PMing my replies!

Thanks again for reading guys, I'm glad you like it so far :D