Machine into Man

I decided on this one, obviously.

My review of the Nico got positive reception, and I got Reviews! A very pleasant surprise because I honestly didn't expect many people to still be here after so long.

There's apparently still drama going down on the subreddit. I've gotten multiple notifications from others about users getting banned for talking about me in a positive light, and that the mods have changed the way they do things. Rather sad, really.

Oh, well. Glad those days are behind me. It's like recalling how you were in middle school: just absolute cringe. I now have to go the rest of my life remembering that time I was once an actual redditor.

Ew.

But anyway.

The story continues with Percy and Thalia entering the arena of Antaeus, which is actually at the end of the Battle of the Labyrinth, meaning I managed to skip over Briares in Alcatraz, Geryon's ranch, Mt. St. Helens, and Calypso. None of that was actually intentional, but here we are.

And here we go.

Disclaimer: I don't own PJO or AC

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Inspired by historical events and an over-active imagination, this work of fiction as designed, developed, and produced by a single-cultural team of religious faith and belief, gender identity, and sexual orientation.

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Percy and Thalia walked into a huge arena, but they didn't have time to drink in the sights as a centaur went crashing to the ground in front of them, a cyclops looming over with its war hammer raised high.

The centaur reached for Percy, desperation and terror clear as day on his face and in his eyes. "Help me!"

Percy sprang into action faster than a bullet fired from a gun, and that was not a use of figurative language, but literal. The Sword of Destiny was in his hand, and he swung once, severing the cyclops's wrist, swung a second time, severing the monster's leg, and swung a third time as the monster fell, severing its head. That's when Percy took the extra second to actually look at where he was at.

Combat arena, numerous chains dangling from above, human skulls impaled on hooks at the end of the chains, and the tiered seats of the arena were teeming with an army's worth of various monsters. At the opposite side of the arena was a gate flanked by huge trident symbols made of gold, and sitting above the gate in an official's box was a red-skinned giant with a shaggy mane of black hair, dressed only in a loincloth.

Sitting next to him was Like Castellan.

Ah.

Percy and Thalia had unwittingly walked right in on the Camp Half-Blood invasion army.

The Lord truly did work in mysterious ways.

Then Percy had the idle question that if he prayed, grabbed hold of one of the chains, and yanked on it hard enough, would he bring this place down like Samson did with the Philistines? However, that was after Samson had been disgraced, humiliated, and divested of God's blessing for his sins, and was also an act of suicide since bringing down the Philistine palace resulted in his death.

Percy decided not to pull a Samson in that he brought the house down on his own head. But he did decide to pull a Samson in that he took on a whole army by himself and won.

He leapt fifty feet in the air, landed right in the midst of the stands, and just started swinging. If the monsters were made of blood, it would have been a bloodbath with limbs and entrails flying all over the place, but there was only dust in Percy's wake as he tore through the army, charging his way through the stands to get to Luke and the giant.

The whole place descended into pandemonium as Percy sliced and diced his way through everything in his path.

Back in the arena, Thalia looked down at the petrified centaur. "If you stab us in the back after he saved you, I'm ramming my spear up your ass an then electrocuting you."

The centaur hastily shook his head no.

Thalia nodded. "Right, then."

The bracelet on her wrist became the Aegis shield, depicting the fearsome visage of Medusa, and the can of mace she pulled out from somewhere became a spear made of Celestial bronze. She was still figuring out this big sister thing, like what was considered to be overbearing vs underbearing, but she was certain that covering Percy's back was a very good big sister thing to do right now.

Thalia crouched and jumped, her demigod muscles—child of Zeus muscles—propelling her even higher than Percy had jumped. She came down on some hapless monster, and then proceeded to discharge several jagged tendrils of lightning from all over her body. The tendrils bounced and bit their way through the ranks, incinerating dozens within seconds.

Even more chaos was heaped upon the monster army, since they had the son of Poseidon annihilating his was through them on one flank, and then the daughter of Zeus coming up the other.

Thalia was on the move, bashing with her shield, stabbing and swinging her spear, and blasting foes with lightning. All the while, she was mentally figuring out some boundaries. For example, she was certain that being a good big sister did entail her asking her teenage younger brother if he needed to go potty, and certainly not helping him undress and clean up afterwards—baring some kind of majorly unfortunate accident that left him paralyzed or something—while the other extreme, going from invasive to completely dispassionate, was being totally okay if he up and said he was going to go snort some cocaine with a group of hookers.

There were definitely some lines that Thalia needed to draw and confirm with Percy, but there were also a number of no brainers. Helping him go to the bathroom like he was a toddler in potty training? Obviously not. Letting him do harmful drugs with whores that may or may not be diseased? Also obviously not. Helping him fight an army of monsters? That was a great place to start.

The army squawked and screamed, their discipline and morale broken in the face of demigods that weren't really kids, but seasoned warriors that had ended hundreds of human lives.

Up in the box, the red giant Antaeus rounded on Luke. "Fix this!"

"It's your arena that you simply wouldn't let us pass through," Luke returned evenly. "You fix this."

Antaeus snarled. "Were you not the chosen of Kronos…"

Luke said nothing further on the matter, and so Antaeus leapt into battle.

Percy and Thalia both saw that at the same time, and attacked. Percy pointed the Sword of Destiny and fired off a beam of golden energy, and Thalia pointed her and discharged a bolt of lightning. Both attack struck Antaeus mid-leap, where his earthly protection didn't apply, and vaporized him. The reincarnate siblings immediately resumed their carnage without a single missed beat, and slaughtered their way up to the official's box.

They both had a sheen of sweat on their foreheads as they breathed a little heavily. It wasn't that they were out of shape, but just that they had fought really hard. It was a lot of monsters, after all.

"Hey," Thalia said.

"Hey," Percy returned.

Luke was already gone, and his army had fled into the Labyrinth.

"Think we routed them?" Thalia asked.

"It's best to think of it as only temporary. Luke will have them regroup."

"Did we screw up? Luke was right here, but we went through his army instead."

Percy shook his head. "Getting to Luke here from down there would've been next to impossible, even with ranged attacks. What we did was best. Now he has fewer monsters to work with, meaning the camp should have higher odds of a successful defense."

"Well, that is a positive, but now he's back in the Labyrinth, and we have no way concrete way of finding him. Even our Eagle Vision is screwy down here. And we have no idea where Lou and Arno are at, or if they're even still alive."

"They're alive."

"You're sure?"

"Completely."

"Okay. Now what?"

Percy turned around and beheld the rather large and fanciful door that was situated behind the box. "Let's see what's through there."

"Probably something awful." Thalia readied her spear.

Percy pushed the doors open, ready for battle, only to blink in surprise.

"Okay, this is definitely not awful," Thalia remarked.

Indeed, this place was quite lovely. It was a craftsman's shop that looked like the inside of a log cabin, with many tools, trinkets, and half-finished projects strewn about on tables and benches. The whole left wall was windows overlooking a breathtaking mountain valley, with snowy peaks, lush forests of vibrant green, and a lake that sparkled in the light of the setting sun.

The reincarnate siblings entered and Percy shut the door behind them.

"What is this place?" Thalia asked to the air. "This stuff is advanced."

Percy looked around with a critical eye. His sister was right—this stuff was definitely high-tech. Not what you would expect in some place situated in the mountains. It didn't have a "secret base" kind of feel to it, like you would expect of an evil scientist, but a homely, and even melancholy atmosphere, like the home of a genius inventor that was working tirelessly to create a machine that could keep their dying child alive for just a little longer until the doctors could find a cure.

He was already trying to think of anyone that could make machines of this caliber, and was drawing a blank. Granted, that wasn't really saying much considering it wasn't like he spent his free time researching the current greatest inventors of the modern day.

Percy didn't have to ponder for very long, however.

"Thank you very much, Thalia Grace. An artist is always pleased to hear his work is appreciated."

Standing at the top of a wooden stairwell leading to the workshop floor was a man. He was of average height and build, with short grey hair, a black goatee that was sprinkled with white hairs, wearing jeans, boots, and a white shirt with a bronze breastplate over it. At his left hip was a sheathed sword.

"And you are?" Thalia asked.

"Daedalus."

"As in the architect of the Labyrinth?"

"The very same."

"That would make you over two thousand years old."

"2213, to be exact."

"Then how are you alive?"

It was Percy that answered. "You found a way to build a body for yourself and transfer your consciousness to it."

Daedalus looked surprised. "How did you figure that out?"

"There's no blood in your body, only fluids like oil, coolant, and antifreeze. Trying to cheat death, are we?"

Daedalus narrowed his eyes. "You would be too if you knew that the Fields of Punishment awaited you in the next life."

Percy cocked a brow. "And why would you be headed to the Fields of Punishment? 2200 years and you haven't done enough good to sway the judges in favor of Elysium? What have you been up to, then?"

Thalia got ready to strike. She might've been a Greek demigod on a quest to save a summer camp full kids and teenagers, but she was also an Assassin, a warrior that worked in the dark to serve the light. While the Templars were certainly the main focus of the Assassins, they also struck down anyone that was evil and wicked. You didn't have to be a Templar for an Assassin to come after you in the dead of night.

So, if Daedalus was convinced he was going to the Fields of Punishment for his crimes on earth after over 2200 years of being alive, and somehow hadn't done enough good deeds in that amount of time to have earned a spot in Elysium, then she was with Percy. Just what had Daedalus been doing with his time?

It hadn't escaped Thalia's attention that Daedalus knew her name. He obviously knew her as Thalia, and he obviously knew Percy as well, but whether he knew them as Assassins was something she didn't know. As for not being surprised that Daedalus knew them, well…he invented the Labyrinth, had apparently been living in it all this time, so he probably installed various means of surveillance.

Which would mean that he had seen them fight.

Now it was a question of how well could he fight? He had the homefield advantage here in his own workshop, no telling what other surprises he had built into his robot body, or whatever body that was—android? Cyborg? Thalia didn't know—and then there were wherever his allegiances lied. Had Luke gotten to him, or has Daedalus remained hidden?

But then if he had remained hidden, how come Thalia and Percy just waltzed right into his workshop that was right behind the death arena of that giant?

Daedalus looked forlorn and stricken. "It's not that I've committed to a lifetime of evil. I've actually done what you could call many good things. Every now and then I've helped move history along. I made the internal combustion engine, after all, and a number of medical devices like the X-ray and the MRI, and a few other things, like the Gameboy and the iPhone…"

Percy's eyebrow remained raised while Thalia found herself blinking.

"…but what I did two thousand years ago can never be outweighed by how much good I've done since," Daedalus said heavily.

"Which would be…?" Percy prompted.

Unless Daedalus was referring to his disastrous flight with Icarus, Percy was drawing a blank. The extent of his knowledge about the inventor was that he made the Labyrinth on the order of Minos, was then imprisoned in the king's palace, and eventually escaped thanks to wax and bird feathers. During the flight, Icarus flew too close to the sun, melted his wings, and plummeted to his death.

Daedalus looked haunted. "I had a nephew…Perdix…he was more brilliant than I was. I was jealous. His last day alive, he and I were working on a project together, and in the typical style of a child, he pissed me off and didn't even realize it. He told me that he'd heard about how I had made wings for myself and Icarus, but that my wings had ultimately failed, and that he would one day like to make wings for himself so he could fly, only his wings wouldn't fail."

"Ouch," Thalia muttered.

"Then you killed him?" Percy asked.

"I did," Daedalus answered. "I was overcome with rage and grief, and out of sheer malice, I tossed one of my tools to Perdix, only I tossed it high on purpose. He went to catch it, overextended himself, and fell off the ledge of the seaside cliff were working near. He managed to catch himself, and he cried out to me for help. I-I…" the inventor had to pause to clear his mechanical throat. "I just stood there and watched. I told him that he had better make his wings quickly, and then he…he fell…he screamed the whole way down. I still remember how the screaming came to an abrupt halt."

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It was eerily quiet in Daedalus' workshop.

Thalia was staring at the wooden floor an inch from the ends of her boots, pale and wide-eyed as she was haunted by her memories of being Evie. Instead of being repulsed by the inventor's testimony of him and Perdix, she was hit right at home. All she could see was her past self and how she had treated Peter.

Not fun.

As for Percy…

"You're not that man anymore."

Daedalus looked at him. "What?"

"You are not that man anymore," Percy repeated. "If you were to have made a new family for yourself since those times, you would never repeat that sin."

"How do you know that?"

"Because I can see it in your eyes. Hear it in your voice. Two thousand years, and you feel nothing but regret, remorse, guilt, and agony over your actions. You made medical marvels to save lives, and you made toys to bring happiness to children—all for Perdix. Two millennia and you've been doing all that you can to make up for murdering your nephew. You are not the same man you once were."

"It doesn't matter," Daedalus said bitterly. "I still stood there and let my nephew die because of my own pettiness. I deserve punishment."

"And yet you have valiantly staved it off all these centuries. If you deserve punishment, why have you not embraced it?"

Percy already knew the answer, but he wanted Daedalus to say it. The old genius didn't disappoint.

"Because I don't want to be punished," he said honestly. "I'm afraid—terrified, even—of having to face Hades for my crimes. It's cowardly, I know-"

"It's natural," Percy interrupted. "It's a natural human thing to not want to be punished, but to instead experience grace and mercy for our wrongdoings. However, that's not what really keeps you anchored here. Tell me the truth, Daedalus."

Thalia couldn't help but appreciate the absurdity of this situation. Daedalus was over two thousand years old. He'd been on this earth longer than all of Percy and her's past lives combined, and was an absolute genius. You would expect him to be wise in everything he did, well-seasoned with experience, well-learned from thousands of mistakes. You would expect him to be the paragon archetype of character, like Gandalf or Master Splinter—the mentor, essentially.

But it was not so here.

For all his worldly experience and technological genius, Daedalus was a scared and meek child, and it was Percy that was the man. The tall figure standing upright with a straight back and firm voice, his eyes piercing and powerful.

Daedalus seemed to realize this himself. He also stood up straight and got composed. "I-" his voice cracked and he tried again. "I…cannot look Perdix in the eye. Nor Icarus."

"You fear their condemnation."

"I deserve their condemnation. If I had been a better father, Icarus would not have died, and if I had been a better man, I would not have murdered Perdix. Their blood is on my hands."

"Have you given no thought that in the two thousand and some years they've been in the Underworld, that they have forgiven you?"

Daedalus fell quiet.

Percy continued. "You have been beating yourself up for far too long, my friend. It is time to let go."

"Let go? Just like that?"

"Yes. There is nothing you can do to change the past, and you've been fervently trying to make up for what you did. You've been tortured enough."

"I can never be forgiven for what I did."

"Yes, you can." From the holster at his side, Percy pulled out the Holy Bible.

Daedalus shied away from the book. "That doesn't apply to us."

"Why do you think that?"

"Well…because…there's the Underworld. And Olympus. And that book says that gods like the Olympians aren't real."

"Not so. This book says that gods like the Olympians are false gods, and that is certainly the truth. They are vain, petty, sexually immoral, and many other adjectives. They are not worthy of respect or worship. This One is. Do you really hate yourself so much that you refuse the love and comfort of the Father?"

And Daedalus was rattled. "I…I…I…"

"Daedalus," Percy said gently. "Stop it. You've been living with your guilt long enough now. You regret your actions and are ashamed of them. It's time to be forgiven."

"Just like that?"

"Just like that."

"But…isn't that cheating? A get-out-of-hell-free card?"

"No. You have to believe it in order for there to be any meaning behind it. There are many who will say that they're saved because they believe in Jesus, but what they believe about Jesus is that He was just a good teacher, not the Lord made flesh that died and rose again on the third day to defeat death and sin. And there are many who just say things to say them."

Daedalus swallowed. "What…what do I need to say? How do I do this? Yeah, it's funny, I know, that a man like me who's older than the Bible and more or less got to watch the spread of Christianity actually has no idea how to do that salvation thing."

"It's a good thing I'm here, then. Do you believe in your heart, mind, body, and soul that you are a sinner?"

"Without a doubt, yes."

"When Jesus of Nazareth says that He and the Father are One, meaning that He is God in the flesh, do you believe Him?"

Daedalus took a deep breath, thousands of years of stuff running through his head in the flash of a second. He had to really think about, weigh it against everything he knew and everything he had seen, and after he was done thinking, he answered, "I do."

"Then you accept that His ways are the ways, and that His laws are the laws, and that He is above all other false deities, and that He truly is God of All."

"I do."

"Then you accept that Jesus died a substitutionary death on the cross, and rose to life again on the third day, therefore defeating death and sin, and granting eternal life to all those who would believe this?"

Daedalus nodded firmly. "I do."

Percy smiled. "Then amen, brother. Your faith has saved you."

And Daedalus felt it. An immense weight vanishing from his shoulders, a warmth in his breast that had nothing to do with his power core, and a general feeling of simply feeling better. Better than he had in two thousand years.

But the smile faded from the old genius. "Something else that's funny: I brought being afraid to die, and then criticizing salvation as a free ticket out of hell, and now…I need you to kill me."

Percy blinked. "I'm sorry—what?"

Daedalus steeled his resolve. "When I first built the Labyrinth, I poured my bitterness and resentment for Minos into it, effectively giving it a small consciousness of it own. I also built it to grow and expand, a feature meant to confuse anyone, preferably Minos himself, that entered. In two thousand years, the Labyrinth has grown out of control. It's become a weed through the very planet itself, with roots branching through every continent, building, subway station, and public restroom. The Labyrinth will spawn random doors that people will haplessly walk through, end up trapped, and then killed by one means or another. I've tried to shut it down, but it's self-sustaining now. However, the Labyrinth is still tied to me. If I die, then it'll be destroyed. Please, Percy, the Labyrinth must be destroyed. It's too big and too evil. It's a threat to everything alive, and it'll devour the world unless I'm gone."

"Are you certain of that?" Percy asked. "Are you really sure that if you die, the Labyrinth will die with you?"

"100%, yes."

"And what if the Labyrinth has grown too big for you? That if I kill you, only the original section will collapse, and the rest will just repair itself in time?"

"I…uh…let's hope not."

Percy stared at Daedalus. "I'm not going to kill you on the mere suspicion that doing so will destroy the Labyrinth. I'm going to need more than just your theory."

"I have come bearing more."

Thalia and Percy whipped around quick as lightning, weapons in hand, and Daedalus looked shocked because that guy was not there two seconds ago.

It was a handsome man with healthy skin, sharp features, short dark hair and dark eyes, wearing a white suit with a red tie.

"Which god are you?" Thalia snarled.

"I am no god, Thalia Grace."

"A demon?"

"No, but you are closer."

"An angel," Percy said.

The man slightly inclined his head. "Run Daedalus through the heart with your sword, Percy. The Lord will handle the rest."

Percy proceeded to stab Daedalus through his chest, his breastplate sparking as the blade went right through unimpeded. There was a trembling through the inventor's workshop before everything stilled once more.

Then Daedalus coughed, spitting up not motor oil or coolant, but blood. Real, genuine, scarlet blood. Percy pulled his sword out, catching the inventor as he fell forward. Strangely, the blade was completely clean, and stranger still, braced on his hands and knees, Daedalus was breathing only slightly heavy, and there wasn't a drop of blood draining from anywhere on him.

Daedalus shed his breastplate, and to his utter astonishment, there was no wound on his chest, or on his back. To his even greater utter astonishment, as he felt his chest, he could feel warmth. He could feel movement. He could feel a heart that hadn't been there in over 2100 years pumping blood through veins that hadn't existed a minute ago.

"I'm…human?"

"You are," said the angel. "The Lord has work for you to do."

"But I—my mother, Athena, she-" Daedalus cut himself off as he felt his neck.

The brand of the partridge was gone. Athena's curse was gone.

"As I said, the Lord has work for you to do."

Daedalus couldn't think of anything else to do but throw himself down before the angel. "Oh, thank you-"

Percy grabbed by the back of the shirt and yanked him all the way up to his feet. "We don't bow to angels."

"What? Why?"

"Because bowing is an act of worship, and only God is to be worshipped, not His angels."

"Amen," said the angel.

"Ah, okay," Daedalus said.

Percy looked at the angel. "The Labyrinth has been destroyed, then?"

"No. It has been tamed. You will need it in time."

"I…see."

"Indeed."

"Wait!" Thalia blurted. Everyone looked at her. "So…you're an angel? An actual angel? Legitimate servant of God, sent from Heaven, all that?"

"All that and more," the angel answered, a faint trace of amused sarcasm slipping into his monotone voice. "Salvation is yours as well, Thalia. You need only ask and believe. Something that should not be hard for you, as you have been given a rare blessing: the visual proof that many say they require in order to convince them of the free gift of salvation."

Thalia swallowed. "Y-Yeah. Thanks."

"You are welcome." The angel looked back to Percy. "Continue on the narrow path, Percy. Do not stumble, do not falter, and do not forget the Lord our God."

"Amen."

"Amen."

"Uh," Daedalus piped up. "What, exactly, is the work I'm supposed to do?"

"Show Percy the odd trinket you have found in your travels. It will be clear from there."

Percy and Thalia instantly looked at each other, figuring that the "odd trinket" was another Piece of Eden.

"Alright," Daedalus said.

The angel nodded. "Goodbye."

Then he was just gone as if he had never been there.

Percy looked at Daedalus. "Odd trinket?"

"Yes, it's actually right over here."

Percy and Thalia followed the now-human inventor to a table in his workshop. Upon the table was a box like 3-D printer, and suspended inside was a very familiar ring. Familiar to Jake Swallow, anyway.

"This little thing is simple but baffling to me. The metal is unlike anything I have ever seen or worked with besides it. It produces a powerful magnetic field, able to repel even a speeding bullet, but it's onery. It doesn't play nice with anything else here. I've had to keep it contained in this box for a few decades now. I take it you know something about it, Percy?"

"Correct. Jake Swallow wore this ring, and several others, in his later years. He used them to repel musket balls, cutlasses, knives, bayonets, and even cannonfire."

"He did? How would you know that?"

"Jake Swallow was my one of my past lives."

"Excuse me?"

Percy settled his hand upon Daedalus' shoulder. "We have a lot to talk about, my friend. Too much for right now, as Thalia and I have some pressing matters to attend to, but we will speak. Please give me the ring."

Daedalus nodded. He shut down the containment field in the box, opened the lid, grabbed the ring, and gave it to Percy. He slipped it on his finger and the kind of look on his face that an elderly man wore when seeing his elderly dog.

"Still fits," Percy murmured. "Thank you, Daedalus."

"No, thank you. I'm flesh and blood again, and I have purpose. Whatever you need, I'll help as best I can."

Percy looked around the workshop, appreciating the fact that God had just given him his own Leonardo da Vinci. "Thank you, my friend." He then nodded his head at Thalia. "Let's go."

"Should be interesting to see what a tamed Labyrinth is like."

"Agreed."

"Heading back to Camp Half-Blood, yes?" Daedalus asked.

"Yep," Percy said.

"Oh! My first chance at helping the good cause."

He grabbed a number of spheroids from a nearby tabletop. "Click the button here and throw. They're grenades, yes, but they're magically attuned to only damage monsters, not the environment or mortals."

"How much trial and error did it take to get that to work?" Percy asked.

"Let's just say that PETA would try to have me executed."

"I hate PETA," Thalia helpfully added.

"As do most sane and rational beings," Percy agreed.

He and Thalia accepted the monster grenades, and reentered the Labyrinth.

Daedalus waited until the door shut before he jumped and shouted with joy.

He didn't know how much longer he had left to live now that he was flesh and blood again, but he was going to use that time to make sure he was the kind of man that Icarus and Perdix would be proud to call their family.

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I was going to have the actual battle of the Labyrinth in this chapter, but I decided otherwise.

Instead, Luke may or may not be having some dubious thoughts, Daedalus got his hands on one of Jake's old rings, and is now flesh and blood again! And sealed with the Holy Spirit. And is now Percy's weapon and gadget supplier.

Lots of fun with that coming up, just like shenanigans with the Labyrinth now that it's "tamed."

Which is just a fancy way of saying it's now a plot device that will always work in Percy's favor. Still going to be some shenanigans with it, though.

No idea what story will be updated next, probably this one because I've admittedly been stuck in a slump for a couple of days now, but we shall see in due time.

In the meantime, Fav, Follow, and Review please!