"If Fate means for you to lose, give the bastard a good fight anyhow."
- William McFee
Destiny's Gambit(The Bitch)
TW: Mentions of Abuse and SA below
29 July 2010, Aegean Sea, Naxos, Greece
56 Hours Till G-Day
PERCY HAD DECIDED HIS SISTER WAS CERTIFIABLY BAT-SHIT CRAZY.
He didn't doubt that in the slightest, but he'd be damned if she couldn't barter with the best of them.
It had been more than 5 hours now since Jason's and his encounter with his estranged half-sister.
More than 5 hours since the subsequent arrival - and abrupt departure - of one of his deadliest enemies.
The Bane of his fa- of Poseidon. He wasn't quite comfortable calling the god, Father, with what he knew right now.
Was it a fair bit of virtue signaling?
Without a doubt, he hadn't even known Kymopoleia existed till today.
Percy wasn't stupid - no matter how much he strove to prove the contrary - he could maybe contextualize the fact that Poseidon had pawned off his own full-blooded daughter to Briares as a product of the times, but what he wouldn't do was sit back and pretend the very act and didn't disgust him to his core. Due in part, to no small degree, that it appeared the barnacle-ridden euphemism didn't even care enough about her to dissolve the marriage till now.
Putting aside his own...experiences, his personal upbringing from his mother all but demanded he throttle the god the next time he saw him.
Back to Polybotes though. The very thought of the Gigante, should have disgusted him to his core, yet he found himself fighting to hold back his amusement as he thought back to how the Elder Giant had met his gruesome end.
Till the day he croaked, he doubted he would ever be witness to such a blatant manner of highway robbery.
Kym had demanded everything - and more - on the Styx from the over-eager son of Jupiter for her aid in slaying the Giant, from great grand temples right on Capitoline Hill to merchandizable action figures.
Luckily - for him at least - Percy had been a tad bit busy trying to force-feed the Giant its own poison to entrap himself in such a bargain, but credit where it was due the deal had cured Jason of his sword poisoning...somehow.
Speaking of the self-proclaimed Pontifex XLS, Percy was surprised by how little a fuss he'd made about...that. Granted he hadn't revealed much of anything before Polybotes made his presence known.
Still it was nice, he supposed, he hadn't tried to corner him and make him unload. He'd been content to let Percy maintain his space, whilst leaving the avenue of conversation open to him should he require it.
There had been no pity in his stormy blue eyes, not even a patronizing are you okay. Jason had only given Percy a firm squeeze on his shoulder after his sister's exit, and a resolute nod as they ascended to their friends.
And that was all he needed. Truly. He didn't want to be treated like some particularly fragile piece of china, locked up and paraded in a silly glass cabinet for the sole purpose of 'protection'. He didn't want be coddled or given importance over others because of his issues.
He didn't need to be seen as weak. He didn't want to. The very thought had his guts itching to retch.
He was Percy fucking Jackson, he'd clawed his way out of Tartarus gargling on the blood of his enemies. His fear could only ever be as deep as he allowed it to be, what She'd done to him didn't phase him even a little bit and he'd more than prove it to everyone and everything the very second he got back to kicking ass and taking names.
He just needed time. He was sure of it. He could get over this with just a little bit more time. He had to hold onto that lifeline.
But if he couldn't?
If dealing with...that ever became too much for him to bear?
We're staying together. You're never getting away from me. Never again.
An oath to keep with a final breath.
He had his out.
...
'Woof, that was fucking morbid.' He thought belatedly.
He turned his attention back to the present, the Argo II had made some decent progress in the hours past, he supposed. It had taken about an hour and a half to get the ship stable again after the beating his sister's storm had handed it, and an extra two before they finally continued sailing(= read limping) over the Mediterranean again.
The crew had agreed to continue traveling over water - the ship much too damaged to even entertain the thought of flight at the moment - given they'd secured Kymopoleia's blessing for the duration of the trip.
As for why they hadn't petitioned for some kind of blessing from one of the Olympians before this quest began? Percy wasn't quite sure. The gods were holding out on them it seemed.
'As usual.' He thought cynically.
They were a ways off the coast of Mykonos now, the sharp summer trade winds aiding the ship's mobility immensely. Jason and Frank had volunteered to scout ashore for supplies once they reached the port in the morning, while Percy and Leo kept watch in the crow's nest for the night.
Well, Percy kept watch in the crow's nest, while the pint-sized Latino lamented over his busted magnum opus. He'd been a bit miffed when the younger demigod had brushed off his help with fixing the boat earlier, but he respected the younger boy's need for his own space. Cause that's what friends did for each other. Support each other at their lowest.
And if the son of Hephaestus slipped on an inconspicuous puddle of engine oil in the dimly lit maintenance room about...mmm 45 paces to his left and a floor below him? Percy would be right there to patch him up and brew him a nice hot cup of cocoa. Cause that's what friends did for each other. Support each other at their lowest.
He took a generous inhale of the crisp, humid Aegean air as he continued to fuss over his weapon.
Anaklusmos. Riptide. His ride or die.
The blade had neither chipped nor charred from any of the abuse he'd visited upon it, what with the battle-frenzied lunatics he often found himself up against.
A standard issue celestial bronze xiphos with an ethereal glow on paper, yet so much more.
Riptide was more than beautiful.
Calling her - yes he'd given his blade a gender - just a sword or tool was a disgusting descriptor. Riptide was inspiring yet terrifying, powerful and merciful, stained by blood yet pure as a newborn...she had remained his constant companion through all his years as a demigod, more so than Grover.
Even Annabeth hadn't had his back as much as her lately.
'...May eternity remain kind to you, Zoe Nightshade.' Percy prayed quietly.
A surge of nostalgic warmth flowed through his nerve-endings as the constellation of the Huntress twinkled softly in the star-lit night sky. The world he occupied was all manner of magical and it remained keen on reminding him of that fact with every passing day.
He adjusted his hold on her worn leather grip as he gave a cursory inspection of his newly acquired whetstone. A block of smoothed silver about the length and breadth of a 90's era brick phone.
Smack dab in the center, was an engraved box jellyfish.
The symbol of Kymopoleia.
It was a gift from his sister, in lieu of an apology for trying to capture and kill them for the Earth Mother.
A whetstone.
"It's a Kymopoleia original. The entirety of the Greek world will be at each other's throats to get one once it stocks the shelves, of this I have no doubt." The madwoman had promised with all the unapologetic audacity he'd come to expect from all immortals by now.
Percy could no longer hold back the shudders that wracked his body, he threw his head back and openly laughed to the heavens for all he was worth, tears prickling at the edges of his vision with every second he spent in joyous stitches.
'It was all so bizarre,' He thought fondly, his soft green-eyes half-lidded.
He continued like that for a few more blissful moments, before finally reining himself in. Taking a fair bit of time to gaze at the majestic canvas above him.
What humanity had done to nature as a whole was unforgivable he decided.
You really had to be there to see it. Like the clouds had been pushed apart by some otherworldly force, - which was likely the case here - the stars made themselves known to him with the sheer zeal of a New York street vendor.
Percy wasn't going hippie by any stretch of the imagination. No sir, he'd still take his cheeseburgers with extra chili and jalapenos.
But gods.
In this quaint patch of ocean, untouched by pollution, he could gape in speechless awe at the ethereal beauty of creation. The boundless, violet dome above him was blanketed with the pulsing hopes and dreams of billions before him.
Each and every single one of the twinkling luminaries telling a tale as old as time.
A sudden surge of euphoria allowed him to dream again.
No, not the metaphysical kidnapping the three Watery Tarts insisted on forcing upon his sleep every time there was a quest to be had.
This was a proper innocent childlike dream.
This feeling pushed for him to fantasize without a care, begged him to whisper dreams he'd long since buried in the furthest depths of his subconsciousness.
He felt a calling - more akin to a higher purpose really - to reach beyond the 'paltry' dregs of human civilization. To go beyond the lands of gods, mortals, monsters and anything else that wished to stifle him. To explore without constraint and forgo his problems.
To live free.
He sheathed his sword in anticipation, he could see it now all too clearly.
A ship not too dissimilar from the one he found himself musing upon, Hades he'd settle for a moldy dingy if it came down to it. Draped in all manner of memorabilia from his travels. His vessel would persevere through the lamest of squalls to the most thunderous typhoons.
Waves the size of skyscrapers would fall short against his celestial bronze figurehead. Adversaries with forces numbering in the thousands would swoon in terror at the sight of his Jolly Roger.
He couldn't do this without a crew though, not at all, by his side was his Wise Girl her breath-taking face set in her usual shit-eating grin, their conflicts long behind them.
Grover was with them too, besting his opponents with the ear-killers he called reed pipes. It had started with the three of them, it was only right it ended with the three of them.
He'd ask the rest of the seven if they wanted to come along with him too. The individual talent and raw willpower they'd all shone on this single quest was more than enough for his seal of approval.
Manning the crows nest was none other than Sally Jackson - La Madre Grande - she'd been hesitant at first to go on such a voyage, but caved at the mention of novel inspiration.
His friends from Camp Half Blood and Camp Jupiter could make the occasional cameo or two, he thought, the more the merrier.
He saw them all together in a great round table. Trading laughs and stories, singing shanties across a fire, chucking grapes and hams, living in content far away from the whims of the gods.
Like a proper family.
It almost brought a tear to his eye, it was an excellent dream.
...
Yet it ended all too soon, as he felt a soft rapping on the sturdy white pine of his perch. He'd been content to ignore the trespasser for some time now hoping they'd maybe take the hint, but alas, he could only be so lucky.
He let out a sigh of discontent as he felt the body moving resolutely toward the starboard rail, it seemed he wasn't going to be able to avoid this confrontation.
A slight poke in his gut brought one of the many coils of hanging rope to his side in an instant. His moment of respite passed indefinitely as his chucks thumped down against the main deck, a soft wind ruffling his shaggy unkempt hair as he marched towards the culprit with forced ease.
He took on a relaxed position by their side, as he drew comfort from the gentle lapping of the waves on the barnacle encrusted hull. He'd ought to give that a look sometime before the final battle.
His visitor was dressed in her regular attire. An atrocious bright orange Camp Half Blood tee, tucked into a snug a pair of jean shorts with an empty knife holster strapped to her left thigh. Why she still kept the holster after she'd lost the blade somewhere in bumfuck Tartarus he had no clue, but it wouldn't be the first time the daughter of Athena's familial affection for Luke Castellan had puzzled him before.
'I'm a lot taller than her now huh...how about that?' He remarked to himself.
He broke the silence finally, when it seemed like his companion was having some difficulty in getting her words out.
"The stars sure are beautiful tonight," He said, "aren't they Annabeth?"
Y*C*O*Y*W
His girlfriend remained quiet for a few beats, her brilliant eyes tracing every open nook and cranny of his figure.
She spoke - praise the gods...nah, keep them far away from him - when she noticed her staring had started to become visibly uncomfortable.
"You look about as good as I feel."
His girlfriend folks, ever the voice of brutal honesty. He welcomed it. They were going through a rough patch right now - a statement he'd never so much as considered the possibility of before - no use acting like everything was all hunky dory.
"Nice to see you too babe," He started, "How bad are they?"
He took solace in the fact he didn't need to specify what they were judging by the way she clammed up on herself.
"The nightmares are...tamer now I guess, haven't had to heave my guts out since Sparta. Piper's been-" Annabeth stopped abruptly, her face adopting a sheepish impression.
"..."
His answering smile was wistful. He raised his hand to comfort her, but thought better of it. Annabeth was skittish right now, the erratic pounding of her heart he could feel with his powers only served to confirm his worries.
Any sudden movements no matter how well meaning would backfire utterly.
"It-it's okay. I'm serious it is," He added at her skeptical glance, "You were in a bad place and you needed support from someone you could trust. And I...well I couldn't be that person for you then. It's fine. There's no judgment here." Percy ended casually.
And he meant it too, while his patience with the Cherokee bombshell was rapidly thinning on account of her blatant evasions. He appreciated the wonders the daughter of Aphrodite's much needed company had done for his girlfriend.
Her skin had once again regained her usual golden Californian tan, her arms and thighs were firm and defined again.
Her soft blonde curls, smelling faintly of lemon shampoo, bobbed and danced in the warm Aegean air. She carried herself better too now, (the fact she was even talking to him was proof enough) her back was straighter, her jaw set and her eyes hard.
To the untrained eye it might have looked like not much had changed for her psyche, but Percy knew better. She was a thousand times better now than back in the pit.
Percy thumbed his left palm, tracing a jagged scar that went from end to end, as he recalled the crazed fit she'd had once they were free from Her.
"Annabeth...Annabeth please you have to wake up, we need to move. Now." Percy breathed out.
Exhaustion colored his tone as he continued to funnel Phlegethon liquid to his cohort's chapped lips.
Bob the Titan stood quietly to the side, measured anger pouring out of the kind Titan in waves with his formerly innocent face twisted in a mix of fury and muted pity. His grip on his spear was bone-white as he surveyed their immediate surroundings with Small Bob as his loyal shadow.
"She told me she'd drop us off here with Bob, but She never elaborated on where here is." He continued seemingly to no one.
"Annie. Wise girl, please. Please. I can't do this without you. I'm too..."
He let out a choked sigh. His skin felt like a moist nesting ground for marching fire ants. Everything about his senses felt loopy, like he'd just come off a nasty acid trip from raw fentanyl.
Percy felt dirty.
His body and soul felt tainted in a way he didn't want to put into words, the more he tried to scrub away the metaphysical stains the harder the slimy feeling overtook him. Every time he dared to close his eyes, allowed any sort of darkness to overtake him he swore he could hear Her haunting laugh right next to his ears.
Percy wanted to go home.
He wanted to get out of this stupid Pit preferably within the next 10 seconds. He wanted to wash his hands clean of this accursed quest, purchase a retirement home maybe somewhere in Cabo far away from the gods and their asinine bullshit for himself and Annabeth and never so much as smell a monster again. Exactly in that order.
Percy didn't care how twisted it appeared to use his abilities on his lover in such a way, he had to get away from here. The chances of Her coming back to him for more were far too high what with how close to her abode they were. With all the dangers they experienced every 10 feet they took in this hellscape expecting any one of their weary party to carry Annabeth would be tantamount to suicide.
He had to do this.
Annabeth wasn't giving him much of a choice here.
It wasn't his fault.
"Wake up Annabeth." He poured out, putting a great deal of power into those 3 simple words.
Annabeth shot up like she'd been supercharged with a double shot of espresso, her eyes wild and frantic searching for anything familiar in the red hazy mist of their forced habitat.
There was a hint of recognition once her eyes landed on Percy - he dared to hope again - that was all the warning he got before she whipped out her ivory blade and slashed diagonally in a wild effort to decapitate him.
Years of battle instincts saved his life as he leaned just out of reach. The bone sword missing his left eye by a hair.
What the Styx?!
"Annabeth! Calm down, its just me," Percy implored, "It's just me, I'm not going to hurt you. I'd never hurt you. You're safe."
Well as safe as could be, but still.
He raised his arms slowly in surrender, hoping to appear as non-threatening as possible.
Bob had turned around now at the noise, Small Bob already tearing towards them, retribution splayed across his feline features.
"No wait! She's not her-"
She took another wild swipe at him in his moment of distraction, nearly cleaving his hand in two before Bob bull rushed her. His enormous bulk more than enough to corral her, while Small Bob hissed with venom from Percy's side.
"Calm yourself, friend Annabeth," The silver Titan ordered, "You are among allies here!"
"Monster!" The daughter of Athena shrieked, "He's a fucking monster!"
She continued trying to wrestle away from the Titan, her legs kicking wildly at the fog, but Bob didn't so much as flinch. His gaze mournful as he took in Percy's shattered visage, the son of Poseidon didn't even seem to notice his own blood pooling at his feet.
"Wise girl..." He murmured.
"Don't you fucking call me that!" She screeched.
Percy recoiled in horror. His eyes dulling in anguish, yet Annabeth continued to push on.
"Stay away from me Percy Jackson," She warned lowly, "You stay far the hell away from me."
Her words may as well have been physical blows, with the way Percy nearly buckled underneath them. He wanted to defend his actions, to protest his innocence.
"I didn't have a choice!" He wanted to say.
"I did it for you!" He needed to shout.
He couldn't bring himself to say a word, instead taking her odious insults to the chin with a stony face.
He still couldn't say a word even after they'd passed through the doors.
Y*C*O*Y*W
He was brought out of his memories by his lover's short peals of laughter, a soft tinkling note that managed to sound both endearing and condescending.
He arched a brow in confusion, which only seemed to make her laugh harder.
"What's so funny?" He asked, his mood souring even further.
Annabeth took a few scant breaths to stifle her giggles, her hand covering the lower half of her face in a cartoonish haughty expression.
"You, Seaweed Brain," She answered finally, "Or your thought process, if you want me to get technical."
"Huh?"
The daughter of Athena let out a long-suffering sigh, as she prepared for a verbal sparring.
"It just happened Percy stay with me now. Earlier you said you 'couldn't' be that person for me...I think we both know that's not true."
"In what regard?" He deadpanned, a frown marring his face.
"..."
Annabeth looked at him like he'd personally defiled a modern marvel of architecture.
"Oh gods, we're really doing this song and dance routine tonight aren't we?." She answered finally, "Shame, the stars looked really good too."
"Get to the point Annabeth." Percy clipped. His arms folding across his bony chest, as he adjusted his back on the railing.
"Oh I'm getting there trust me," She responded with equal fervor, her dazzling eyes getting stormier by the second as she clenched her jaw stubbornly.
He should have stopped her then and there, should have acquiesced to whatever inane conjectures she'd come up with. Percy knew that look like the back of his hand, by the gods she still got caught up in cow dung regularly from the last goddess she'd spoken to with that look.
Yet for some reason, he didn't back down an inch from the coming argument. To be honest? This conversation couldn't have come sooner. The frustration of weeks and weeks of radio silence from his paramour coupled with his own unattended problems, nearly bringing his more destructive heritage to the fold.
"Tartarus. Edge of Creation. Akhlys." She bit out acidly, "Don't tell me you couldn't be the person I needed, it implies you didn't have a choice."
"I wasn't sure death by melting a neighbor's distance from the end of the universe was much of a choice." Percy scoffed with an annoyed eyeroll.
"Bull. Shit. Jackson."
She emphasized each word with a poke to his chest, her face coloring with anger as she worked up her nerve.
"You had her dead to rights already, there was no reason to go that far."
Percy had to murmur a quick prayer to a higher power for patience, of all the things she could have said...
"She was a Primordial Goddess Annabeth," He said slowly, unsure how this was still a talking point, "She'd already shown she was willing to go nuclear on us for giggles, whaddya mean 'no reason'?"
He knew he should have ended things then and there, nothing good ever came through for his body whenever he got annoyed enough for his New York tongue to come out.
"I mean, you could have handled things differently there. You had all the power in that fight, you could have struck a deal or something."
She'd begun pacing around the deck now, lost in her own world she was, her hands flapping wildly in the wind as she emphasized her points. She turned her attention back to him.
"You saw how quickly she ran away from you once she had the chance didn't you?" She questioned innocently.
Too innocently.
Percy sighed in annoyance.
Why did she keep doing this. Could she try for one fucking second to understand where he was coming from.
She was the smart one. The one he could trust to somehow find a way to pull his ass out of the fire when things got shaky.
And yet..he couldn't help but whisper:
"It's a miracle you could see anything at all with how far you were from the action."
...
Annabeth froze for all of 2 seconds before she herself went nuclear.
She cocked her fist back and socked him square in the eye.
...Fuck, okay that was fair, he deserved that. He'd gone a bit too far there.
He took a second or several to steady himself, his vision already dimming from where she'd punched him, and tried to reach out to Annabeth to apologize.
She smacked his arm away like the limb had groped a gorgon while he wasn't looking, she wasn't quite finished it seemed.
"Fuck. You. Percy Jackson. Fuck you and everything you've made yourself into. You think I don't-that I haven't been asking myself all this time what I could have done differently in that fight?!" Annabeth screamed right in his face, "That I haven't run myself ragged playing all the scenes in my head praying for one. Single. Alternative? Are you stupid? How dare you?!"
She was crying now, sobbing more like, her right hand fisted into her tee right above her heart as her knees wobbled unsteadily. Every single layer of practiced ease she'd crafted over the past few weeks was falling apart with every cuss word. Percy had practically broken his girlfriend apart with one sentence.
How could he?
"I'm sorr-"
She raised her hand in a stopping motion, ending his coming apology as he held back an instinctual flinch.
"Don't! Just shut up. This was a bad idea from the very start. What was I thinking? Everything you've done since we stepped into Tartarus. Lying to Bob. Manipulating him into killing his own brother. Akhlys. You boiled those harpies alive with their own blood just last week Percy! Why? What was the reason?" Annabeth counted his sins like a tallly card on a scoresheet, taking righteous satisfaction from every one of his flinches, "You've turned yourself into a selfish monster not even Sally would want to remember anymore. And it's all. Your. Fault."
Never let it be said the children of the Wisdom Goddess couldn't strike where it hurt, especially with words. Annabeth had all but stabbed him with a serrated knife then twisted with that last barb.
"Not the gods. Not the fates. Not even Gabe."
One syllable.
Just one syllable was all it took for him to snap, his earlier feelings of remorse crumpled and thrown into an empty trash compactor. The fire in his core raged as repressed memories pushed themselves to the forefront of his mind, phantasms of abuse howling at his soul with the intensity of a damned maelstrom. The feeling of betrayal audibly masticated on his psyche like a starving cannibal, Percy had told her about that in confidence. That she'd willingly bring him up for the sole purpose of hurting him...
A fractured memory of a comically obese humanoid walrus in a smelly, greasy wife-beater and musty forest-green cargo shorts pulsed violently with a red hue in his head. The fat man loomed over him balefully with a bloodied bottle in his catcher's mitt of a hand.
'And your dreams? They're just fucking dreams! Y'hear me ya little shitstain? SAY IT!'
7 year old Percy had his tiny hands fisted on his bleeding skull as he sobbed on the bloody shag carpet. Even as an infant his inborn demigod instincts had been able to subtly to warn him of the dangers of leaving such a ghastly wound to chance, between hate-filled tears he managed to eke out a feeble response to the animal before him.
'My dreams are just dreams.'
'AGAIN! LOUDER!'
'MY DREAMS ARE JUST DREAMS OKAY?!'
Gabriel Ugliano.
"I WAS DYING ANNABETH!" He bellowed. His hand slamming onto the enchanted oak railing, cratering it in the center and descending further, sending forth a colossal pulse of divine energy to the tranquil ocean.
A violent eruption of water roughly 80 meters and climbing towered over them a moderate distance away from the Argo II, yet still managed to douse the deck and it's occupants with a hefty shower of saltwater and sea life, the after-flood rocking the ship violently. Nature itself bent the knee to the irate son of Poseidon as thunder rumbled deafeningly up above them, the once beautiful star-ridden sky becoming polluted with storm clouds the color of gun metal, lightning streaking erratically through them unimpeded creating the vindictive impression of a spider's web.
'No puedo más, NO PUEDO MÁS!' Leo yelled from the engine room. "Puedes pendejos dejar de lastimar a mi amiga?! POR FAVOR!"
Percy's eyes were glowing again. His enraged glowing green eyes incandescent against the gloom, a blazing searchlight in the dead night lighting up the choppy inky-black sea with acid-green in a way not even the stars could hope to achieve at the moment.
Time chugged on annoyingly sluggishly for Annabeth as the daughter of Athena actually feared her boyfriend would hurt her...however, Percy's grief won out. The unwelcome emotion replacing white-hot anger with hard-learned despondency. Why she'd even thought his anger at her would amount to anything close to detrimental to her truly pained him, he'd never willingly bring harm to her.
He could never.
No amount of unattended trauma would ever be able to justify living with himself if he ever laid an unwanted hand on a girl he'd sacrificed so much for, especially not for a dead man.
Percy dug his arm out of the shattered wood roughly, grimacing at the concernedly wet tears he heard as his flesh systematically shredded itself from the action.
He slumped to the ground, his head between his thighs, as he willed an orb of seawater to treat both his mutilated hand and his black eye. Taking extra care to summon a gentle wave to sweep back the displaced fish before they suffocated.
"I was dying." He resumed minutely, his expression haunted, "In body and soul. There wasn't going to be an afterlife for me, not in Tartarus. It'd be like I'd never even existed."
He turned to the daughter of Athena, her own visage especially conflicted.
"And you want to know the craziest thing?" He asked, "For a hot second there I was actually okay with it, I'd actually accepted dying there alone."
Annabeth sat down by him taking his mostly healed arm to her own, helping him pick out the more difficult splinters the water had been unable to clear.
"...What changed?" She inquired timidly. Ever the daughter of the Knowledge Seeker. "What made you want to keep fighting? What pushed you to do what you did."
"You, dummy." He answered simply.
"Don't try to put that on-"
"I'd have had to leave you alone again," He rushed to clarify, "I'd be abandoning my mom, the crew, Camp Half Blood, the world, everybody. Everything and everyone I knew would be lost to me."
"...And it might not mean too much to you. But it meant everything to me then. It's the only thing keeping me going now."
His girlfriend studied him intensely as he concluded his soliloquy, biting her lip in frustration as she let him see her vulnerability.
Slowly, almost imperceptibly she rested her head on his shoulder, her grip on his hand tight as she rubbed the scar on his palm softly.
They had fallen into a cordial silence now, content with each other's warmth as they shifted and swayed to the boats now gentle rocking.
...
"Percy?" She asked softly.
He hummed in answer, too mentally drained to offer up a more verbal response.
"Wha-what did she do to you once I lost consciousness?"
He froze, not at the question but at the sheer memory of the Primordial.
"No."
"Percy, I'm the last person to be telling you this," She said, "But please, don't shut me out."
That was fucking rich. Points for honesty he supposed, but he wasn't budging.
"Stop it. I'm not talking about this."
"Jason was the one who suggested I give you a shot. He didn't tell me anything, calm down, but he looked worried Percy." She added quickly upon seeing Percy's turbulent expression.
Well there went any good will he'd felt for the Son of Jupiter earlier, he should've finished the job and fed his corpse to the sharks while the storm kept everyone occupied.
"Annabeth I can't." He stressed.
She got off his shoulder and looked him right in his eyes.
"You can't or you won't?"
"What the fuck does it matter?!" He demanded desperately.
"Percy, I saw what you did to Akhlys..."
"I know you did, you don't have to keep reminding me." He moaned as he buried his head in his hands.
"No Percy, I saw what you did to Akhlys."
That caught him off-guard, his head snapped towards the grim face of his girlfriend in shock.
She nodded in understanding.
"She brought me back just in time to see the end of it...but even that was more than enough." She pushed.
"I was," A pause, "I was terrified and so, so confused and it made me act stupid." She said self-deprecatingly, "I should've tried to reach out, should've gotten your side of the story."
"Annabeth, don't-"
"But I was so angry and-and-and-and hurt! I thought" She stammered unsteadily, "...I thought you'd gone back to finish the job when you thought I wasn't looking."
"Annabeth-"
"And it made me act like such a bitch to you, it made me selfish because for all my problems, at least I had someone looking out for me. But you?" She laughed self-deprecatingly, "You've been dealing with all of this alone from the start, haven't you? From the-"
"Stop it Annabeth! Please just-just stop it already." He ended lamely, the tears running down his cheeks already puddling in front of him as quiet sobs wracked his body.
Annabeth wasted no time in consoling him, cradling his head in her bosom as he cried his heart out. Murmuring sweet nothings into his hair as he struggled to get his shit together.
He hated this. He hated this conversation.
He hated Annabeth for making him like this.
He hated himself for being so weak.
He hated Gaea, Athena, and this stupid fucking quest for making him have to go down into Tartarus in the first place.
And he hated hated hated hated hated Her for what she'd done to him. For fucking him up so utterly.
He looked upwards desperately, hoping to draw comfort or a reprieve at least from the stars again.
No such luck, what he saw had him wishing for the burden of the sky again.
Holy Hera, drowning in muskeg again was preferable to this.
He was struggling for air now, the mouthfuls he gulped seemingly disappearing by the second. Annabeth detached herself from his immediate space as soon as she noticed his vigorous breaths, fearing he was having an anxiety attack, hoping to grant him respite. She turned her upwards violently, when the shallow breaths showed no sign of stopping, and audibly choked on her saliva.
As if summoned by immortal spite, She stood there.
Billowing clouds of black extended from her back, floating outward like wings. A miasmic fog floated across her almost nude form as it clung to her like the barest hint of primal wear. Even her flowing hair helped hide her skin. Across her body, the same stars that dotted her cheekbones splattered her torso. He could even make out the form of the Huntress aiming her bow at the Goddess' heart.
She gave him a smug tinkling white smile, and he knew instinctively She could taste his fear.
Tartarus' sweaty armpits, it looked like She couldn't quite get enough of his panic.
Percy should have done something, anything at all to try to defend himself yet he sat his ass down firmly on that deck, paralyzed with fear as the Night cackled maliciously to herself.
He closed his eyes tightly as memories of the Mansion of Horrors reacted vehemently to their proprietor, trying their level best to leave him a sniveling mess on the floor.
He felt a soft tugging on his shirt from his girlfriend. His girlfriend. He couldn't leave her alone to deal this monster, it wouldn't even be a contest.
He rose to his feet and opened his eyes glaring fiercely upwards to where the goddess once was, a violent churning in his gut as he prepared for what would most certainly be his final battle, but she was gone just as fast as she came. Not even a hint of the fog she emanated lingered in her absence.
...
Huh.
Well that was anticlimac-
SMACK.
His head twisted violently to the side, and Percy was all but certain it was going to leave a very red cheek.
He rolled with the strike as he plunged his hand into his pocket and bent the entire Aegean to his will, he turned back to his assailant. Riptide and the barely restrained fury of the sea ready to skewer and crush and...faltered at the sight of an unamused Annabeth Chase.
Her arms were folded across her chest as her foot tapped against the floor absently, a perfectly sculpted eyebrow raised in question at the towering conglomeration a literal hair's breadth away from her form.
"ANNABETH!" he shouted angrily, not quite ready to release his hold on his domain yet.
"What?" She said in answer, her hands placed on her hips as she returned his glare with equal ferocity.
He gestured comically to the rapidly forming hand-shaped bruise on his cheek then looked at her like she was crazy, gesturing for her to speak.
"You were tempting fate." She said simply.
"WHAT?!" He exclaimed in indignation, his eyes narrowed in confusion as his arms drooped limply to his sides, the sea receding slightly.
She marched towards him determinedly - utterly unimpeded by the water still surrounding her - and poked him in the chest aggressively.
"Don't get snippy with me Jackson, I've been with you for 5 years now. I know your at least it can't any worse look like the back of my hand." She finished with a poor mimic of his voice.
"I wasn-" He stopped suddenly once her eyes drifted to her hand, likely in prep for another round of disciplining.
He slumped fully now and sheathed his sword, his earlier adrenaline fully deteriorating as he relinquished his hold on the water.
"You did that on purpose didn't you?" He questioned "To loosen me up."
"I have no idea what you're talking about, Seaweed Brain." She said absently, though her self satisfied smirk was evidence enough to the contrary.
Idly, he noticed they were close enough to each other now for their noses to touch, likely a conscious effort by his Wise Girl if the way her eyes were shining were any indication.
He enveloped her in a gentle hug sighing in content as the scent of her shampoo massaged his fraying nerves, his heart skipped a beat at her noticeable flinch then nearly flatlined when it looked like she wasn't going to reciprocate the hug. Her soft chuckles soothed him though, it seemed teasing was the order of the hour now.
"You dick," He grumbled, "You're too good for me."
She remained silent for a few beats instead choosing to cling onto him like he was a life preserver on a sinking boat.
"No Percy, I'm really not."
He felt a jolt of pain as drifted her hand down to his previous Achilles spot, almost like she was guarding it, and guided them back to the railing.
They meandered in silence for a bit before Percy finally huffed a puff of air in exasperation.
"You still want to know, don't you?" He asked.
"..."
She kept quiet as she nodded minutely, her curiosity overriding her self preservation.
He glanced upwards again to nothing but the desolate sky, its previous brilliance dulled. He didn't for a second take that to mean She was gone though.
Just because he couldn't see her didn't mean She couldn't see him.
"We made a deal," Percy said, "Akhlys' life for yours."
Annabeth narrowed her eyes in suspicion. Figures she wouldn't buy such a feeble response.
But that wasn't what he was trying to hide.
"There's more to that, I know there is." She pleaded.
"..."
"Percy..."
"She needed a sacrifice for something," He said carefully, "She'd have preferred me but Akhlys was enough of a substitute."
Another round of contemplative silence.
"Wasn't-wasn't Akhlys her daughter, why would she..."
"I'm not going to pretend to understand her thought process," He shook his head in disgust, "And I don't really want to, but the Night is from a different time. It's not so hard to believe that She wouldn't have much of a tolerance for 'weaklings'."
"But she protected Hypnos from Zeus in the stories!" She cried desperately, still trying to make sense of it all.
He empathized with her wholly, he still questioned the point of it all even now and he'd been there for it.
"I think She was more okay with it?" He pondered, "Yeah, more okay with it because Akhlys lost to a demigod. Hypnos had the defense in that he'd been running from Zeus of all gods."
"Either way it doesn't matter much to me." He shrugged.
"What do you mean it doesn't matter?!" Annabeth wailed in annoyance at the casual dismissal.
He turned to her, gazing solemnly down at her enchanting stormy irises. He cupped a hand to her left cheek, preening inwardly at the way she leaned to his touch unintentionally.
"It doesn't matter to me because I don't regret it." He said as he brought his other hand to her right cheek, "Not one bit. You're here, you're here right now as strong and beautiful and as freaking amazing as you've always been."
Annabeth was holding onto his wrists like they were the only things keeping her from melting on the spot, her cheeks as crimson as one of Apollo's cows.
"You're such a sap, you dork." She murmured softly, "What are we going to do Percy?"
She released his arms and rested her head on his chest while he wrapped his arms around her, reveling in her warmth.
We.
He noticed fondly that she'd said We, there might still be some hope here.
"We still have no idea how to beat Gaea of all gods, now we have another Primordial after our necks." She laughed depressingly, "Two, if Tartarus himself wants a piece of the action."
"Plus Titans and Gods and monsters and-it's too much Percy, we've done too we've seen too much. I can't-I don't," Annabeth looked up to him with wide panicked eyes, "I don't want to die, Percy."
Annabeth's voice broke at the end, her body shaking weakly as his chest dampened from warm wet tears. He took it all in silence however, content to let her be while he worked out a response.
What could he even say? He'd thought as much during his encounter with Akhlys and it had only gotten more apparent as the days came and went.
Demigods normally weren't expected to live long anyway on account of their scent. Heroes in general were all but fated to die terrible deaths once Fate decided their purpose was fulfilled. He'd thought - prayed - that with the death of Kronos, things would change for the better. That he and his loved ones could finally move on with their lives, and yet...
"I don't know." He said finally, "I really don't know."
Annabeth looked downcast at his response, her brilliant eyes dulling as she lost her last bit of hope for a better tomorrow.
For a happy ending for the both of them.
He took a fair pause as he gathered his wits.
"But I also didn't know how we were going to get Zeus' bolt, I didn't know how we were going to cross the Sea of Monsters or the Labyrinth," He continued resolutely, his hold on his lover firm, "I didn't know how we were going to beat Kronos."
Annabeth was looking at him now, her red-rimmed eyes latching onto his words like they were scripture.
"I didn't know how we were going to kill an 'unkillable' Giant," Percy chuckled animatedly, "And I sure as Hades had no idea how we were ever going to get of Tartarus."
"But we pulled through." He finished, "Time and again we always managed. Whether by the skin of our teeth or otherwise, we mostly made it out with our dignity."
Annabeth was smiling now, a weak somber smile but a smile all the same.
"I'd like to believe we'd be able to pull of a miracle here, can't you?"
"Percy-" She started.
"It won't be easy I know - gods of Olympus I know - but I also know I can do just about anything when I have you with me."
Slowly, gently, he brushed aside her golden bangs to lay a delicate kiss on her creased forehead.
It was simple. It was chaste. It had him itching for more yet he cuffed that annoying urge with a barbed leash. He'd made his point.
"I love you, Annabeth Chase," He whispered lovingly his voice laden with affection, "Every single facet of you."
Annabeth never responded.
Y*C*O*Y*W
1 August 2010, Long Island Sound, New York, United States of America
15 Minutes Since Gaea's Resurrection
AS SOON AS GAEA ACHIEVED LIFTOFF, THE GROUND SOLIDIFIED.
Demigods stopped sinking, though many were still buried up to their waists. Sadly, the monsters seemed to be digging themselves out more quickly. They charged the Greek and Roman ranks, taking advantage of the demigods' disorganization.
Jason put his arms around Piper's waist. He was about to take off when Percy yelled, "Wait! Frank can fly the rest of us up there! We can all –"
"No, man," Jason said. "They need you here. There's still an army to defeat. Besides, the prophecy –"
"He's right." Frank gripped Percy's arm. "You have to let them do this, Percy. It's like Annabeth's quest in Rome. Or Hazel at the Doors of Death. This part can only be them."
Percy obviously didn't like it, but at that moment a flood of monsters swept over the Greek forces. Annabeth called to him, "Hey! Problem over here!" Percy ran to join her.
Frank and Hazel turned to Jason. They raised their arms in the Roman salute, then ran off to regroup the legion.
Jason and Piper spiraled upward on the wind.
"I've got the cure," Piper murmured like a chant. "It'll be fine. I've got the cure."
Jason realized she'd lost her sword somehow during the battle, but he doubted it would matter. Against Gaea, a sword would do no good. This was about storm and fire…and a third power, Piper's Charmspeak, which would hold them together. Last winter, Piper had slowed the power of Gaia at the Wolf House, helping to free Hera from a cage of earth. Now she would have an even bigger job.
As they ascended, Jason gathered the wind and clouds around him. The sky responded with frightening speed. Soon they were in the eye of a maelstrom. Lightning burned his eyes. Thunder made his teeth vibrate.
Directly above them, Festus grappled with the earth goddess. Gaea kept disintegrating, trying to trickle back to the ground, but the winds kept her aloft.
Festus sprayed her with flames, which seemed to force her into solid form. Meanwhile, from Festus' back, Leo blasted the goddess with flames of his own and hurled insults. 'Potty Sludge! Dirt Face! THIS IS FOR MY MOTHER, ESPERANZA VALDEZ!'
His whole body was wreathed in fire. Rain hung in the stormy air, but it only sizzled and steamed around him.
Jason zoomed towards them.
Gaea turned into loose white sand, but Jason summoned a squadron of venti who churned around her, constraining her in a cocoon of wind.
Gaea fought back. When she wasn't disintegrating, she lashed out with shrapnel blasts of stone and soil that Jason barely deflected. Stoking the storm, containing Gaia, keeping himself and Piper aloft…Jason had never done anything so difficult. He felt like he was covered in lead weights, trying to swim with only his legs while holding a car over his head. But he had to keep Gaia off the ground.
That was the secret Kym had hinted at when they spoke at the bottom of the sea.
Long ago, Ouranos the sky god had been tricked down to the earth by Gaea and the Titans. They'd held him on the ground so he couldn't escape and, with his powers weakened from being so far from his home territory, they'd been able to cut him apart.
Now Jason, Leo and Piper had to reverse that scenario. They had to keep Gaia away from her source of power – the earth – and weaken her until she could be defeated.
Together they rose. Festus creaked and groaned with the effort, but he continued to gain altitude. Jason still didn't understand how Leo had managed to remake the dragon. Then he recalled all the hours Leo had spent working inside the hull over the last few weeks. Leo must have been planning this all along and building a new body for Festus within the framework of the ship.
He must have known in his gut that the Argo II would eventually fall apart. A ship turning into a dragon … Jason supposed it was no more amazing than the dragon turning into a suitcase back in Quebec.
However it had happened, Jason was elated to see their old friend in action once more.
"YOU CANNOT DEFEAT ME!" Gaia crumbled to sand, only to get blasted by more flames. Her body melted into a lump of glass, shattered, then re-formed again as human. "I AM ETERNAL!"
"Eternally annoying!" Leo yelled, and he urged Festus higher.
Jason and Piper rose with them.
"Get me closer," Piper urged. "I need to be next to her."
"Piper, the flames and the shrapnel –"
"I know."
Jason moved in until they were right next to Gaia. The winds encased the goddess, keeping her solid, but it was all Jason could do to contain her blasts of sand and soil. Her eyes were solid green, like all nature had been condensed into a few spoonfuls of organic matter.
"FOOLISH CHILDREN!" Her face contorted with miniature earthquakes and mudslides.
"You are so weary," Piper told the goddess, her voice radiating kindness and sympathy. "Aeons of pain and disappointment weigh on you."
"SILENCE!"
The force of Gaia's anger was so great that Jason momentarily lost control of the wind. He would've dropped into free fall, but Festus caught him and Piper in his other huge claw.
Amazingly, Piper kept her focus. "Millennia of sorrow," she told Gaia. "Your husband Ouranos was abusive. Your grandchildren the gods overthrew your beloved children the Titans. Your other children, the Cyclopes and the Hundred-Handed Ones, were thrown into Tartarus. You are so tired of heartache."
"LIES!" Gaia crumbled into a tornado of soil and grass, but her essence seemed to churn more sluggishly. The mind shredding power in her voice earlier lost.
If they gained any more altitude, the air would be too thin to breathe. Jason would be too weak to control it. Piper's talk of exhaustion affected him, too, sapping his strength, making his body feel heavy.
"What you want," Piper continued, "more than victory, more than revenge…you want rest. You are so weary, so incomprehensibly tired of the ungrateful mortals and immortals."
"I–YOU DO NOT SPEAK FOR ME–YOU CANNOT–"
"You want one thing," Piper said soothingly, her voice resonating through Jason's bones. "One word. You want permission to close your eyes and forget your troubles. You–want–SLEEP."
Gaia solidified into human form. Her head lolled, her eyes closed, and she went limp in Festus' claw.
Unfortunately, Jason started to black out, too. The wind was dying. The storm dissipated. Dark spots danced in his eyes.
"Leo!" Piper gasped for breath. "We only have a few seconds. My charmspeak won't–"
"I know!" Leo looked like he was made of fire. Flames rippled beneath his skin, illuminating his skull. Festus steamed and glowed, his claws burning through Jason's shirt. "I can't contain the fire much longer. I'll vaporize her. Don't worry. But you guys need to leave."
"No!" Jason said. "We have to stay with you. Piper's got the cure. Leo, you can't –"
"Hey." Leo grinned, which was unnerving in the flames, his teeth like molten silver ingots. "I told you I had a plan. When are you going to trust me? And by the way – I love you guys."
Festus's claw opened, and Jason and Piper fell.
Jason had no strength to stop it. He held on to Piper as she cried Leo's name, and they plummeted earthwards.
Festus became an indistinct ball of fire in the sky – a second sun – growing smaller and hotter. Then, in the corner of Jason's eye, a blazing comet streaked upward from the ground with a high-pitched, almost human scream.
Jason blacked out, before he could confirm if the comet intercepted the ball of fire above them.
Y*C*O*Y*W
A Minute Before Leo 'Destroyed' Gaea
"FROM YOUR RIGHT SEAWEED BRAIN!" HIS GIRLFRIEND WARNED.
Percy rolled to the side as a blackened, imperial gold warhammer swam through the air right where his head would have been and slammed into the ground, his face and arms scratched and stained by the debris and mud from the impact. He endured all the same, rolling to his feet and slashing right where his would-be killers elbows would be.
He was awarded for his efforts with a shriek of pain as the monster - a wild horned centaur - stared horrified at its freshly relieved forearms.
Percy wasted no time dispatching the party pony from hell, Riptide little more than a blur as she tore through the flesh, sinew and cartilage of the enemy's unarmored front and hind hocks with surgical precision. He ended the monsters misery when it looked like it was going into shock instead of dust.
It seemed his merciful deed had given him some good karma in the form of a moments respite, he took that time to survey the battlefield rather than dig out the aching wedgie that had been hampering him for the better part of an hour now.
He despised armor with a passion.
All in all, the battle was going overwhelmingly well in their favor, his allies were handling themselves far better than any force on Earth could boast of given the odds. For every Demigod, Roman and Greek, or Nature spirit they had in fighting shape they were outnumbered 10:1 by a literal roulette wheel of mythological horrors.
Yet, his people soldiered on with the manic and persistent tenacity of a Jehovah witness - clubbing smaller foes with their fists if they had to - Gaea be damned before they lost their loved ones here.
Percy let out a low appreciative whistle as he watched Annabeth ride a massive cyclops to a mass gathering of bogeymen.
Her Drakon bone sword lodged in its shoulder serving as an anchor and her clawed hand on the monsters lone eye serving as a disgusting steering wheel, while the cyclops pulverized any soul unfortunate enough to remain nearby it in its agony-fueled rampage.
And that was humane compared to where Clarisse had shoved her spear in that Cyno-doggo whatever monster.
KABOOM
Percy nearly buckled as a titanic expulsion of energy roared above him from the heavens. He turned his sights to the sky as the weather altering explosion turned the still dark sky golden. Idly, he noticed a blazing comet streaking upwards mere inches past the radius of the explosion.
What the heck was that about?
'Shit, the team!' He thought frantically.
The sheer force of the explosion was enough to put most of the ongoing battles on pause if not outright knocking combatants over like bowling pins, and that was from 1000's of meters from ground level. How on Earth would they survive so close to the explosion?
He searched through the skyline and the blast radius like a man possessed for any indication of his friends to no avail, yet as he started to fear the worst three vaguely humanoid shapes expelled themselves from the thinning explosion. He heard cheering behind him from his friends as they celebrated the victory of not one, but two great prophecies in the span of a single year.
Maniacs.
He smiled wearily. His good mood only skyrocketing as more and more monsters dropped their weapons in despair as it dawned on them that not even a Primordial was enough to cull the Demigods of Olympus.
His smile melted off his face however, when he noticed the Roman war eagles had only plucked out 2 bodies from the sky, avoiding the third like it had the plague.
He figured it could be Jason though, the son of Jupiter might have lost all love from anything resembling Roman for his hand in their unintentional Act of War, but Piper and Leo especially were undeniably Greek.
And Jason wasn't 10 feet tall.
His blood chilled.
'Fucking Fates.' He thought miserably.
"Keep her off the ground!" Percy screamed at the eagles hopelessly, his friends looking at him like he was crazy, "Don't let her touch the-"
An earth rending boom sent tremors across the state as Gaea's fiery body collided with itself right outside the camp's border with the force of an atom bomb. The world was lit up with white for several seconds as the shockwaves from the explosion tore through trees and earth with all the open disrespect only a New York cab driver could offer a traffic light, already monsters were quickly regaining their wits deducing that the day might not truly be lost.
That their malevolent mistress could still offer them salvation.
...
He counted 5 dead demigods in a matter of mere seconds - caught unawares as they were - and while his blood boiled at the very thought of it he didn't falter in his advance.
Percy tore through the valley at inhuman speeds with his sword in hand, clearing entire boulders in single leaps and crushing brainless monsters underfoot.
Annabeth, Clarisse, Frank and Hazel remained hot on his heels, righteous fury splayed on their faces, their sole intent on ending this madness before any more innocent blood was spilled.
Gaea had already started to rise again by the time their hastily formed team reached the crater's edge, the unstable earth at their feet nearly flinging them into the comically steep trench.
Gaea looked for lack of a better term of phrase, like freshly spent satyr dung with hints of Styrofoam residue.
Her earth brown hair clung limply to her scalp in hirsute patches. One of her emerald green orbs had been permanently burnt away along with her right hand. Her previously creamy skin was a morbid mix of blackened and peeling patches - to the bone in some places - and melted opaque glass.
And her grass blade dress...listen he was about as willing to fight the goddess in her Granny nappies about as much as the average guy was willing to go for a colonoscopy, but even he could admit that the poor piece of apparel had suffered enough. The 'dress' looked more like a poor-man's parody of kirigami art as opposed to anything resembling wearable clothing, Percy didn't doubt the sight of it would give most denizens of the Aphrodite cabin a collective stroke. Even Balenciaga wouldn't want to be caught dead promoting such an atrocity.
Yet, he doubted even a divine meteor shower to her noggin could wipe off the concernedly unhinged grin on her face.
"Ha ha." The goddess started moderately, "Ha ha ha"
"HAHAHAHAHAHAHA" She continued uncontrollably, "I LIVE! HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!"
Percy and his friends could only watch on in morbid fascination as Mother Earth - A GOD - was pushed further into hysterical madness in front of them. The weight of her barely avoided death leaving her in a frenzied state of shell shock.
She threw her head back, the very act slamming gusts of wind into them from where she stood, and screamed into the heavens.
"EH?! HOW DOES THAT STRIKE YOU HUSBAND?!" She shrieked venomously, the power in her voice fluctuating like cable TV in a thunderstorm, "WHAT OF YOU MOTHER? DOES MY SURVIVAL PLEASE YOU? DOES IT EAT AT YOU SISTER?! YOUR PAWN OF THE DECADE THREW HIS LIFE AWAY FOR NOTHING! HOW MANY MORE SHALL YOU CAST TO THE WOLVES BEFORE YOUR ANIMOSITY IS SATED?!"
Gaea began to pant in exertion at that, her head bowing as her manic high started to dim.
"Such a senseless, utterly pointless waste of life Leo Valdez. I almost pity you." She murmured mournfully to no one in particular.
"But don't worry," Her voice turned frosty as she faced them now, her lone green eye shining with malice, "I'll be sending the rest of your accursed family to you soon enough."
His friends tightened their holds on their weapons, their stances shifting in unease, but Percy remained stationary - lost in his own world, he was. His body shuddered with angry tremors of grief for another dead demigod.
Leo.
Leo was 15 years old.
He'd been in this business for a little over half a year.
A newborn child in this lifestyle as far as any thinking observer was concerned.
He'd been smart, funny, lonely, brave.
Braver than anyone that squishy had any right to be.
"Prissy?" Clarisse asked concernedly as she noticed his inaction.
Percy wasn't sure why this particular death had irked him so, he had burned plenty of shrouds already.
He didn't even know Leo all that well, their conversations on the Argo II had always been scant and to the point.
But he knew of Leo's dreams...and for a guy so utterly devoid of hope for the future like Percy, the very thought was simply earth-shattering to him.
Leo had been the only person on that boat who'd steadfastly kept to his plans for his future. Sure Jason had his noble aspirations for respecting all the gods, but even the son of Jupiter would admit it was something he was only half interested in. It wasn't even close to the raw passion and effort the fallen son of Hephaestus had put into seeing through his ambitions. He'd had the audacity to hope for a better tomorrow for he and his loved ones even with the bleakness of a demigod fate towering behind him.
No, in spite of it.
Percy and the rest of the seven had long since pushed any hopes of living long, fulfilling lives to the backs of their minds. It had been...easier in a way, for them to ignore whatever twisted futures the Fates had in store for them and focus everything on the now, and yet Percy could scarcely remember a time when the gutsy son of Hephaestus hadn't tempted the Hags with how much fun he would have surrounded by his children and Calypso in their little Auto Shop.
How the scrawny latino's eyes would shine like miniature suns when giving the crew another play-by-play on how he'd propose to the Mistress of Ogygia.
Leo had the balls to dream and he died alone for it.
"My dreams are just dreams."
Leo had died alone for nothing.
"MY DREAMS ARE JUST DREAMS!"
It didn't make even a lick of sense how Gaea was even alive.
' "To storm or fire the world must fall" right? RIGHT?!' Percy was spiraling now, his head a disorganized mess as he tried to contextualize how in Hades the goddess had managed to survive, 'SHE WAS WEAKER IN THE SKY, THAT EXPLOSION HAD TO BE ENOUGH.'
And yet the half dead deity in front of him only looked like she still had more in the tank to expend.
Only half finished off.
Only half finished. The story here was only half finished.
Percy recalled fragments of a conversation he'd shared with Her.
One of the only points in that slot machine of a game he'd played against her for all his shitty luck, where she'd actually given him an answer to his questions however vague.
"I don't care for the way the story is headed."
"I see before me an opportunity to tip the status quo a bit to my will and I am more than inclined to take it," The unholy Consort of Darkness crooned, "Well...you were supposed to take it.."
The Embodiment of Night poked his head teasingly at that.
"But you're not quite ready for it yet, are you my little Ελευθερωτής?" She cooed with faux tenderness, "You're only half finished."
"Your authority not yet claimed. But don't worry, I will take care of you."
He'd said before hadn't he? Just because he couldn't see her didn't mean She couldn't see him.
The ascending comet.
The Night Sky.
'...Fuck.'
Percy didn't notice when his body started moving.
He didn't hear his friends pleading for him to not be stupid.
He didn't notice the mist screens of the Olympians, watching and awaiting the final confrontation in eagerness.
He didn't notice the earth rumbling as entire hillsides crumbled in the face of his divine fury.
He didn't notice his form flaring with unbridled malevolent energy, blanketing the charred crater in a deep sea green.
He didn't notice the rain pouring in sheets or the roiling dark storm clouds that gathered above him menacingly, lightning streaking through the cumulonimbus clouds and striking the land around them unabated.
He didn't even notice the foreboding death knell that rang around the clearing in finality.
All he could see was the taunting sadistic smirk, on the drenched beat-up face of yet another Primordial deity who had stolen something from him.
"Are you familiar with Murphy's Law child? I'd abide by the term if I were you. Nothing will ever be the same again."
Percy's path had been forcibly revised without his say-so. And now his altered destiny was laid out for him fully in greeting. There was no going back now.
An oath to keep with a final breath.
He crouched for a split second and leapt into the air with godlike force, the ground shattering apart in a web like design below him. At the zenith of his leap the very sky seemed to touch down upon the earth for the first time in eons, wreathing his weapon in lightning and fury.
The tempestuous winds held his elevated body theatrically in the air unbothered by the laws of Physics for several slow-going seconds...before he tore his weapon and all the gathered energy downwards with authority.
The Earth Mother reared back her arm in greeting to his challenge, coating her still functioning fist in emerald green eldritch energy as the earth reached upwards to her thighs to steady her. Her smile twisted in sick glee at the thought of putting down one of her many wayward family members once and for all.
"Come, boy. ENTERTAIN ME!"
Outside observers would swear up and down that their weapons never even touched each other.
Yet the divine power expelled from that single clash sang like a sacred hymn for the birth of a new Age.
Y*C*O*Y*W
It was a clash straight out of the tales of legend.
An epic that would have even Homer sweatdropping in anticipation.
The battleground was changing itself into a spectacle of wartime desolation, with tremors and twisters destabilizing the already battered landscape. And in the middle of this? Perseus MXXXXXXX Jackson fought relentlessly, trading earth-splitting blows with a Primordial over 10 feet in height.
"GRAAAAHHH!" Percy bellowed savagely all caution and strategy thrown into the turbulent winds as he brought down Riptide on Gaea's fist with enough strength to crater boulders.
As their individual means of destruction clashed again and again, shockwaves of power melded with the charged air and shook the soil beneath their feet spinning it in endless electromagnetic spirals.
The wind howled in tempestuous fury as dark cumulus clouds blotted out the sun above them and skin-shearing mud-nadoes enveloped the fighters. Vibrant green auras struggled for dominance between them, drowning the clearing in pure divine authority.
Percy glided through the rain soaked terrain with determined vigor, his years of battle instincts, his stint in Tartarus, the Athena Parthenos' power, his own inborn powers and the sacrifice of one Leo Valdez the only reason he was even putting up a pitiable challenge to the severely weakened Primordial.
Yes, you read that right true believers.
A pitiable challenge.
Percy was losing. Handily at that. For all the destruction it unleashed and the apocalyptic awe it inspired from an outsider's perspective, for all the advantages Percy had gotten going into the battle, our boy was still a 100% mortal. He tired, he struck impulsively, he lacked the sort of battle experience needed to put down an all-powerful opponent that actually took him seriously.
And Gaea was that opponent and more, the crippled immortal hadn't so much as uttered a word - never mind a taunt - at any point during their battle, her near stroke with death disillusioning the goddess of the need for byplay.
She was a Primordial Goddess.
She'd fought and prevailed in wars against sanity-blasting adversaries that would leave the impertinent savages of her wretched lineage in lifelong straitjackets, and yet she could only claim to be alive by sheer luck. The very thought had her frothing at the mouth in indignation, she would rather die than bear the humiliation of losing to the petulant little toddler before her.
Percy couldn't even hope to use her awkward height to his advantage, Gaea moved through the mud with the ease and grace of a ballerina. Her bare handed strikes were calculated, patient and refined to an unrealistic extreme.
There were no wasted movements. No over the top displays needed to validate her superiority, each strike was laid onto him with the intent to cripple and stagger. She knew she was better than him, she knew Percy was nothing more than an angry bug to her, yet she never erred from her strategy.
To wear him out or psych him out.
This wasn't a battle of equals or an impulsive need to assert her dominance for Gaea, she was far above that.
This was pest control.
Their exchange barely lasted 2 minutes before Percy slipped.
Gaea blocked a heavy over-hand strike to her skull with terrifying ease, as she spat a globule of golden ichor to his face. Percy instinctively tried to blink the offending substance away.
That proved to be his downfall.
He screeched in agony as pure Primordial lifeblood threatened to tear him apart from the inside out, it left a clear opening in his defense for his opponent to exploit.
And exploit it she did.
A devastating fist to his solar plexus had his ribs doing a three count for his insides and folded him in half, very nearly breaking through his chest and out of his back. Time slowed to a crawl as Percy's body was content to stay buried in the goddess' fist...yet it resumed with a harsh lesson as he heaved a bucket of bile from his belly before rocketing away at speeds that'd leave the Roadrunner feeling inadequate, finally crashing a foot deep into a healthy layer of sediment.
Gaea wasted no time gloating. Instead leaping into the air in blatant mockery of his earlier showboating, fully intent on smashing him into a bloody smear. Percy didn't even get to see his life flash before his eyes before the goddess was upon him, her fist glowing in that same acrid energy as earlier mere inches from him.
FROOOOOM
A trumpet?
Gaea was bulldozed to the side by a convenient elephant.
As if summoned from the ether, his friends crowded his half-buried form protectively as Frank the Elephant mushed for his life against Gaea, Young Hazel on his back trying to skewer the goddess with her spatha amidst the confusion. Annabeth wasted no time on commentary as she drizzled a cold rejuvenating liquid over his aching eyes, his breaths coming out in tight puffs, he lapped at some of the liquid that dribbled down to his chapped lips. It tasted of liquid chocolate chip cookies.
Nectar of the Gods.
"Thanks." He grunted out when thinking stopped hurting.
Annabeth paid him no mind. Her attention on the Daughter of Ares before them. Clarisse was draped in her blood-red armor, he noticed idly, an aspis on her left forearm with her grip bone-white on the shaft of her crackling electric spear.
Her back was turned to them protectively. A crimson aura encapsulating her form as the rain sizzled against it.
"Clarisse?" The daughter of Athena called out, she received only a boorish grunt in answer, "Smash."
The slayer of the Lydian Drakon let out a booming war cry as she charged down the gravel path and lingering fog without fear. The blood-red plume of her Corinthian helmet billowing in the tempest, as she sought to add yet another legend to her name.
"You can be such an idiot sometimes, you know that." She remarked idly, her stormy-grey eyes managing to look exasperated yet in disbelief, "I'm not even going to ask if there was a thought in your head, when you chose to OUTMATCH A PRIMORDIAL!"
She slapped her hand over her head in annoyance as she stood over him and readied her sword, offering a hand to his still immobile form. He took it firmly at the elbow and crawled out of the hardened soil, right as a stray bolt of lightning struck the ground a few feet from them where the fighting was heaviest.
The boom of thunder was killer to their sensitive eardrums but the Heroes of Olympus gave no visible response to it.
"Can you beat her?" Annabeth questioned nonchalantly, her eyes scanning the terrain for any sort of hidden advantages before deciding better of it.
An advantage on the Earth against the Earth?
Was she baked?
"Not while she still has home field advantage." He commented tiredly.
The lovers watched in muted fascination as Clarisse arced over them from the fight, right before crashing into the gravel in an unceremonious heap. The warrioress wasted no time scrambling to her feet, her discarded helmet giving them an eyeful of her bloodstained scowl, she ran stationary for seconds on the muddy ground kicking up dirt and debris before rocketing back into the melee with barbaric glee.
"Definitely not." He continued unhindered, "Jason and Leo's plan should have worked, all the better if we'd all been there together to finish her off." Percy sighed.
"But I can't lift her into the air by myself and finish her off alone, and the gods aren't too keen on helping," Yeah, he called bullshit on the contrived Ancient Laws bit they'd pulled at the Acropolis, "We're on our own here."
Annabeth chewed on her thumbnail in frustration, a vein throbbing on her soaked forehead as she racked her brain for a solution, before settling into grim acceptance.
"What about the ocean?" She asked finally, "Could you kill her if she was in the ocean?"
He arched a brow in skepticism. He didn't doubt that the goddess would be killable in the deep. If they were following the same rock-paper-scissors like odds the Primordials were victim to, then it was possible Pontus' realm would be just as lethal to Gaea as Ouranos'.
No his problem was a lot more grounded than that.
"How the Hades do we get her into the water?"
"You let me worry about that," The daughter of Wisdom answered ominously, "Can you do it or not?"
He wanted to grill her more on what her 'plan' was but faltered at her determined glare. He nodded grimly in answer.
"Good." She answered, "Stay here, I'll make sure you get your opening."
He still had no idea what this 'opening' was supposed to be, but this was Annabeth. Her plans had plans. If she was keeping her cards this close to her chest it meant the situation was really that dire. No use heaving more pressure on her shoulders.
His girlfriend twisted towards the main battle, about to charge when he grabbed hold of her silver bracer. She eyed him quizzically.
"Annabeth don't-don't do anything stupid okay?" He begged. "Promise you'll come back to me."
Her cold gaze softened considerably. She grabbed him by his bloodstained collar and gifted him with a passionate kiss that had his brain buffering, as she poured all her love and desperation into it.
It felt like a goodbye.
It ended all too soon though as she parted from him, a long trail of saliva following in her wake as her breaths came out in short pants. Her eyes hazy and unfocused.
BOOM
The heroes returned to reality just in time to see Frank the Gorilla get sent soaring out of the crater, a trail of smoke following behind him from his chest.
"Don't worry, Seaweed Brain," She responded to his silent plea, her eyes never leaving Franks receding form, "I don't plan on dying today. You go get Frank we'll definitely need him for this."
Annabeth's heart skipped a beat.
She handed him a baggie of Ambrosia and dashed away.
"You still haven't told me what any of thi-and she's already gone." He ended as his girlfriend ran into the still raging storm, lightning lighting the path ahead for her.
He grumbled something fierce as he jogged on for his mighty morphing pal, glancing back to the skirmish momentarily.
An oath to keep with a final breath.
The line continued to beat him over the head all the while.
Y*C*O*Y*W
Translation of foreign words in Ch 3:
-No puedo más: I can't take it anymore
-Puedes pendejos dejar de lastimar a mi amiga: Can you assholes stop hurting my friend
-Por favor: Please
Reviews:
-Anonymously96: While I don't intend on letting Annabeth entirely off the hook, I do ask that you cut the poor girl some slack seeing that her reaction isn't something that comes too far out of left field. The fear of the unknown usually makes even the best of us do ridiculously stupid things out of instinct, I imagine watching your loved one torturing someone and enjoying it without shame would have you side-eyeing them in skepticism regardless of the circumstances. Even more so, when all you can see after the fact is them falling deeper and deeper into depravity like Percy has.
Annabeth's dissociation from him wasn't a decision made without any thought, Percy's actions absolutely can be classified as 'monstrous' from an outside perspective even though they entirely have the excuse of self-defense. From his sadistic thought process while torturing Akhlys to the fact he didn't bother letting Polybotes poison him in this story out of some misplaced sense of guilt. He quite literally force-fed the Gigante his own poison here for kicks. Whether or not I intend on actually writing that fight later down the line is up in the air, but it did happen.
In the House of Hades Annabeth shows a healthy bit of fear of Percy after what he did, with that fear only festering under the surface in the Blood of Olympus till her adventure with Piper in Sparta, and this was after acknowledging the fact that Percy actually felt some remorse for what he did to Akhlys in canon. This story tosses that remorse to the sewers and pisses on it, and already we can see bits and pieces of the butterfly effect from that simple decision coming in to play here. Percy's experience in Tartarus was a hell of a lot darker than in canon, and I'm trying to show the effects it could have on his relationships and psyche without him seeming too out of character.
The main purpose of this arc is overcoming that trauma and maybe not moving on from it entirely but not letting it hold him back and dictate his actions, because Percy isn't some angsty, brooding archetype. He's a kind young kid with a heart of gold, a hero who triumphs over even the most insurmountable of odds. I'd like to say more but spoilers.
-Prenicolado: Thanks man I'm trying, I hope you enjoy the chapter.
Will our heroes prevail over Mother Earth and her legions of doom? Will Percy manage to acquire his retirement home somewhere in Cabo? Will I ever manage to keep a chapter within the promised 10,000 word count?
Find out next time on You Can't Or You Won't.