Author's Note: I'm on Sping Break right now, so I have time to write. Enjoy.
Chapter Nineteen: Unexpected Waves
Luke Castellan, son of Hermes and general of Kronos' forces, stared in disbelief at a battleship as she bore down on Princess Andromeda. Backbiter gleamed in Luke's hand as the mortal ship seemed to roll lazily on the seas behind them. He wanted to laugh, but this whole situation had him on edge. Demigod instincts insisted the ship was more than she appeared, but Luke couldn't harmonize that instinct with his eyes as he paced on the deck while he watched. Can't be The Mist, he reasoned. The ship doesn't shimmer or change, but what in the dark depths knows this is more than a cruise ship?! At the flash from the guns, Luke's eyes widened. He wanted to believe the mortal ship didn't see the cruise ship or thought it loaded with harmless mortals, but instead, shells rained down on the ship. Only for children of Tyche onboard could Luke breathe a sigh of relief as many shells exploded prematurely and did not damage the ship.
Distraction set, Luke failed to notice a tracer that fell from the cloud of flak and attached itself to the underside of the ship. Panic set in deep at the blindside of an attack, Luke pleaded with Oceanus. Luke heard the ship creak and moan as the metal came under impossible strain before negative pressure took the ship under the water. Luke and every monster with the demigods aboard began to curse Poseidon as the ship plunged to the depths like a flushed toilet. When the ship popped back to the surface, it bobbed like a cork for a little while. Luke stared in stark terror at the waters ahead of him. White hair peeked out of the unkept blond while Luke's knuckles showed white while the rail groaned under the mortified strength of Luke's grip. That wasn't a normal ship!
At the Roman camp, Percy suddenly stumbled and felt his legs go weak. Thalia rushed over to him in concern and came up next to him just in time for the young man to find his feet again. A sense of wrong came over the young man as he looked at Thalia. His eyes glowed faintly before they faded back to their natural color. Thalia could see ancient storms bartering Mycenaean ships without mercy in those eyes and shot Arcee and Jack a worried glance as her face drained of color.
Jack shook his head when he caught a glimpse of Percy's eyes. They reminded him of the look in Arcee's optics after she came back from an attempt to rescue a zombified Cliffjumper: rage and hurt. He nodded to Arcee and gently tried to lead Thalia back from Percy only to get a shock which numbed his hand when he tried to touch her.
"Damn it," Percy growled. "The Eldest Titan is in league with The Crooked One. I don't know what he did, but it feels deeply…wrong."
Jack shivered as he thought not of Unicron, but stories from his mom spoke of this elder Titan as Lord of Water before Neptune took control of the oceans of the world. Granted, that version of events now seemed highly unlikely with the son of Posidaeia in his face. That demigod seemed to ripple as his body quivered. With each blink, Percy shimmered and rolled as the Sea Child bent in pain, not like the hazy changes when The Mist effected things but with a more substance. One moment, a boy of sixteen stood with hands over knees silently retching. The next, a young girl stood in his place and mirrored him exactly with raven hair down an inch past her shoulders and some expansion of the hips to mark her as different from behind. "Percy, what's the matter?"
"He went against the nature of water somehow," Percy managed, panting with effort and sweat.
The Child of Posidaeia then looked up and straightened, his face set to Arctic ice. "It was only for a moment, but anyone with the Sea in their blood could feel it."
Jack just closed his optics and tried to digest what he'd heard. Titans were powerful, but they couldn't change the nature of a thing. Steel remained steel if you melted or froze it. Energon remained Energon regardless of its form. It would make sense for Posidaeia and anyone of The Sea to flow between forms like water, but surely transmutation was beyond them. Right? Jack looked at Arcee and felt a stone in his stomach. Then, he summoned Spark Render and looked at Thalia and Percy. "We need to get to Princess Andromeda asfast as possible," The Son of Primus nodded to the pair of Greeks. "Get in close, guys," Jack advised with a nervous expression. "I'd rather not accidentally teleport half the camp with us."
Thalia elbowed Percy.
"What?" Percy asked indignantly. "I didn't mean for Mount Saint Helens to blow! If you'll remember, Pinecone Face, you didn't help the situation by blasting the caldera with lightning in attempts to attack the automatons who were after us."
Arcee looked at Jack and shook her head while she mouthed, "Miko?"
Jack shook his head with shiver. When this is over, remind me to tell you about some of the quests Mom undertook when she was still part of The Legion. Even as the group vanished in a ball of blue Energon, Jack could still hear the pair arguing.
On Missouri's deck, the group appeared. Jack and Arcee braced themselves expectantly at the mild vertigo of transwarping. Percy only breathed in the salt air and seemed to overcome the effects of the instantaneous journey with this action as the Sea herself restored his strength. Thalia ran to the port of the ship and launched bile over the side. While she remained hunched over, a hand touched the daughter of Zeus' shoulder. Thalia whirled on the woman with a fury to make her father proud, but the fury turned to icy fear as her eyes met the unforgiving stare of a seasoned warrior. A smile quirked on the stranger's lips, but it did not touch her eyes. Thalia straightened to attention unconsciously at the captain's continued study.
"First time at sea?"
Thalia managed to nod. "What in Hades did Jack just do to us?!"
The woman looked back and watched Arcee pull a chunk of raw Energon from her subspace and offer it to Jack who took it greedily and ate as a starving man might: slow and deliberate bites of the crystal until she was satisfied. "The youngling has much to learn yet," the woman muttered to herself with the trace of a frown on her face. "Idiot could have offlined himself with that stunt." Then, the captain turned her attention back to Thalia. "Welcome aboard, I am Missy."
For a moment, Thalia stared and fought down the instinct to attack. "Are you like Jack?"
Missy's face turned pensive as if the question never occurred to her before. "I and my sisters are as different from Jack as he is from Arcee." Missy looked at Thalia again, and her optics flashed briefly. "Father does not like to create the same being twice."
Thalia nodded and looked past Missy to Percy, Jack, and Arcee. The three seemed to be completely at home on the deck and sat, amiably chatting as if the world wasn't tossing them around with every slight moment of the hull. Thalia shook her head and turned back to look at the horizon with a sigh. Give me land over sea any day. Thalia thought as she sighed and shook her head. By the time we find Luke, I can only hope the battle will be landlocked.
"You seem well enough to join the others now." Missy stated before she stepped aside and motioned for The Hero of Half-Blood Hill to go to them.
Thalia sighed and moved, only for her legs and equilibrium to go completely haywire. Thalia's body told her she was moving towards Percy and the others, but her eyes kept moving up and down with the movement of the ship. As a result, she stumbled and limped along the deck in a zigzag like a drunkard until an unexpected arm around hers and pressure against her side made Thalia walk more steadily. She looked over to see Percy smiling at her with a teasing light in his eyes.
"I know it's rough. Time literally rooted to the earth can't help with that," the son of Posidaeia turned to put a gentle hand on her face before he looked at her and flashed with worry. "Close your eyes and feel the roll and toss of the Sea," Percy coached. "Back and forth, to and fro…" When Thalia moved, she stumbled and almost face-planted into the deck had it not been for quick action from Percy. "This isn't fair, Percy. You were born with innate sea legs!"
Percy bit his lip and pushed down the urge to shake his head. "You're fighting it, trying to subdue waves." Then, Percy beamed as inspiration washed over him. "How do you control lightning?"
Thalia laughed. "You can't control lightning, Kelp Head." She laughed halfheartedly. "Once generated, you guide the energy but don't control it, per se."
"Show me."
Thalia looked at him in stunned silence for a moment. Then, she sighed and simply directed her arms to take in the entirety of the ship. Percy blushed when he realized his blunder. Percy laughed at himself and relaxed to flow through the Water Bending forms with a little variation that seemed to take the sure feet of an Earth Bender and integrate it seamlessly as Percy moved across the deck with almost unnatural ease. Thalia shook her head with a sigh and a giggle. Then, Thalia blinked when a thought struck her and imagined herself as a bolt of lightning with Percy as the ground. Clumsy movement gone, Thalia zipped across the deck to Percy's arms and let out an unconscious whoop of excitement at the victory which caused Percy to laugh softly to himself.
Out of the corner of his eye, Percy noted Jack and Missy in the pilot house with what seemed to be mischievous looks on their faces. Percy raised an eyebrow at this. Then, "Percussion, strings, winds, words!"
Percy turned purple with embarrassment the moment he recognized the opening to "Kiss the Girl" played over the ship's PA system. Then, Percy glared up at the wheelhouse when Thalia erupted with laughter. Oddly, she didn't push away from Percy but began to match the rhythm of the song and lead Percy in a dance while he started muttering, unaware she heard him as Percy ranted quietly. "Triton is a PRINCE of the Sea, not king…" Percy groused, using irritation to beat down embarrassment. "Ariel isn't named in the original story, and Ariel isn't a Greco-Roman name but a masculine Hebrew name."
Thalia took a breath as she ignored her own burning cheeks and looked at Percy, "I didn't know you felt so strongly about a kids' movie."
The son of the Sea sighed and shook his head with a shaky laugh, "It…was my favorite movie when I was little."
Percy rolled his eyes when he felt the metal-on-metal vibration of Arcee's pedes before he saw her. The fifteen-foot femme folded her arms as she watched them. Seriously, Jack, Arcee thought. Sometimes, you're worse than Miko.
What? Jack defended. I figured we could use some laughs before slag really hits the fan.
Arcee vented and watched the sun begin to dip below the horizon. For a moment, the two-wheeler shuttered her optics and shook her helm to rid it of a flash where the sun turned into a massive ball of Energon plasma. Arcee had to focus on the growing Bond between her and Jack to calm herself and truly only felt the tension leave her frame when she felt Jack's hand on her leg and felt peace flood her processor at the simple action before she focused and shrank down to go inside. "What do you say to some rack time, partner?"
Jack looked up at her and smiled, "I'll stay out here until you are ready, Arcee." He could still feel a bit of fear from his Cybertronian guardian and girlfriend. "I can stand for first watch with you, Cee. Don't worry." As he spoke, Jack bit back a yawn and inspected the mental block built around his tiredness to keep Arcee from forcing him into rechage to keep HIM out of Jack's head at night.
Arcee gave him a worried look after the danger of the day where she thought he overtaxed himself but only vented before she settled in for first watch with the son of Primus, aware something was off with him but giving him a little room for the time being.
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