Disclaimer: I don't own Percy Jackson and the Olympians

This fic would not have existed without the encouragement of Stereden, who has also done a podfic of it, which can be found in its AO3 crosspost /works/57201739 or on my tumblr tsarisfanfiction!

Warning for some sensory overload in this chapter.

"Alana," Kronos said. "Your turn."

Next to him, Aquila startled. "He didn't answer mine, Lord Saturn," they protested, sounding put-out. Kronos shot them a look and they recoiled slightly; even Kronos' own demigods clearly feared him, Lee realised.

The daughter of Demeter, a couple of years older than Lee, stepped forwards as the girl with Reuben and Aquila dragged her friend back, out of Kronos' immediate eyeline, for what little it mattered when the titan had returned his inspecting gaze to Lee.

For his part, Lee couldn't help staring helplessly at the girl he'd once considered if not a friend, at least someone he'd got on with, and wondering when things had gone so wrong that she was staring at him so dispassionately, almost looking through him rather than at him.

"My favourite flowers are dahlias." Lie. "I grew up in rural Ohio." Lee hadn't known that about her, but that was probably the point. "The only time my mother ever acknowledged my existence was when she claimed me." Lee knew other demigods had it bad, had heard sentiments to that degree scattered throughout camp across the years, but hearing it here and now, surrounded by demigods that had decided to throw their lot in with the titan best remembered for eating his children, vehemently against their own parents…

The weight hit so much harder.

"Well?" Kronos prompted when he didn't react.

Lee shook his head, dragging out the stubbornness again because it was the only defence he had.

"This is not optional, Lee Fletcher," the titan growled. "One way or another, you will answer. I suggest you take the easy route while it's available."

The sheer absence of a lie in his words should have been enough to get Lee to cave and save himself the torture, but he couldn't do that, because surrendering and helping Kronos meant betraying his siblings, his father, and he couldn't do that, no matter what was at stake. Besides, truth wasn't always what people thought it was.

Truth was finicky. What was true for one person was a lie for the other, and it had taken Lee years to work out exactly how his sense worked (Apollo had helped with that, in his dreams, answering questions and explaining just enough for things to make sense). Luke had known the basics, but if Kronos was trying to use it to intimidate him, he was missing one crucial detail.

Truth was personal. It preyed on belief, powerful and unwavering. If someone believed in something whole-heartedly enough, then it was their truth, and even if Lee knew it was a lie, it didn't set the tingle going down his spine.

Just because Kronos believed he could break him didn't mean he could. It was admittedly a small sliver of hope, because Kronos was a titan that also apparently had access to everything Luke had ever known about Lee, and Luke knew quite a lot, but it was enough of one to matter.

Lee met Kronos' eyes firmly. "Go back to Tartarus," he growled, words tumbling together in the back of his throat.

Gold eyes flashed in anger and the titan stepped forwards, kneeling down and gripping his shoulder again. It hurt and Lee had the sudden flash of fear that if he kept not cooperating, then Kronos would break him physically, even if he couldn't mould him mentally.

That was better than being used to hurt his loved ones. Much, much better, even if the concept was terrifying.

"Claudia," Kronos snapped. "Your turn." The girl of the original trio stepped up, and Alana faded into the background again, making no indication on her thoughts of Lee, or the fact that he'd refused to answer her. She'd always been smart.

Claudia was sending Lee silent daggers with her eyes, arms crossed and muscles bulging. Where Reuben had a dove, she had two crossed spears tattooed on her arm, with the same letters. "I am a daughter of Mars," she proclaimed, spitting the god's name as though she couldn't think of a worse father to have. From his interactions with cabin five over the years, that seemed bizarre to Lee. Ares wasn't close with his kids, not compared to Apollo, but he wasn't often resented by them.

Then again, the fact that he gave them shiny new and dangerous weapons from time to time probably helped. Clarisse had loved her first electric spear, and had become a lot more protective over the replacement when she'd received it, presumably after realising that even godly-given weapons weren't infallible.

Claudia started to speak again, to either spit out her lie or throw another truth into the room, but Kronos held up his free hand with a sharp jerk that promised retribution to anyone that disobeyed the gesture and she instantly fell silent.

"Truth or lie?" the titan demanded. Lee swallowed, not sure what to think of the change but figuring it was only going to mean bad things for him.

"What happened to two truths and a lie?" he asked. The words came out slightly muffled, but Kronos' dismissive hand wave – with entirely too many sharp gestures and wary looks from the closest demigods – proved that he'd understood Lee without any issues.

"The game has changed," he growled, voice thick like gravel. "Truth or lie?" His hand slipped from Lee's shoulder to wrap around his throat instead, pushing until he could feel the cool stone of the cavern wall against the back of his head. "My patience is not infinite, demigod." That was quickly becoming apparent as the grip tightened and his windpipe began to fear being cut off from the air.

"No," he strained.

Kronos scoffed and released him. "Next statement," he snapped, as Lee's head sagged forwards, gasping slightly.

Claudia didn't hesitate. "I ran away from home when I was ten," she said, and the prickle of a lie ran up Lee's spine.

Calloused fingertips brushed against his ear before forming a fist in his hair, yanking his hair hard. Lee was sure several hairs had just parted company with his scalp, and that more were on the verge of joining them.

"Truth or lie?" Kronos asked.

Lee grit his teeth and stayed silent.

He was a terrible liar. That was common knowledge in camp, and not all that rare a trait for an Apollo kid to have – Joy physically couldn't lie, after all – although Lee suspected it was a direct consequence of his own ability. There was something poetic in being able to uncover everyone else's lies while being unable to hide his own. Most of the time, it didn't bother Lee – he didn't like lies, mostly for the way they made him feel, and always tried to be truthful – but sometimes it was annoying.

Either Kronos also knew that, from Luke – likely, because he knew Luke knew he was a terrible liar – or he'd already worked it out, because yes/no questions like this were his bane if he was trying to hide something. If Lee was confident in his ability to lie, maybe he would have started to answer, mixing up truths and lies so Kronos couldn't trust him.

Unfortunately, he knew that if he tried to claim she'd told the truth there, Kronos would see through it in an instant. Luke had been one of the ones to first point out to him that he was a terrible liar, and Lee had always wondered if there was a possibility that a child of the god of thieves and liars could do something similar to him. Apollo and Mr D had also told him, with drastically different words and ways, that his skills didn't lie in deceit.

All Lee could do was stay silent.

He'd had years of practice of not calling out when people lied – living in a camp full of teenagers meant that lies seemed to float around near-constantly, mostly small and inconsequential white lies but sometimes bigger, more important things that made or broke relationships. He could do it.

Even if he'd never tried to not do it during an interrogation that felt barely a step away from looming torture.

Kronos shook his head slightly, forcing him to meet those horrible golden irises of his again, and they bored into him as though the titan had his own truth-sensing ability. Lee hadn't even considered that he might do, too – he associated the truth with Apollo, lies with Hermes, and how the mind worked with Dionysus. Kronos was the titan of time and agriculture – neither of those should lend themselves towards lies.

But also he was a titan. Lee couldn't tell when a god lied – his head hurt when gods spoke to him, a constant clash of lie-lie-lie, and Apollo had explained to him that it was because gods knew so much more than Lee could comprehend, so everything triggered as a lie because Lee could sense there was more, even if the god was actually telling the truth.

Apollo and Mr D both actively blocked his ability when they spoke to him, now, to save him the migraine. He still wasn't quite sure why Mr D did it, but he wasn't complaining about it.

For some reason, though, Lee wasn't getting the same incessant feedback from Kronos. Maybe titans were less complex, or maybe it was because he was in Luke's body, rather than his own.

Maybe that made him functionally closer to a demigod, or demititan, than he should be.

Lee wasn't going to ask.

"You will answer," Kronos promised him, voice low and gravelly. The weight of a truth fell from his tongue. "Third statement."

Golden eyes pinned Lee in place, a metaphorical restraint to go with the physicality of manacles and a hand balled in his hair, as Claudia dropped another truth. "I left the legion when I was fifteen."

These demigods with tattoos on their arms and their strange words had Lee wanting to ask questions. Legion, and legacy, and Lord Saturn, Mars, Vulcan. The Latin for Greek, used as a clear slur.

There was something going on there, something that niggled at him as being big and also very concerning, but he couldn't ask questions, because Kronos would use that against him.

It would also reveal which things they'd said were truths.

"Well?" Kronos asked him, raising Luke's eyebrow again. Just one, in a look that would be inquisitive if the eyes below it weren't burning with unmasked fury.

It was foolish to keep antagonising that fury, Lee knew, and he liked to think he had a reasonable degree of self-preservation. Being a demigod at risk of being attacked every time he stepped out of camp did a lot to nurture one of those.

His self-preservation did not outweigh his need to protect his siblings, and he knew they were safer as long as he didn't answer, so he set his jaw defiantly and stayed silent.

"This stubbornness of yours is pathetic," Kronos sighed. He let go of Lee's hair and stood up, turning away from him and striding across the room. Lee sensed the other demigods also tracking the titan as he found his way to an outcropping and sat himself down on it as though it was a lavishly decorated throne, and not simply a chunk of rock at odds with the rest of the cavern.

The sight put Lee on edge, for reasons he couldn't pinpoint.

Kronos waved a hand loosely in their direction.

"Lie," he said. "All of you. Now."

Lee's breath caught in his throat.

For a moment, there was silence, the demigods looking at each other. It was difficult to lie on demand – for all of Kronos' talk of Lee being good at two truths and a lie, he'd always actually lost because he was both a terrible liar and also couldn't think of one, ever – and for a heartbeat, Lee had the faint hope that they wouldn't manage it.

Then Reuben spoke. "I like you," he said, and the zing of a lie down his back was potent.

It was the single pebble that sparked an avalanche.

Lee could handle lies. He lived in a camp full of teenagers, which all but forced him to have a high tolerance to lies setting off his senses more often than not. Usually, though, they weren't all aimed at him, and they weren't in such quick succession, either.

And he had his limits. Most people didn't know that his headphones were noise-cancelling, or that they didn't actually play music. Hades, most people didn't even know that they were a gift from Apollo, specifically designed to cut him off from voices whenever it got too much for him. Lee could still have a conversation with them on – he'd learnt lipreading fast – and it had left most of camp none the wiser.

Those headphones were long gone, maybe still in his bunk where he'd left them before the battle, maybe burnt with Marcus' body, maybe tidied away along with the rest of his things. That would have been his siblings' decision – and Michael knew, so he might have treated them specially.

Reuben led the charge, not even bothering to be creative but repeating the same words over and over again – I like you – each one stacking on top of the last one, but for whatever reason, likely fear of Kronos (Lee hoped it was fear of Kronos more than a desire to hurt him, tried to persuade himself it was that), the entire crowd joined in.

The words overlapped with each other, a building cacophony the same way an orchestra slowly crescendoed to a fortissimo finale with more and more instruments joining in and filling the area with sound until there were no gaps to be found, nowhere for silence to find a home and wait it out. Lee counted his breathing, trying to hone his focus away from the lies bombarding him and keep his body under control at the same time.

He could only stave it off for so long.

Despite his best efforts, his breathing started to hitch as lies thrummed through his body, crawling out from just his spine and dancing across all of his nerves, leaving its localised, normal, area and branching out desperately for any space it could find to express itself. It took over his back first, the trapezius first to fall, followed by the latissimus dorsi, before it sprawled out further, down past his glutes and up across his deltoids. His limbs were second, creeping down the backs of them before it started to wrap around his torso, setting sparks that burst into flame over his pectorals and obliques.

Breathing got harder still as his chest tightened involuntarily, trying to protect itself from the sensation that wasn't supposed to be there. It had only got so bad once before, an occasion back when he was seven that ended up being the inciting incident for the gifted headphones. Lee had forgotten how bad it had been, trapped with no way out.

His wrists tugged uselessly at the metal that held them in place, hands desperately reaching out to try and cover his ears, to try and block it all out, but they were too secure, and too far away. The best Lee could manage was awkwardly straining his neck far enough to reach one, and attempting to raise his other shoulder high enough to block his still-exposed ear.

It didn't work. His knees drew up, trying to curl into some sort of protective ball as his breathing turned to wet gasps and moisture flooded down his cheeks, completely out of control with no way of reining it in, but that didn't work, either.

The lies had long since turned into an indistinguishable sound, one that his truth sense could still identify as lies, somehow, despite not being able to hear the particular words. It echoed around in his ears, bouncing off the inside of his skull as the prickling closed in on the crown of his head.

Hands grabbed his legs, forcing them to unfurl and pinning them mercilessly back to the floor. Lee thrashed, trying to kick out and force his freedom, but they were too strong. Another hand grabbed his hair, yanking his head upright and away from any attempts at muffling the noises. Through watery vision, Lee could just about make out Reuben's sneer, so close to his own face that it was almost impossible to focus on.

It was too much.

It was too much.

Lee thrashed harder, but both the metal and the hands overpowered him, forcing him to stay still as more lies were poured upon him, turning his entire being into a single, overcharged lie detector that had hit its limit a long time ago but had been pushed over the line with no regard for whether or not it could handle it.

The pleas started to fall from his lips with no conscious thought, sobs and moans. "Please," he begged, barely able to even feel the cold stone and even colder metal that surrounded him. "Stop, please, stop, please, please, please."

He couldn't even think any more, his whole being a single raw nerve that got ignited over and over and over again. If he was even still breathing, no air was getting into his lungs, and his vision was dark. He didn't remember closing his eyes, but there was a tightness to his face that had to be him screwing them as tightly shut as he could. His raw voice echoed in his ears, gasping and begging.

Distantly, he heard a voice cut over the others, felt the restraining hands disappear, and somehow ended up with his knees up, face buried in them again. His heartbeat was too high and showing no signs of slowing as he trembled and shook in his restraints.

Lee had no idea how long it took before the ignited nerves burnt out, leaving him a raw husk trembling and sobbing against the wall. His eyes cracked open to show an almost empty room, the demigods all gone but Kronos still sitting on his throne of stony outcrop, golden eyes boring into him like he could see past Lee's skin and into his soul.

Maybe he could.

Something must have alerted him to the fact that Lee was aware of his surroundings again, because he suddenly moved, fluidly finding his feet and striding across to squat in front of Lee. A sword-calloused hand grabbed his hair, yanking yet more poor strands out from his scalp, and tilted his head back.

"I will break you," the titan said, the absoluteness of truth blanketing Lee and sheering a swathe through the residual traces of lies that still wracked his body. "Truth or lie."

Even if Lee wanted to answer, he was still too wrecked to even consider trying to wake his voice. It didn't seem to matter, though, because Kronos ruffled his hair with a grin that was far more evil than anything Lee had ever seen on Luke's face before, twisting the scar until it was almost unrecognisable. "Good boy," he said.

Then he stood and left, leaving Lee alone in the cave, still shaking and filled with an indomitable sense of dread.

Thanks for reading!
Tsari