#capsize fic

After waking up earlier than expected, you skipped breakfast, showered and dressed in freshly washed clothes. After a swift goodbye to Sally, who made you promise to use a payphone and give her a call at some point, yourself and Percy made the walk into town. It was as you played hopscotch on broken concrete that you fell into an alley, and came across an entrance to the labyrinth.

Dirt tunnels turned into stone rather quickly, and the air grew damp and somewhat mouldy, the scent of dew and rot in the air. At this point you were largely unaffected by the sudden change in paths every few metres. You were confused about the silence, however. No monsters.

Things began livening up the further in you got. As you stopped at a small crossroads, you could no longer smell rot, but peonies, and roses, fresh cut grass on a summer’s day.

“What is it?” Asked Percy. You must have stopped for too long.

A shrug of your shoulders seemed to worsen his anxiety. “Nothing,” you assured. “Nothing bad, anyway. This bit feels different. That’s all.”

“Let’s keep moving,” Percy urged, slinking around you. “Left or right?”

You didn’t think too much on it, trusting your instincts. “Right. I feel like we’re close to something.”

Percy didn’t look so sure, turning your flashlight to the ceiling. His mouth twisted, and his eyes worried.

“If we see even an ant looking wrong, we’re turning back. Agree?” He held out his pinky finger to you. You connected yours instantly, and nodded firmly.

You wished you could put aside your pride for five minutes and admit you were wrong. With Percy’s hand on your shoulder trying to pull you back, it seemed harder to swallow that pride. You refused to admit this was a bad idea. Or was it?

This direction threw you out onto Mount Tam, where a a huge fortress loomed, overbearing. Casting your eyes around the mountain and its beings, it all appeared somewhat hazy, like your brain knew what this was, but your eyes refused to accept it. A headache began forming behind your eyes.

In the distance, not so far from your hiding spot, monsters were crafting weapons. These things were at least ten feet tall, and complete nightmare material. Compared to the Telekhines of your past adventures, these monsters were the very definition of the word. One of them lifted a different weapon, a scythe—a six-foot-long blade curved like a crescent moon. The blade had been crafted with two completely opposite metals on the spectrum. The edge, sharper than anything you’d seen before.

You looked away when the creature began to talk. “Sanctify this in blood. Then you, half-blood, shall present it when the lord awakes.”

Too locked in on your surroundings, you failed to notice Percy leaning in close to get a better look at the weapon. “Through there,” he whispered. “Straight ahead. We can make it.” Whatever he saw, it must have been important.

Hand in hand with him, the two of you managed to skirt around the centre full of monsters and make a run for it, casting looks over your shoulder periodically. You slowed down when Percy did, heart racing.

“What is it?” You turned back to him, away from all the monsters, and faced it.

A golden sarcophagus in the middle of the room on a marble black dais. It looked rich, it looked powerful, and yet it was largely unguarded. Suppose that was why you ran after Percy, following him up the three steps to get close enough to it you could reach out and touch the coffin.

“I’ve seen this before,” muttered Percy, frowning at it.

“What? Where?”

His lowered gaze skirted the patterns and pictures on the coffin. “In my dreams.” The pictures depicted death, carnage and destruction, total annihilation of everything good and everything you’d ever known. Tiny pictures of the gods being cut, hurt, wounded and discarded of, stamped into the gold. On the far right lay a tiny image of your mother, and something like nausea filled your senses. She might not have been a good mother by any means, but she was still just that, and still she was the voice of reason and sanity in all of this. It didn’t sit right with you to see this depiction of her, hurt and defeated.

Suddenly, your breath began to visibly plume. When you reached out and ran your fingertips along the pictures, ice followed on the side of the coffin.

Percy cleared his throat. “What does it say? On the top?”

You tilted your head, and brushed your hand across the letters beginning to frost over. “Kronos. Lord of Time.” With mild panic and mild fascination, you watched as your fingers began to turn blue from the cold, tilting your head. You pulled away from the source, Percy taking hold to hold your hand up, peering at the blue frost decorating your skin.

Voices grew louder way behind you. Percy, apparently, took that as a sign he should act quickly. With enough force to topple mountains, he shoved the lid of the coffin right off. The noise almost deafened you, when it hit the ground.

“Percy!” You hissed. But…he was right, in a way. You wanted to know what was inside.

You leant forward, peering into the coffin. Morbid curiosity overtook every reasonable thought in your brain. You examined the body lying there.

Blond hair. A scar across his face. A white shirt, and where his heart should have been, a hole lay instead, like someone had taken a hole puncher right to him. His hands lay on his stomach, and he looked at peace.

The body inside the coffin was not one of a god older than everything.

It was the body of Luke Castellan.

You shook your head. You furrowed your brows. “What?”. You clutched the side of the coffin like it might help to ground you amidst the confusion.

“Careful!” Rasped a monster in the distance. Percy’s hand shot out and yanked you around the coffin, ducking down. “He wakes! Present the gifts now.”

Whatever stood on the other side held up something. Kneeling, you looked at Percy, mildly worried, now.

“My lord,” presented the monster, “your symbol of power is remade.”

Quite obviously, the man in the coffin didn’t respond. Luke, remained silent.

“You fool,” said another. “He requires the blood of the half-blood first!”

“Whoa, whoa!” A boy’s voice echoed, shocked. You recognised it, tilting your head. “Nobody said anything about needing me.”

“Don’t be a coward! He only needs your allegiance. Just pledge your service. Renounce the gods. That’s all.”

Percy inhaled sharply. The voices stopped. And so did your heart.

“Go on, then!” Pushed one of them. “Say it!”

The demigod sighed. “Fine! Fine. I renounce the gods. What have they ever done for me? I will serve Kronos. There. Happy?”

The ground beneath you began to shake. Your hand shot out to grab Percy’s arm, but the floor beneath your feet shook so violently that it knocked you right over, tumbling down the dais to the demigod’s feet. Frozen, you lay in wait for him to do something. The boy with one eye, the boy from camp that you knew you had seen before. Ethan Nakamura, an unclaimed child. He stared down at you with an unreadable expression but one which was most definitely crafted from shock, and some hatred.

“You,” he breathed. “I know you.”

Just then, something cold pulsed beneath your left hand, where your fingers splayed out across the marble ground, holding yourself up. A tiny wisp of cold, midnight-blue light appeared under the marble and shot out beneath you, heading right to the coffin on the dais. You twisted, following it in your line of sight, with the stunned demigod behind you. All attention fell away from you, to the figure sitting upright in the coffin, as he did in life. There was nothing lively about this version of Luke Castellan, however. Nothing at all. The flush of Luke’s cheeks was missing. The life and hate in his eyes were gone. His own heart was missing, the very organ that made him Luke. An empty case of a boy who never stood a chance.

It occurred to you that you should make a move, run for the hills while you still can. Grab Percy and get a move on. But you feel weirdly obligated to watch this, whatever is happening. This part is pivotal, you know. Your stomach cries out for it, your heart surrenders, and your brain prepares.

Here.

We.

Go.

The shell of Luke turned his head, and those eyes were cold. Trained on you, he sighed, as if he, too, knew you were in the right place. Right time. Right moment. Luke smiled cruelly.

“This body has been well-prepared, has it not, Daughter of Athena?”

Frozen, unable to move, you remain in spot on the ground. Where your ankle lies pressed to the floor it turns cold, creeping up your leg. Your palms are icy, numb. Horrified in conjunction with intrigue, you watch this part play out, and know from the bottom of your aching heart, that there is nothing you can do now.

Luke moved an inch, and Percy leaped a mile. With his sword raised high above his head, Percy stood with no warning and swung for Luke’s head. Something like a horrified shriek fell from your mouth, your body lurching forward on the cold ground as if to stop Percy. Ethan Nakamura, behind you, gasped, stepped back. The Telekhines scattered. Three demigods left to the ruins yet again.

The sword did not bend. Nor break. It didn’t shatter or stamp. It merely met Luke’s skin and did nothing at all. It bounced off of him. A tug pulled at Luke’s mouth, as he began to rise from the coffin. With deft hands and strong arms, the young adult body grasped the scythe.

Head tilted down, a slight rumble to his voice, he proclaimed, “Backbiter, Luke called it. Don’t you think that is an appropriate name? It shall, indeed, bite back in the right time.”

Any and all courage you had coming down here is long gone. You are left with the dregs, enough to make a run for it. But your legs feel weak, like you’ve been sleeping for too long and they’ve fallen asleep with you, and you’re turning clammy-cold.

Kronos in disguise as Luke pays Percy no mind as he creeps slowly around the coffin, dragging Riptide along the floor. With his left hand free and his eyes on Kronos, Percy reaches his hand sharply around your upper arm and pulls you up. It helps, but you still feel weird. Like the world around you was slowing down. Like your body is suddenly laden with a dozen weights. Your brain is full of cotton. Your eyes begin to blur. Is this an attempt to zone out? Or is it him, messing with you?

Kronos is out of his coffin. Everything around you is slowing, slowing, slowed, but him. And he’s coming right for you.

“This is the part where you run,” he laughs cruelly. “Isn’t it?”

He must have been ten footsteps away when a girl’s voice yelled from your left. Your name, she yelled. Percy, she called. You try to turn your head in this jello-like space, and watch as a red-haired girl by the name of Rachel Dare throws a dagger with such precision you will be in shock forever. The dagger looks familiar. Its shine is brilliant. Its point is sharp enough. It’s yours.

The suddenness of the situation breaks Kronos’s concentration. Your weapon hits the floor after making contact with his face, and it shatters to a million pieces. It will never be fixed again. But it served its purpose for this part. You watch with returning consciousness as the pieces of your dagger reflect light like a million stars. You think of Zoe Nightshade. You think of Bianca. You think you need to fight for a world in which this is never allowed to happen again. And you think you need to start now.

For a split second, Luke returns. Shock wears on his face. His voice is light and pained. “Ow!”

Maybe he doesn’t know what he’s done. Can Luke ever be blamed fully?

Some dizzying feeling takes over you once more, like something is being committed to memory for later, some important part of your past. It feels distantly upsetting, like you could fall to the floor and cry.

But it’s as gone as quickly as it came because Percy has you by the arm and the back of your shirt, pulling you along to the exit side, where Nico and Rachel wait together. Out in the darkness of the corridors, Rachel leads the way, and Nico commands the earth to bend to his will. Dust billowed. The earth shook.

Time marches on.

On the corner of the Marriott Hotel, amidst tourists and workers alike, you stood together processing what just happened.

“We’d better get back,” Percy shrugged tiredly. “Rachel…”

Rachel Elizabeth Dare looked pretty shellshocked herself. After all, she’d stumbled into something akin to a fairy tale not too long ago and saved your asses.

“Yeah,” she shrugged back. “I guess so.”

An awkward silence ensued, whereby Percy shifted from foot to foot and Rachel sighed slowly, looking around. You cleared your throat heavily.

“Thanks, Rachel. We couldn’t have done all of this without you. Literally. I think…Luke would have turned us to toast back there if you weren’t on time.” You fold your arms across your stomach. Surprisingly, Rachel smiles. “But I have to ask,” you flick your eyes between the four of you, “where did you get my knife?”

Recognition flashes across Rachel’s face. “Oh!” She exclaims. “It was on the ground. Like, just waiting for me. I thought maybe it fell out of your bag or something, I was gonna bring it back to. Perfect timing, am I right?”

“Yeah. Like you were meant to be there, I guess. It’s funny though, I don’t even remember the last time I had it.” You turn to look at Percy, he might know better than you, but he shrugs again, with that clueless expression only boys can have. “Ah well. It’s over with now. We’ll make sure to send a thank you card.” You joke. Thankfully Rachel sees the humour in it, and even little Nico laughs. You turn to him, next.

“We should call a cab back to camp. Nico, how are you with the Mist?” You send him a finger gun.

“I’ve been practicing,” he confirms ominously.

“Well, if you guys ever want to hang out with a mortal again,” says Rachel, “you’ve got my number, Percy. It’s not in the books. Give me a call. As random as you guys are, you’re fun to hang around with.”

Percy and Rachel meet each other’s gaze. She slowly smiles, and he turns pink. You feel like an outsider looking in on something private. It kind of hurts. You almost feel like pushing Rachel off the curb, but you’ve just thanked her, and that would be severely random.

“Yeah, that’d be great.” Percy confirms, rubbing his hand on his neck.

At last, the moment comes to an end when Nico huffs impatiently and begins to walk away. You take after him, determined not to lose him again. “Wait for me!”

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Chiron, uncharacteristically quiet beside you, sighs heavily. “You’ve always been burdened with deep thoughts, my girl. You’re certainly your mother’s daughter.”

You cock your head, and rub the space between your brows, just a little stressed. “It’s only the truth.”

The fight is over. Camp has been ravaged. There are injuries to be tended to, crying, unclaimed children hidden away the best they could be of whom need comforting. Somewhere, Percy is scavenging for some ice to tide you over until there’s some spare ambrosia. Your left eye is bloodshot and bruised from a direct hit that you’re surprised didn’t blind you. You can’t see a thing out of it, except for faint colours. Sitting on the edge of the path which winds through camp, you can do nothing but wait for Percy. Travis stopped by after it all calmed down, nursing a broken arm, and after a quick relieved hug, he decided he needed to get back to Katie, his newest friend, and a newcomer to camp.

“I’ve gotta get back to her,” he jabbed his thumb over his shoulder, the non-broken arm. His hair lay sweaty across his forehead, his cheeks were scarlet. “Katie, she—well, she’s new. She needs somebody right now. Remember when that was you?” He settled for a light laugh, but you couldn’t quite manage the same. His smile faded, and Travis looked away awkwardly. “Catch you up later?”

You nodded, and smiled, tight-lipped, pressing your hand against your injured and pulsating eye. Where the hell was Percy with the ice?

“Yes! Sure. Go save Katie.”

It was meant to be a soft-spoken, lighthearted sentence. You’re afraid it came across as quite the opposite.

Between the small groups of people gathered here and there, some recovering, some cracking brave smiles, Percy moved between them. His shoulders were slumped, tired and heavy, and a strong sense of tiredness pulled at his eyes. He lifted his head, sliding through the crowd, and looked at you. Instantly, you sensed the weight dropping from his shoulders.

“Found some,” he lifts up a small white carrier; the ice clinks around inside it. “Here. Jeez, not to worry you, B—it looks pretty bad.”

You peer up at him before he kneels in front of you, and flash an award-winning smile. “Will you still love me even with one eye?” You kid, heart hammering away.

Cherries blossom on Percy’s face. He blooms red. But…he doesn’t shy away. Instead, he touches the ice to your face gently before you take over, moving it where you need it most.

“Yeah, sure,” says Percy, nonchalantly. “We could make you a cool eye patch.”

As a matter of fact, the injury begins to clear up by nightfall. You keep at the icing, shovel a load of dinner down your throat, and walk with Percy to the Big House shortly following sundown. Still lacking vision in your eye, you hold Percy’s arm walking to the house on the hill, unable to judge the distance properly. With sore and weary eyes, body drained from the long few weeks you’ve endured without a real rest, you sink into the sofa cushions like a marionette with its strings cut loose. You eyeball Chiron on the opposite side with the injured side of your face away from the cushion, slumped sideways. Percy takes a seat next to you, close, your shoes up on the couch pressing against his leg.

When Percy rests his hand on your ankle, a gesture you’ve seen Paul enact with Sally during movie night, you feel a sense of peace hit you. You could fall asleep right here with Percy at your feet, like he’s guarding your way, taking care of you at your most vulnerable.

“Daedalus leaves behind his works,” Chiron gestures to the table separating you, where a laptop lays. “For Annabeth.”

For Annabeth. Not you. Not the person who ventured out to stop all of this, but your sister who has not been so much involved. A familiar tinge of jealousy strikes up in your body. You raise your glare from the table to the head of the camp.

“There will be a ceremony for our dead,” he choked, “tonight.”

It got you thinking, wishful thinking, of a place where demigods might grow up and grow old together, where families could mix and be. You fall asleep, when Chiron leaves the room, with your back to the armrest and your aching feet in Percy’s lap. He accepts you as you are, and you him, in all your shared hurting and turmoil. You dream of a place where demigods can live without fear of what ifs and whens.

You hope you might see it one day.

Occasionally, you look at your friend and wonder how on earth he functions in life. Percy is as Percy does. Percy doesn’t think, but sometimes Percy thinks a lot. It depends what mood he’s in. Silly Percy doesn’t think and only jokes. Serious Percy broods and hides away in his room, locked away from the world. Sad Percy sits by the lake and skips stones across the water silently. There are, as you’ve grown to love by now, a dozen different types of Percy Personalities. Each one is unique.

Caring Percy you don’t see all too often. Sure he can be kind and soft at heart, a total pushover for you. He hates when you’re in pain.

“What if you just attempt, like, to drink more of it slowly and see how you get on?” He prods your eye, purplish but less swollen. You recoil suddenly at the shock of pain. You shake the glass of flavoured liquid designed to heal demigods, huffing.

“Yeah, sure, I’ll heal up nicely burning from the inside out.” You wish you could roll your eyes.

“Don’t roll your eyes,” Percy warns, and shoves a towel full of ice on your face. “It’ll hurt more.”

“You know me so well.”

Sitting cross-legged on the dock together, the cicadas and other evil creatures chirp away in the long grass around the water. It’s dark now, all the stars are visible, even with one functioning eye.

It’s a real dream playing out in real time. Lately, you’ve been dreaming in snippets, and seeing them play out now and again in real life. Not everything, of course, but small things, like Katie and Travis walking hand-in-hand in the field while you watched from your cabin unhappily, or an unidentified laugh in your dream coming from the other end of your table at lunch. Silly things which you thought couldn’t possibly happen, but Percy says he sometimes dreams of things happening elsewhere, including days ago when he dreamed of you and he in Daedalus’s workshop, and of Nico talking to Minos in the Labyrinth.

Tonight is one of your dreams come true. And not in the good way. It’s freaky, and you’re not sure you’re a fan. See, the thing is, why is this happening now, you want to know. Why you? Which of the gods has decided you will be their sacred messenger turned crappy oracle. And why? Throughout the day, you’ve become overcome with sudden emotion, while eating, while showering, or talking with your friends. A heart-skipping, terrifying feeling, sadness and fear combined and intensified and chucked at you to endure. The moments feel relevant, important, but you don’t know why yet.

The Oracle won’t answer your questions. You doubted she would, when you kicked her on your way out of the attic.

Grover declares the great god Pan dead.

You mourn your missing and dead, and those demigods who’ve changed sides.

You say goodbye to Nico, on the edge of the woods at midnight. With your bunk just under the window at the front of the cabin, you were woken by a tiny tap, sounding similar to a stone, right above your head. The universal signal amongst all growing up for: hey, I need to talk. It was Nico di Angelo, looking small and sad, blabbering on about how he had to leave and that the camp would never accept a child of Hades.

“But I do,” you urged, taking a step forward, “so does Percy. We’re here for you, Nico. I swear.”

That familiar feeling you’ve experienced the last few days strikes again, a shot to the heart, electric and upsetting. You commit this scene to memory, but why? Nico, before you, this image of him, is transferred to your long-term memory without effort. Little Nico, with shaggy black hair and big, doe-ish eyes. He has a look about him that screams somebody take this weight from my shoulders.

He shuffles on his feet uncomfortably, admiring the muddy spot of grass. “Nah,” Nico mumbles. “I want to go. I wanted to tell you where I was going. You know…you came to rescue me, and all that stuff. So…yeah. I’m going now.”

Should you run for Chiron? Tell him Nico is planning on running away? What difference would it make? He’d only do it again a few days later.

You sigh softly. “Look after yourself Nico. Don’t forget us. We’re here for you always.”

He blooms red in the face, averting his widened eyes. “Whatever.”

And so, that’s the end of Nico di Angelo at Camp Half-Blood. He disappears into the woods, and you don’t see him again.

You’re standing alone in the mildew grass, watching the space where Nico walked just in case he turns back. He does not. Nico is lost in the darkness.

It is silent. No cicadas tonight. No weird animals prowling the woodlands. Just dragonflies and the godly version of fireflies, bigger bugs with brighter lights, drifting here and there in the grass like they’re dancing on dreams, unbothered by the troubles of the world they live in.

You’re so lost in your thoughts that you don’t know how long you’ve been standing here waiting for Nico to come back. You jolt to life when a twig snaps behind you, forcing you to spring away and turn, holding back a scream.

There stands Dionysus, a hand in his pocket, still wearing the suit he wore to burn his son’s shroud. There’s a glass bottle of coke in one hand. It sloshes into the grass when he waves it in a cheers to you. The bugs scatter around the coke splatter.

You look him up and down. “What the hell?”

“You’re not the only one out for an evening stroll,” he rolls his eyes over to you. “Or, rather, evening chatter. That’s not the last we’ll see of the runt. Sorry, child.”

“Don’t be mean.” You’re unsure of where you find the courage to be snarky. “Nico’s just…lost. There’s not much guidance ‘round here as of late.” It explains the drastic change in camp attendees.

Mr. D. only hums under his breath. He takes a deep breath and sips on his drink. Swallowing, he clears his throat. “There goes a very troubled young man. There’s no helping some people.”

His criticism of Nico ignites anger. You stress the line between your eyebrows. As of late, you’ve become so burdened, that at the bright age of fifteen, you’ve developed a permanent line there.

“Nico’s been thrown around like a Barbie doll and shoved from pillar to post,” angrily, you snipe. “Is it any wonder half your camp’s gone? Do none of you have any empathy at all for those of us who fight your battles for you? We wander the earth all by ourselves, or may as well be, feeling misunderstood or lost, and all you have to say is there’s no helping some people. When have you tried?”

You’re breathing heavily by the end of your small speech. Your eyes are blurred with tears. They hurt, and your throat is aching.

You cock your head, and smirk sardonically. “You can’t answer, can you?”

Dionysus looks his years tonight. His face is weathered, his eyes are old, they’ve seen much. A lot. You’re struck with the realisation that he’s looking at you the same way Chiron does often: like he’s seeing someone else, seeing through you, enduring watching a bad play to the end.

You look away for half a second thinking of anything and nothing. “Look—something is coming. I don’t know what, but it’s not gonna be good. You know it. I know it. When the time comes, I reckon that me and you? we’ll be a fleeting thought to those idiots up there. So will the rest of this camp. Do me a favour and fight with us. Otherwise, you’re just as useless as the rest of them.”

The silence is thick between the two of you. Uncomfortable. Unhappy. It feels final. Right. Just. Like you’ve said all that needs to be said. There’s just him left.

Dionysus nods, once, slowly. He holds up his drink to you in cheers. Like someone would toasting at a funeral.

“Remember. The pen is mightier than the sword.”

“You shall delve in the darkness of the endless maze

The dead, the traitor and the lost one raise

You shall rise of fall by the Ghost King’s hand

The child of Athena’s final stand

Destroy with a hero’s final breath

And lose a love to worse than death.”

Ethan Nakamura. The great god Pan, who passed on.

Nico di Angelo.

Daedalus in two instances. Not you.

The last line remains to be seen. You can’t quite figure it out yet.

You think about the prophecy a lot, in random places, mostly. At the counter, paying in a Dollar Tree. Playing with your little brother, getting to know him again in small bursts, now you’re out of camp for the summer. He doesn’t understand why you’re feeling a little out of it.

Right now, you’re contemplating your last few weeks sitting on the toilet in Percy’s apartment. The charts hits are playing in the living room on the television, and someone is blowing a party whistle aggressively. You wish you could sit and think some more, but you don’t want to be gone too long that someone comes looking for you. Besides, there’s a giant piece of cake calling your name and you don’t want to miss it.

The sound intensifies when you emerge from the bathroom down the hall. Sally and Paul have strung up red and green balloons all along the hallway, and put up HAPPY BIRTHDAY! banners too in a shiny reflective shade of emerald. You slow your pace to admire the effort Sally has put into Percy’s sixteenth. That nagging sadness hits you again. You can’t explain why precisely, but it might have something to do with staring at the party down the hall. You wish someone would throw you a birthday party. Just once would be enough.

Percy walks into the shot and shakes you from your brain. He’s wearing a spotty, triangular hat with a pompom on top tied under his chin, decorated with streamers from the poppers people let off earlier. “Come on! Our favourite song is on!”

In attendance at the Jackson party is yourself, the birthday boy, Sally and Paul, the previous neighbours Michael and Jane (whom Sally says were a godsend during Percy’s younger years), Sally’s friends from work with their two children, and their pet lizard (also wearing a makeshift miniature birthday hat).

All thoughts of doom and gloom immediately erase themselves. Percy’s smile lights up the room. You have a Dance Dance Revolution competition in front of the television, then so do Sally and Paul. Everyone eats a tonne of food, moans about getting fat, and eats some more. Finally, when you’re in the middle of trying to do front flips on the sofa, the lights turn off and Sally’s lighting the candles on the cake. Blue frosting, silvery writing, and sixteen candles with angel flames. Their glow reflects in his eyes. At the end of the song, he blows out the candles in one go. Perfect at most things, is Percy. Even when he doesn’t realise it.

It calms down slightly when the cake is cut. Percy gets the biggest slice, obviously, and boasts about it. When you’re all comfortable with something to eat and chatting amongst yourselves, the atmosphere is jumbled with the ringing doorbell.

Closest to the door, you jump up, and move out into the hall. “I’ll get it!”

Percy’s new apartment block comes with a doorman. And typically he’ll call up, if someone’s here. How the hell did this person get in?

You unlock the front door and spring it open, close-mouthed smiling politely. You open your mouth. “Hi—”

And promptly shriek.

The party quietens down momentarily. Footsteps get louder, quick, coming towards you.

“What’s wrong?!” Sally frets, turning the corner. She stops shortly. “Oh! Hello.”

Percy’s dad, his real dad, is standing at the threshold. Poseidon looks between Sally and yourself with, shockingly, nothing but softness and humour.

“I’m sorry to show up so suddenly, but it’s not every day your child turns sixteen. This is a big day for Percy!”

You shuffle back until you hit the wall. Sally steps aside, flabbergasted, to let him in. “No. Yes. Of course. How?”

Percy steps into the hall, taking the spot directly beside you. He always does. “Dad?” He says, bewildered. “What are you doing here?”

“I decided I just had to be here for your sixteen birthday, son. Sixteen is an important age!”

Hm. You’d turned sixteen in the Labyrinth, on July 27th. You’d completely forgotten about your birthday until Percy mentioned that Sally was throwing him a bash for his sixteenth. Nobody remembered your birthday this year. Not even Percy; highly unusual for him in particular. But it was too late to mention now. It would make no difference in the greater scheme of things.

Introducing Percy’s dad to Paul became an awkward affair. Without a doubt, he silently judged Poseidon deeply for not being involved throughout Percy’s life. They were civil. You supposed that was as good as it would get. Poseidon disappeared into the entryway just as Sally lit Percy’s candles.

She called with an impatient smile, “Quick, Percy! The candles are melting!”

The rest of the party included a terrible version of Charades (nobody could guess a single thing), and three rounds of Monopoly with cake on the side. As it turned out, being a child of Athena turned the game in your favour, bankrupting Paul every single time. And when Percy laughed, you bankrupted him, too.

When the party ended, and everyone had gone, the apartment felt empty, and quiet. The familiar feeling came again. Committing it to memory, you turn in a circle around the leftovers of the party: a couple of stray pieces of food on plates on the floor; the Nintendo Wii set up by the television, remote controls abandoned haphazardly.

A hand claps down on your shoulder carefully. Paul leaned forward to look at you. “Feeling okay?” He asks. “Too much cake?”

You shake your head silently. “No, just tired now, I think.”

He chuckles lightly. “I’ll bet. You knocked Percy out of the park with those games! You’re the only person I know who can beat Percy at Monopoly.”

You tilt your head. “And Dance Dance Revolution!”

He laughs heartily. “And Dance Dance Revolution.”

“You pulled some pretty cool moves too, Paul. I didn’t know you could do karate.”

He winks. “I can’t. But I had you fooled, didn’t I?”

You help with the dishes—immaculate, as always—while Sally vacuums and Paul mops. Percy takes out the trash, after half an hour in his room. You thought he was talking to his dad, but you don’t want to be nosy, so you don’t bother to ask. Something looks to be bothering him. You ask if Percy’s okay, and he gives a convincing answer. You drop it.

With the sofa cleaned and covered in sheets, you climb under the covers when it’s the Jackson household’s equivalent of Lights Out. Ticking comes from the clock on the wall in the kitchen, the refrigerator hums. There’s a stream of orange light spilling onto the wall opposite where you lay, sourced from the street lamp outside. The apartment is silent. You’ve all said goodnight. Doors are closed.

Kicking the sheets away to the bottom by your feet, you put your feet to the cold floor and wait a second to get your bearings. You get up and wander silently across the room to the window, pulling across the bottom corner of a curtain. Sally chose the apartment on a quiet residential street, in a good area close to Percy’s new, and hopefully permanent, school. You realise you’re jealous when you become angry just thinking about it. You wish you could have a normal home to go back to, and a nice school. How long have you been out of education, now? Years, at least, with nothing sticking. You’ve been uprooted, thrown from pillar to post not dissimilar to Nico. You haven’t attended a real class since you first met Percy, a good few years ago. Watching a group of friends laughing on a bench down the street, your heart clenches. Sure, you have friends at camp, and family, but they’re nothing like the typical life you want. You want to be normal. You yearn for something steady. In your heart and in your mind, you know that day will come eventually. You’ll get your steadiness, your predictability, and peace. But when? You want an exact date. And nobody can give it to you.

In many ways, you’re growing to resent Percy Jackson for introducing you to this world. It’s cruel, a terrible thing to put on him when it was never his fault. You’re grateful for many things. You just…wish things were different.

You feel violent. You have the desire to smash the vase on the windowsill, to smash up the remains of Percy’s blue birthday cake. You want to scream until your throat feels raw, and cry rivers. You’re forgetting things you should know—your brother’s birth date; your cousin’s name; the colour of your first and only dog; your favourite colour.

Things are changing.

You don’t have the stomach for it anymore.

Everything feels lost, slipping through your fingers like oil. You can’t catch or hold on to anything to save your life. It’s all going too quickly. You beg:

Someone save me.

Someone save me.

Someone save me.