anti-curse
pairing: percy jackson x daughter of apollo!reader
summary: whether he knew it or not, percy jackson made the world a better, brighter place — and you intend to protect him, no matter what path the fates leads you down. fuck prophetic dreams. the future wasn't written in stone.
warnings/disclaimers: mentions of typical demigod things (battles, weapons, etc.); this is set during the heroes of olympus series so roughly follows that plot + features the seven demigods; mainly inspired by book!percy (dark hair, sea green eyes) bc that's the one i fell in love w growing up; characters are aged up from the book (reader + percy are meant to be 21-22 y/o) bc i imagine there was more time between prophecies/series....anyways, please enjoy <3
when you first met percy jackson, he almost shot you through the chest with an arrow.
given that apollo is your godly parent, you often found yourself at the archery field, which happened to be one of the first stops on percy’s tour of camp half-blood. after that first mishap, your other half-siblings were, understandably, too scared to let percy try again — frankly chiron seemed a bit hesitant as well — and you could sense that percy felt disheartened. so, you flashed the boy a reassuring smile before giving him a few pointers and a second chance. when he smiled back at you, you felt a fluttering in your stomach that told you percy jackson would be more than a little important in your life.
archery still wasn't percy's strong suit, but your gut feeling turned out to be true. you and percy had dealt with a lot since then — a handful of quests, several prophecies, more than a few near-death experiences, a titan war, and, maybe worst of all, high school. you couldn't imagine getting through any of it without him by your side, and you knew the feeling was mutual.
so, you were entirely anticipating that percy would be hurt by your announcement during dinner.
“no way that’s happening.” percy laughs, as if he can’t believe you’d suggest something as ridiculous as not having him accompany you on your quest. he remains unfazed, takes a sip of his electric blue coke before gesturing to the empty seat next to him. “come on, sunshine. have something to eat.”
the nickname sends your heart into a frenzy as you sit next to him. you and percy had never been anything other than friends, but sometimes....sometimes you look at his dangerous ocean eyes and wind-swept dark hair and it makes you blush. sometimes you consider the way his laughter fills you with warmth and his smile holds a thousand memories, the way he teases and winks at you and you decide that he makes your world so much brighter. sometimes you remember how sarcastic and thoughtful and loyal and reckless he is, his heart of gold and unpredictability of the sea. and you start to think that maybe possibly you'd fallen in love with your best friend.
that was not the issue at hand, though. you summon your favourite food and drink, but don't particularly feel like having either. percy returns to his conversation with hazel about how the two of you would drive up to montauk after you finally got your license, any time either of you needed to escape your reality, even just for a night. you'd sit on the beach, stargazing and roasting stale marshmallows and wishing to stay there forever. hazel seems to think that sounds like a nice escape, and percy promises that once the eight of you fulfill this prophecy, you'll all go to the beach house together, which makes hazel break out into a grin.
you can't help but smile at percy who loves his friends, who has loved you for so long. that feeling is quickly replaced by a pang in your chest that reminds you what's at stake. from the corner of your eye, you notice annabeth across from you, who looks at you like you’re a puzzle she can’t quite solve. you're trying to hide it, but if anyone can read you better than percy, it's annabeth. she knows something is weighing on your mind. you briefly lock eyes with jason, who you had gone to earlier for help, from the other side of the room, where he sits between piper and frank.
if you weren’t so distracted, you would have been able to enjoy dinner. the eight of you — all demigods of the current great prophecy — hadn’t been all together in a while, and it was nice to share a meal aboard the argo ii despite the reality of why you’d all been traveling together. leo had equipped the ship with magic plates and cups, and with the lively jokes and stories filling the air, you could almost imagine it was an ordinary summer evening at camp. you could almost forget that tomorrow, you had to go on a quest to rescue apollo and artemis from python, a monster so powerful your father barely defeated him thousands of years ago. you could almost ignore the impending war with gaea and the giants, and the doomed fate of the world if you were to fail. the one thing you could no longer ignore, however, is the gut feeling you have about the fate of the boy sitting next to you if your quest is to unfold the way you had first planned it.
you clear your throat, an attempt to interrupt the group's conversations.
“i was serious earlier,” you declare. “you’re not coming with me, percy. jason is.”
the smile percy had on his face fades. his eyes are filled with concern and disbelief, as he glances at you. “i – i don’t understand.”
"percy,” jason jumps in carefully, aware that he’s treading through dangerous waters like you had warned him. “y/n and i were strategizing earlier and it seems to make the most sense, given our powers combined."
percy shakes his head. “but — but you can’t just make last minute changes. we’ve already got everything set. right, valdez?”
leo shrugs, swallowing a mouthful of chicken before responding. “i don’t know, man. i’m no expert in quests, but it seems like i’m not the one who should be deciding this.” leo looks at you, and you nod gratefully.
you've been on edge since last night, and to calm your nerves you fiddle with the gold chain around your neck. it was a gift from your father: a necklace with a music note charm that can transform into an electric guitar or a bow and quiver. thankfully, you hadn't had to need both at the same time.
“it's up to me. and i want leo and jason to come with me.”
“then i’ll come too,” percy's voice remains calm, but insistant.
“isn’t there that thing about quests usually being done in threes?”
“that is true, piper,” percy agrees. he tilts his head towards you, like he's calling on you to remember. "exceptions have been made, though. like that one time with zoe." that had been years ago, when demigods from camp half-blood and hunters of artemis joined forces. five had been sent out on a quest, but only three came back. you shiver at the thought.
"or my quest through the labyrinth," annabeth recalls.
"but won't that also change our other plans, though?" hazel asks.
"not necessarily," you pipe in, your voice more assertive. "if jason and percy just switch. no harm done."
"we're not interchangeable," percy grumbles.
"hera sure seemed to think so!" leo searches the room for positive responses to his joke, but the most he gets is a half-hearted laugh from frank. "too soon?"
you take a deep breath. "it's not a big deal, really."
"it kind of is," percy counters. "you've never gone on a quest without me."
"you've gone on quests without me," you point out.
"that's...that's different."
"why? because i'm so weak that i need the son of the sea god to protect me at all times?"
you're giving percy the coldest stare you ever have. he hesitates to hold your gaze.
"you know that's not what i meant," he sighs.
"then what did you mean?"
percy looks at you, his eyes and tone softer. “look, sunshine, let's just stick with the plan, alright? we can just —”
“gods, you never listen, do you?" you finally snap. "you're not coming! i don’t want you there, percy!”
percy stares at you, stunned. you look around the table, and everyone looks back at you, wide-eyed. they weren’t used to this side of you, your sudden outburst not fitting in with your usually sunny disposition.
“well, someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed,” leo jokes in an attempt to lighten the mood, with less than ideal results.
“you saw something in your dreams, didn’t you?” annabeth realizes.
her conclusion makes you freeze.
demigod dreams are always significant, carrying vivid images of monsters, messages from friends or enemies. some children of apollo like you had visions of the future — pseudo prophecies that are supposedly set to unfold given the path you’re on. technically, you weren’t supposed to share your visions, something about messing with fate or destiny, but that didn’t mean you had to accept the way things were.
what you saw in your dreams last night, what might happen to percy, made your blood run cold.
you would defy all the laws of the universe and divine rules if it meant you could protect him. so fuck the path the fates are attempting to lead you down, and fuck prophetic dreams. you refuse to let percy die. no matter how frustrated you’re acting towards him in this moment, you know he would still do the same for you.
you figure that the future isn't written in stone, right?
either way, you're willing to challenge destiny for percy jackson.
without answering annabeth, you get up from the table and take a deep breath, carefully avoiding percy’s gaze.
“i go with leo and jason, or i go alone.” your voice is steady, fighting the heavy beating of your heart and tears caught in your throat. “either way, i leave in the morning.” you exit the mess hall before anyone — before percy — can protest.
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Use this one trick to instantly fix all childhood trauma (Jedi Masters don’t want you to know this)!!!!!
That is what every “if Obi-Wan had just— *adds one extra scene to canon* —then Anakin would’ve had perfect mental health and never listened to Palpatine at all,” sounds like to me. Look I am not an expert on any kind of psychology at all let alone early childhood development but,
It is possible to do your very best to help or raise someone and still have bad or imperfect outcomes, especially when you have someone actively, secretly working against you (cough cough Sith Lord of the month cough), (for many reasons, but in this case particularly), because unravelling the mindset built in early childhood is hard, actually.
Coming at this from the “raised in a safe and loving environment” side of things, it took me years to figure out and internalize that my friends whose parents weren’t as great as mine were functioning in an entirely different landscape when it came to their interactions with adults.
Many years ago when I was in middle school a friend (acquaintance? idk I think most people thought I was annoying) told me that her ankle kept giving out and causing her pain. I asked if she'd told her parents so she could rest or go to the doctor. She told me she had, but her mother either hadn't listened or refused to help. My (approximate) responses?
"So it's not actually that bad then?"
"You should tell her again."
"Are you sure you explained it right?"
The only explanation I could comprehend at the time was that there must have been some unclear communication about the situation or its severity--if her mother had understood she was in pain, she couldn't possibly have just not done anything about it? Adults are responsible, caring, etcetera! They wouldn't do that?!
With more experience, I've come to understand better, and learned to respond in kinder, more helpful ways, but the shift in mindset was not and is not intuitive.
And I had the luxury of figuring all that out whilst being safe myself. Coming from the other direction, being in danger and trying to figure out why other people act like the world is safe? I can't say for sure, but I imagine it’s a lot more complicated.
Point with regard to Star Wars being, it really is harder for Anakin, coming in later, to acclimate to the Jedi ways and thought processes than it is for his peers who grew up in the safe environment of the Temple. And whatever arguments people want to have about how much psychology and therapy exist in the Star Wars universe, or how much “Jedi just do cognitive behavioral therapy” (not totally inaccurate, but reductive on several levels), no matter what the answers to those questions, it will still be harder for Anakin.
There is a reason the council changes its mind on training him only after he is suddenly famous and the Sith are proven to be back. When Anakin was not in significant danger of being snatched up by someone else, it was genuinely probably the easier and safer option—for him and everyone else—for him to live a different life.
The Jedi are not necessarily fully prepared for a child with Anakin's history, and, there is nothing bad about living an ordinary life. Anakin would not have been somehow unforgivably robbed by living life as a mechanic or an engineer or something, rather than being a Jedi.
Anakin is a victim of many things in his life—Sidious, Watto, Gardulla, Tatooine’s everything, his own conscious choices—but he is not a victim of malice, incompetence, or idiocy by the Jedi just because they couldn't—in only a decade or so—help him fully and perfectly unravel the mindset he developed in his early childhood. If there was any lack of qualification on their part, it was one they were aware of—but which was outweighed by the danger of little Anakin getting kidnapped out of normal-kid elementary school.
Being brought up in and around slavery absolutely made him more vulnerable to Sidous and became the basis of their dynamic as master and apprentice. Acting like the trauma that affects his mindset and actions for his entire life can be obliterated just by making minimal changes to the plot is wild to me.
And don’t get me wrong, fics and headcanons can do whatever they want, not everyone wants or is trying to write a deep psychological character study (also fanfic and even fiction in general cannot and should not be held to any standard of realism if it's not serving the story and the author)—simple fix-it’s (my love) are fun and an excellent short-cut to other things like happiness and fluff (my other loves)—but don’t act serious about the idea that adding one conversation about his feelings or one extra explanation about Jedi philosophy would automatically lead to Anakin having perfect mental health outcomes and always making good decisions.
Disclaimer (if the ones throughout weren't enough) : please go forth and do whatever you want. the moral of this post is actually just that (1) you won’t convince me, (2) I wanted to talk about this, (3) the clickbait title was too funny not to post, (4) i literally can't open my mouth without phrasing things like i'm in the middle of a heated debate, and (5) i continue to not be an expert in early childhood development—my evidence is very literally anecdotal
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It's summer for you, winter for me. Warm me up with strawberry fluff! As always, my muse, your muse, the one and only, Eddie.
Midsummer's night, because I don't have a lot to inspire you with. I'm thinking something cute but weird? Maybe some human body softness where Eddie is a bit of a freak and we love him for it. And we're told our bodies are lovely, even when they're doing weird shit.
I lalalove youuuuu. xo Rhi
RHI!!!! <3 i adore you. thank you for this prompt - i had far too many ideas for it, but ended up on settling for this one, which coincidentally feels like the most subtle of them all? either way, it definitely turned out being the softest. give me an eddie munson who just wants to sniff me like a dog. this definitely got a bit long but i hope you enjoy, my dear <3
the smell of you
warnings: weirdos in love? idk. i have a skewed sense of what is actually weird i think. mentions of death and coffins jokingly. eddie 'manhandles' reader sort of. not edited.
wc: 2.2k+
come enjoy a sweet summer treat with me <3
“Eddie?”
The entire apartment is quiet – too quiet – as you drop your keys into the old crystal bowl on the counter. The clink resonates through the air, louder than the soft murmur of the stereo static you can hear from down the hall.
“You dead?” you call out again, slipping off your running shoes and tossing down your headphones onto the counter as well now, “Do I need to call the coroner?”
Your tone is lilted, teasing with airiness as you continue to wander deeper into the apartment and head straight for the room you know Eddie has to be in. Like the waves pulled by the moon, there’s an incessant string tied around one end of your soul that connects you to his, and you follow it all the way down the hallway. The bedroom door is wide open, and you can hear his mumbled yell of a response without clarity before you even cross the threshold.
You wouldn’t have even needed him to verbally respond to find him in this tiny apartment. You two could get separated on the streets of a bustling city, of a buzzing New York sidewalk, and you still wouldn’t properly lose him. It’s more than just soul ties and his gravity that keeps you pulled to him.
Something unspoken. Something homely.
“Sorry, what was that?” you hum as you spy him face-down in the bed, pillow muting him by the mouthful, “Say it one more time, and this time not into the pillow.”
When he finally properly turns over, he’s a vision. Sleep lines folded into his skin and a bit of drool in the corner of his mouth, eyes squinting in irritation not at you but the sunlight flooding in through the bedroom window. Messy hair, messy shirt, messy everything. A kind of mess you just want to collapse into currently, curling up in all that he is from the day’s exhaustion.
He’d mentioned wanting to take a nap before you’d left for the gym. Something about the summer heat draining him, trailing off as he’d rambled about how he’d probably thrive as a vampire.
“I said,” he huffs, sitting up, the frizz of his hair becoming a makeshift halo, “If you call the coroner, request the comfiest coffin possible.”
“Why do you need a comfy coffin if you’re already dead?”
“You dare deny me of being buried in tempurpedic memory foam? In my hour of need?”
You roll your eyes as you huff out a little laugh, forcing yourself to turn away from him long enough to strip out of your socks. But just as you reach down for the pieces of clothing, you catch sight of the source of that stereo static flooding the room.
Your shared record player, spinning a blood red pressing of one of your more recent vinyl purchases. The album has been played through, but the player no longer had an automatic stop mechanism, probably from years of use.
The center of the record is probably scratched, and Eddie knows it, from how sheepish he looks when you glance over your shoulder at him.
“Speaking of death,” you walk over quickly, purposefully, before carefully lifting the needle and cutting the static finally, “Care to explain why you’re burning scratches into my Momento Mori vinyl?”
“I’m sorry,” he quickly apologizes, nearly flinging himself off the bed as he scooches quickly to the end, clearly fully awake now, “I put it on and thought I’d just lay down for a quick second, but then the bed was so comfy, and I thought it wouldn’t hurt to take a quick nap, and then…” he trails off, looking up at you through his lashes with big eyes already pleading for forgiveness, “I’ll buy you a new one. Swear it.”
It’s impossible to be mad at him when he’s looking like this, inhumanely soft and easily forgiven, “You’re lucky you’re cute, or you really would be dead.”
He doesn’t respond with words, but instead the outstretch of his hands, fingers flexing as he beckons to you. The needle rests on its perch, the vinyl left behind to gather dust for a few extra moments, as you go straight to him.
When his palms slip beneath your old t-shirt and meet your skin, they’re pleasantly warm.
“You were right,” you admit as his knees spread, delegating even more room for you to stand in front of him as your hand wanders to cradle the side of his face, fingers tangling in sweaty curls from his rest. Your thumb mimics his on your own skin instinctively, tracing a large arch right up over his cheekbone, “It’s hot as balls outside.”
“Told you so,” he murmurs, smiling softly in satisfaction as he leans lazily into your touch.
“You did,” you agree quietly, half-entranced by his relaxed face, no sight of pride in the room currently.
He resembles a cat as he continues to preen under your gentle hand, and you almost expect him to start purring right before you find the strength to pull away, removing his hands from where they'd wandered to your lower back.
One swipe of his finger along your sweaty spine, and you’d remembered what your original intentions had been immediately upon getting home.
“Wai- Where are you going?” he’s seemingly brought back down to Earth the moment he loses the pattern your thumb had been tracing, the press of your fingertips into his scalp. When he reaches back out to latch onto you again, you take a step back, “Get back here-”
“I need to shower,” you laugh, shaking your head and smacking his hands away as he continues to barter, “I’m all sweaty and smelly, let me go clean up and then we can nap togeth-”
“You can shower after we nap,” he nearly whines, finally catching your shirt between his fingers and tugging, uncaring for if he stretches the fabric. A small price to pay to have you close to him, “C’mon, sweetheart. I know you’re just as exhausted as I am.”
You swear you meant to take another step backwards, but somehow, you end up back between his knees, “Did you not hear me, Munson? I stink.”
“Good.”
He doesn’t give you any time to react – in an instant, he’s throwing his face forward, burying it against your stomach as you let out a gasp and immediately try to pry him away with far too gentle of hands in his hair.
“Eddie!”
If it were anyone else, you’d probably be mortified. But Eddie just takes a dramatic deep breath in, nose buried just shy of your belly button, and when his shoulders start to shake with muted laughter, you can’t stop the smile from breaking. Your fingers are still twisted in his hair, still pulling back in an attempt to get him away from you, but he’s resilient.
And all your faux resistance is weak in comparison. Soon enough, you’re back to melting into him.
Only once you’re relaxed once more, no sign of trying to pull away again any time soon as his hands once more evade the space beneath your shirt to wander up and down your sticky skin without a care in the world, does he lift his face away from you long enough to breathe and speak, “I’ll have you know – I love your stink.”
“Shut up.”
“I’m serious.”
“You’re an idiot.”
“I’m your idiot.”
The game of banter is cut short when he goes back to pressing his nose into your clothes that surely can’t smell good. No amount of deodorant or perfume could erase that underlying stench of sweat. Hell, the shirt is still a bit moist from it all: from the walk to the gym, from your workout itself, from the walk home. It’d been through the ringer, and you’re back to tugging him away from you.
“I refuse to believe you like how gross I smell right now,” you reinforce, eyes darting towards the bathroom connected to your master bedroom, “I promise I’ll be quick with the shower.”
“Baby,” he fights back, wrapping his arms around you securely, no intention of losing this battle, “You remember that time we went to the fair, and you were complaining about how you were sweating, so I tried to lick your face?”
Your nose scrunches quickly at the memory, “I do, unfortunately.”
“You really think I’d be willing to lick the sweat off your body but be afraid of you smelling a little bad while we cuddle?” his shoulders drop as he looks up at you, head tilted, almost as if amused with the conversation, “What kind of man do you take me for?”
“The kind that gets off on annoying me.”
His jaw drops, putting on a fake look of offense before he dramatically throws himself back onto the bed, laying flat as he makes a fist to mimic stabbing his chest, “You wound me.”
You’ve heard those words a thousand times in a hundred different ridiculous voices. You’ve seen this scene enough to have it mesmerized at this point, down to the over-exaggerated pout of his lips and the lingering of the fist against his sternum.
You never grow tired of it. You never will.
“Need me to kiss it better?” you joke as you prop a knee up on the bed, following the same script as always.
And he hits his queue perfectly when he lifts his head eagerly at the expected response, wiggling his brows a bit. “Absolutely. Doctor’s orders, in fact.”
“Great,” you see an opportunity, and take it, “I’ll get right to it, after my showe-”
You don’t even get the final syllable of the word off your tongue before he’s clenching his thighs around your own, knees pressing hard before he wraps his legs the rest of the way around your waist to pull you in. A squeak of surprise leaves your lips as you begin to fall forward, but Eddie is quick to break the fall with ease. Catching you with his eager hands, maneuvering for you to half drop to the mattress while some of you still lands atop of him.
He has you right where he wants you, turning his head to be face to face with you, noses nearly brushing, “Unfortunately, the doc said you have to kiss it better now, or else you’ll be comfy coffin shopping.”
“A fatal wound?” you gasp, nearly mocking him. It doesn’t offend him – if anything, his boyish grin only grows wider, “First, I’m smelly-”
“Again, I like when you’re smelly.”
“-And then I inflict a fatal wound upon my lover? Oh, how dare I.”
Slowly, all your insecurity of how you currently smell is simply fading. The entire ordeal has become an art of childlike, whimsical jokes – and Eddie is an artist. A professional at the dance, locked and loaded with his incomparable skill set equipped for disarming you this way. The ability to make someone feel loved, imperfections and weirdness aside.
He likes you, even when you claim you don’t smell your best. And you like him, even when his hair is tangled beyond recognition and one of his socks is half-hanging off his foot from a nap.
You like him when he’s embarrassing you in public, tongue chasing after you with the threat of licking your sweat away, and he likes you when all you can do in response is a weak palm to his chest (that isn’t even making an effort to push him away) as you giggle relentlessly.
You like each other on the good days, the bad days, the weird days.
Disarmed entirely, you don’t even notice when his face conveniently slots itself far too close to your armpit as you two scooch further up into the bed. You’re more occupied with the way your legs tangle up, toeing each other’s socks off properly as he slings a heavy arm across your torso.
“We’re gonna have to wash the sheets,” you mumble, exhaustion catching up as the two of you finally settle.
He hums absentmindedly, nuzzling into your skin a bit further as he makes himself comfortable. “And wash away your sweet, sweet stink? I don’t think so, sweetheart.”
“Oh, fuck off,” you laugh, unbothered as your fingers start to trail up and down his back over the t-shirt, smoothing out wrinkles along the way, “I’m serious. We need to change them soon anyways, I think I got crumbs in the bed the other night with those crackers.”
“Bury me in the crumbs of all your midnight snacks,” he almost slurs, clearly drifting back off.
You snort in response, relaxing and letting your own eyes shut. Matching all your deep breaths with his own, a million different last words crossing your mind to whisper to the boy you’re sure is once again asleep.
I love you.
I adore you.
I would like to spend the rest of my life with you, if you’ll have me.
And maybe some of those unspoken thoughts slip out without you realizing, because he squeezes you just a little bit tighter, presses his face just a little bit deeper into your skin as his scruff tickles you.
The only actual thought you can know for certain that you say, though, is, “Do you think they actually make coffins with memory foam inside?”
To your surprise, even despite the almost-snores that had been escaping him, he answers in a heartbeat.
“Oh, definitely. We’ll order two.”
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