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perseusjackson-jasongrace · 2 years

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four ways to not recreate the life of your parents: a guide by Jason, Percy, Piper, and Annabeth.

CW: slight body horror, rapid/unsettling pace change between sections

welcome to the last day of fanfare! I hope you guys enjoyed <3 thank you to everyone who left a comment, they live in my little treasure box now. please have a good time with this. it's the longest in the series but I think it's a story that needed to be told

tumblr's spacing gets worse every fic upload. apologies for any inconvenience

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1. When they tell you you're a god, ask them if that means you have the power to create or destroy.

Jason Grace wakes up to howling. He is twenty three years old and his heart still pounds when he hears the wolves. He can tell from the howl that they are just calling to each other. He has not stepped into Lupa’s den since the night before she left him on the doorstep of Camp Jupiter at almost four years old. But he knows, oh how he knows every kind of howl. How he can follow those sounds deep into his sleep.

He scrubs a hand down his face, and blinks into the blurry darkness of the world. If he had to guess by the colour of the sky and icy temperatures he'd say it's around four in the morning. Two hours early for his alarm and ten minutes late for his insomnia. He had been having a rare night of blissful sleep when the wolves came calling. With a sigh he practically falls out of his too small bed, wrapping the duvet around him as he walks across the cold stone floor of the Zeus cabin. Yes, Camp Half-Blood. For the summer. Here, where he can be a kid. Here, where he can relearn what it means to be the “child” in his title as “Child of Jupiter”.

He can feel lightning crackling under his fingers and it makes his whole body buzz. He's always been more sensitive in Zeus’s cabin. As if the little control the King of the Skies possessed translated into his children. Where Jason is stoic and settled in SPQR, he is buzzing and bright at CHB. He and his father share no DNA but he feels less like his mother with every look at the sky. He thinks maybe if he had never been claimed he would have felt more like a storm passing over than a kid trying to be lightning.

The wolves have stopped howling but he is awake, leaning against the enormous statue of his father that sits in the middle of the cabin.

From here he can see camp spread out in the disappearing moonlight. The camp fire burns no longer, ash cold from a strangely chilly night. But still the sweet smell of strawberries hangs light in the air. He sometimes thinks if he moves right he could change the smell of the wind. He keeps looking, past the strawberry air, over the ocean. Here he can smell sea salt, the way the tide moves. Where lightning strikes hard and fast, the ocean is persistent and fluctuating in strength. Sometimes when he and Percy are sitting on the beach he can tell when the waves will get bigger just by the way the air changes. Sometimes he doesn't need to look out on the water to know. He simply looks at his friend and watches as those green eyes start to flicker; fingers start to drum on sand, thigh, palm; foot taps, twirls, points and flexes. And then Percy is standing and Jason is smiling and they won't see each other for a few hours. And it'll be like learning how to have courage every time. “What do you do when I'm gone?” Percy had asked him once. And Jason had smiled, laughed into that strawberry air. “Wait for you to come home.” “How do you know when I'm back?” They had been staring at each other for so long a storm had started brewing between the sky and the sea. As if they could feel nothing without creating something from it. As if anything they could ever create could be disentangled from their emotions. “The same way I know when you need to go.” He had shrugged, “I can feel it in the air.”

The statue is digging into his back, a lightning bolt straight into the small of his spine. He's pushing a palm behind him, letting the soft flesh of his hands take the brunt of his father's weapons. He catches a flash of light from his window. The Poseidon cabin flickers to life. Before he can think to put on something more than pajama shorts and a torn t-shirt he is racing towards his friend. A knock on the door. A shuffling from inside. He hops from one cold bare foot to the other. The wooden slat door swings open with a rusted creak. “Hey Jase,” Percy Jackson smiles. ”Come on in.”

The cabin is warm, the bed warmer, the conversation glowing. He doesn't need to sleep. No, not anymore. Now he can create another memory.

They tell you being half-god is an honour and a privilege. They tell you nothing ever bestowed on you could be greater than this ichor through your blood. But Jason thinks everything he's ever created has been because he was human. And Jason thinks that maybe godhood is not about holding the power of a universe he has no right to harness. Maybe it is about trying to keep that humanness going for as long as possible. And maybe, that's where his father went wrong.

2. When they tell you you're flawed enough to ruin the world, ask them what the world ever did to stop from ruining you.

Percy Jackson is sleeping enough to rival the Hypnos kids. Drifting in and out of consciousness like it's a hobby. He's been sleeping for three days if the orange glow he sometimes catches against his eyelids is any indication. But he doesn't want to get up. And he can't anyway. The last quest, to retrieve the ancient sword of one of his father’s many partners, was grueling and unforgiving. Trekking through deep forests and into deeper oceans. His body feels like it's taken a head-on collision with an eighteen wheeler truck. He suspects however that the truck would come out worse. Only for the sheer strength with which he would be able to push back. He has never underestimated the strength of his power, only discovered it’s increasing limits again and again. And each time is a revelation and a delight. No matter how insane he might look. Terrifying, maybe, if you talk to the wrong people.

His dreams are not all nightmares but none are pleasant enough to rest peacefully. He feels stretched past the borders of his mind, like netting pulling over and over and over, trying to reach every inch of the ocean.

He doesn't know what he's trying to catch, grasp, gather. Whatever it is, he knows it's heavy, and he knows it's endless, and he knows he will have to hold onto it forever.

The dream starts like this: Percy sits on a deserted beach, a cliff of grey and green and monstrosity looming behind him. Ocean, blue and dark and crashing, in front of him. He can't move. He is curled up with his knees to his chest, arms resting atop them, chin pressing into his hands. And that's how he sits, staring and staring and staring.

He can hear shrieking getting caught in the wind. Sometimes it sounds human and he wants to sprint towards the sound. His blood drawing iron to help. And then it changes in tune, becomes sort of malicious, delighted in the disaster. He knows it's not human, not that sound, not anything that has a scraping of goodness could scream like that.

So he curls into himself more and

stares,

stares.

Then the world turns. Suddenly the ocean is behind him, wetting his back. Water against his skin, cool and spraying. The wall of rock is looking at him. Blinking in time to his heartbeats. And he can't see the human needing saving and he can't see the monster hunting. But this way he can hear it as if it's inside his head. Clawing at the walls of his mind. He almost feels talons brushing against his temples. And maybe he's screaming. Maybe he's silent. He can't hear anything except this never-ending screech. Then the world turns. And it starts again. All over again. Again. For the second time. Third. Hundredth. Again.

He seems to be stuck in a loop forever. No way to escape. He's not even sure he wants to. It hurts here but it hurts more out there. And he is so so tired. There is no fighting here. Not this time. Not today or tomorrow. There isn't even a setting sun and a full moon in this place. The only thing that turns is the world around him. Nothing to ruin here. Only to be ruined. Nothing to be dead here. Only to die. Nothing to change him. Only to be changed. He is nothing here. And nothing he shall remain. He is content.

Somewhere, a wolf howls.

This is not part of the dream. This is new. The world is spinning

Cliff

Ocean

Cliff

Ocean

B l u r b lur blur blurblur

Percy Jackson wakes up in a dark cabin. There is no gasp of breath. There is no sharp inhale, loose exhale. There is only quiet. So much blessed beautiful quiet. Screech silent. Scream soundless. Still._______________ Still.

He looks at the ceiling, the ripples of light reflecting his magical basin. The one made from ocean and shell and his father's power. He lays his hand on the cool white sheets, feels every thread underneath his fingers. He listens for the ocean. He hears it's gentle crash. He listens for the wolves. He hears nothing. Not a cry for help then. Just a howl to let the world know they still exist. As he exists. As he was about to give up on existing.

With quiet calm he slips off his bed, feet curling away from the cool stone floor. He switches on a light and knows he will get a knock. Quickly he rinses the long sleep from his body.

A single knock.

He steps once twice thrice towards the door.

“Hey Jase,” He smiles, ”Come on in.”

His friend is soft on the eyes, softer on the heart. They climb into bed together. Percy's world has stopped spinning. It's just him, and this magnificent view curled around each other. Two parentheses, closing off their own little story.

They tell you you're too strong to exist. That you will do more harm than good. They tell you it's better this way. Not knowing anything. With knowledge comes power, and why do you need more power? What will you do with it? And Percy thinks he's never even wanted this power. And Percy thinks if he ever ruins the world it won't be because he has this power, it will be because he has a heart, and it is tired of being used. That's where they all went wrong. They try to blunt the claws he doesn't want. Forgets the wings he’s learning to use. And when he flies, oh he'll save everyone. Even the memory of Icarus. Even himself.

3. When they tell you nothing good will come of the dreams you have, the story you want to build, ask them if anything ever came of the life they destroyed.

Annabeth Chase hasn't gone a day without this wrenching pain in her chest. A place where her heart is supposed to be. A place reserved for the people who know her story, and stick by her side. That space has been carved out, and removed by something who took no care. Did not read her instruction manual. Did not learn what parts of her would crumble first. They took a crowbar, pried her ribs apart. R-I-P-P-E-D her heart out. Left her open-wounded. Bleeding on the bathroom floor.

She spends her mornings striking down straw and sand and making storms come alive in her eyes. She spends the afternoons picking strawberries and comparing the red juice to her blood, colour matching like an artist obsessed. She spends the evenings staring at the wooden ceiling, trying to mark out cities in the engravings from campers past.

Then she does it over again. No longer the eager kid ready to escape the confines of a camp she knows better than the people who built it. But still the same kid trying to find some kind of permanence in a life. Her father's war figurines had more stability than she did. He moved them to clean them, marked little x’s where they stood, put them back there when he had polished them to blinding shine. She'd knocked on his study a few times when she was young, reached for a little solider. He'd ripped it out of her chubby hands, frown permanent on his face. “Now Annie, we don't touch what doesn't belong to us.”

So she'd vowed to make an entire world her own, and nobody was allowed to touch. No-one but her. Not dad. Not mom. Not anyone but her. And maybe Thalia now. And Luke of course. No no-one. Everyone leaves. No-one. Maybe Grover. Percy. Yes Percy. But no-one else. She can't handle them leaving. Not again. Not another time. Okay Piper. Piper. And Piper. And Piper. The last.

Annabeth rubs at her chest, leans against the window and stares at the moon. She sees Artemis in the bow that carves through it. Wonders if she would have found her permanence in the hunt. She would have had no home. But she would have had a family. Everything she felt when she was young, fourteen years old, comes sloshing back. She needs the home. She wants the family. She needs the home. A place she can learn and love and lounge in. Unburdened, untangled, undone.

She watches the ocean. Finds it unexciting. Predictable in its unpredictableness. She turns her face to the sky. It's equally unexciting. The same circling sun moon stars colour again and again. She looks at the camp. Traces the curves and grooves of all the buildings laid out across the fields. She feels as if she's touched every brick, every stone, and column, and tile in this place. Maybe she has. Her fingers certainly remember what it feels like. Know the familiarity of the nooks and crannies. Her hands are calloused into the exact shape of the camp.

A wolf howls. She wonders if it's in pain. Or maybe lost. She wonders if she goes to it, will it sniff out the missing part of her? They can help each other find their way home.

Across the commons, the lights in Percy's cabin buzz to life. She looks across the room, sees the even rise and fall of her siblings’ breathing. With a final glance at the moon, at the dining pavilion, at the crack made years ago by a kid with too much power and not enough control. She slips out into the night.

A double knock and then she pushes open the door. Two figures curl around each other on Percy's bed. She smiles as she catches blonde hair in the blue moonlight.

“Can I join?”

They don't say anything. Simply open the space between them. It looks distinctly like the wound she carries. Less bloodied. More comforting.

She thinks maybe she's the heart here. Just this once. She can be the thing that fills the gap. Not the gap itself.

They tell you nothing will fill the void. If you are not happy with life now you will never be. Not time or space or people will change it. She knows it's not true. Because here in this space, created for her, created with her, she is permanent. And she is whole. She is not the void, nor within it. She is the beginning, and she is still growing. A universe, young and expanding. And letting light in with each step towards home.

4. When they tell you nobody cares about things that can't be of use to them, ask them what use they ever were to you.

Piper is running. Away from something? Towards something? She doesn't know. Not yet. All she knows is that her feet are hitting the ground, echoing gunshots in her ears. All she knows is that her lungs are still full of air. She is not out of breath. All she knows is that when she finally stops she will be okay. But she can't stop. Not quite yet.

So she's running through these woods and maybe there's something chasing her. She catches glimpses of moonlight through the forest canopies. She smiles. Artemis may carry the moon, but is her mother who makes it's light beautiful. And it is her who appreciates both. Woman who strap celestial beings to their back and stumble across this dangerous world. Woman who make sure that even if it is heavy, it is still worth holding.

She runs on………………………….runs and runs and runs.

The ground squelches under her sneakers. Strange since there hadn't been any rain. She keeps going. She's running and she swears the seasons are changing. Summer green turning to autumn gold. Here the leaves crunch with each footfall. Here she is running and it feels like her time is close. Closer than she thought but far enough that her legs cannot begin to give up. Her breathing is harder now. Lungs losing air. A gas tank leaking into closed space.

She keeps running. Running. Runnnnnnniiinnngggg.

The wind is colder here. Snapping against her red cheeks. She sees dead branches looming over her. Turning and twisting towards her path. She jumps over a fallen trunk, her pace doesn't slow. She knows what it means to run. She has been doing it since her crawl turned into legs.

There is warmth at the end of these woods but to get there she must move. Carry herself across thresholds she has never fought alone.

The winter is dead and silent. Her heart is the loudest sound she hears. Beating wild against her rib cage. Not trying to escape, just demanding it be fed.

“Hold on,” She whispers, uncaring to reserve oxygen. “Just a little longer. Almost there.” She can feel it.

This cold season lasts the longest, as her energy wanes, as her body tries to use it for heat instead of moving. She wants to curl up in the little hollow of the tree and fall asleep. If she stops she will not move again. And she is so close to whatever it is.

So she runs.

Her shoes crunch twigs perfect for firewood. Her breath comes out in frosty cloud. Her lungs burn within her, racing fire up her throat. She swallows it down, let's the inferno beat and bruise under her too hot skin. She can make it if she just… pushes… a little… longer.

She runs past a clearing, streak of brown and gold. She sees them before they see her. A pack of snow white wolves. In her moving state she bows her head. The leader, with her single black paw and her deep soulful eyes, bows back.

Piper runs right through the woods.

A wolf howls.

She runs.

Right into Percy Jackson's room.

She stops running.

Collapses with scorched lungs and a heart in overdrive.

“We were wondering where you went.” Annabeth smiles at her softly, stroking her cheek.

“Was finding my way here.”

“Running towards us or away from something?” Percy pulls her into his chest. She's facing Annie and Jason. She's feeling the heat and warmth and encompassing of Percy.

“Both. I'm always running. It's always towards you. It's always away from them.”

“From who?”

“The people who don't want us around. The ones that think we're dangerous together.”

“How did you lose them this time?”

“In the Weathered Woods, there lives a pack of wolves.”

Jason squeezes her hand. ”We are safe. You did a good job.”

“We heard the howl.” Annabeth nods at her.

“Welcome home.” Percy brings them closer, long body spilling over them. Wave engulfing them.

They tell you you aren't useful and therefore not wanted. They tell you if you can't do something worthwhile you don't belong. Piper thinks the definition of worthwhile needs to be changed. She thinks if she can keep finding her way to her friends, to the home they keep rebuilding she will always be doing something worth it. Piper thinks if she keeps caring then nothing else matters. She can never be without value, if this heart of hers knows it's way home. She is worth every beat it takes to run them to safety. To each other.

#pjjg fic fanfare #day 6 #jercipabeth #jason grace #percy jackson #annabeth chase #piper mclean

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