#olympus the battle of the giants

[artthatgivesmefeelings]

Francisco Bayeu y Subías (Spanish, 1734-1795) Olympus. The Battle of the Giants, 1764 Museo Nacional del Prado, Madrid This painting is a sketch for a ceiling fresco in the Royal Palace in Madrid.

[echo-stimmingrose]

The most unrealistic thing about The Battle of the Labyrinth is Rachel Elizabeth Dare brushing out her curly hair.

[illustratus]

Olympus: The Fall of the Giants (Battle of the Titans)

by Francisco Bayeu y Subías

[thanks--for--listening]

reading through blood of Olympus for the second time almost hurts as much as the first

[arsgoetiq]

angels before man (rafael nicolás)//olympus: the battle of the giants (francisco bayeu)//angels & man (rafael nicolás)//fallen angel (alexandre cabanel)

[skrbol]

Semi-Aquatic Percy Jackson Headcanons

(A lot of these will be random Atlantean culture ideas I made up)

Markings

If you were to ever see Percy shirtless you would see what he wants you to see, the mist is a powerful tool, especially for covering obvious marks. But if you are one of the few to see him without you would see identical columns of burn marks going from his collar bones down to his waist, each small and precise. In Atlantis warriors mark themselves with each battle won, each powerful enemy slain. Percy choose to brand himself with his victories, so that every time he looks at them and remembers the victory he remembers the pain and suffering wrought with it. Percy is a war veteran, and he’ll be damned if he ever lets himself or others romanticize the killing of war and the death of his companions.

Hair

Atlanteans put either a braid or loc in their hair for each year they are alive. The royal family never has, for in their immortality they would run out of space. Percy has never viewed himself as a prince, and he sure as hell isn’t immortal. He had 16 of them when he decided Olympus's fate, and 17 when he walked through the depths of Tartarus. And ever since he got them he’s had his camp beads decorated on them.

Strength

After his third quest Percy became obsessed with getting stronger to mitigate future deaths. It got to the point where he let himself submerge to the bottom of the sea, to the deepest trench, and let himself slowly get crushed by the pressure of the ocean. Pushed into the mud until he grew the strength to stand up, and then he’d let more weight fall onto him. Eventually he was able to stand with the weight of the entire ocean on him. It took him a week of ripping doors off hinges and breaking something with a touch before he got control over his new found strength.

Monster (Inspired by Witch_of_History’s Series)

Poseidon was renown as the Father of Monsters. All his children have the potential to live up to that title, his godly spawn where born with it, sharp teeth, razor claws, and tough scales. It came with being his immortal child, you were born touched by all his domains. But demigod children only gain access to their parents domains as they age or as they need them, and his half mortal children had never been monstrous. But as with all things mythological Percy pushed the envelope. His time in the deepest depths of the sea caused his body to adapt to his environment, the royal family was mostly homogenous with their monstrous traits. Percy was always an outlier to them though, when he finally ascended from the depths he had adapted beyond human. Increased senses of smell, sight, hearing. Able to sense nearby creatures bio-electric signals, capable of echo-location, can see infrared, magneto-reception. His monstrous form is a blue scaled, razor clawed,bi-pedal apex predator of the deep. A scaled merrow-esque person with an extra rows of shark teeth behind their human teeth. Annabeth and Grover have never been more enamored with a demigods powers before, and the Hunters have never had a better hunting companion. Much to Artemis’ chagrin and Thalia’s delight.

Favors

Strong warrior or kings in Atlantis keep rings of their enemies and allies. On one hand will be rings made from the bones or weapons of enemies defeated, on the other are gifts or symbols fealty of debt’s owed to the wearer. Percy has no lack of rings. Titans, Giants, and ancient monsters leave many spoils for souvenirs. It’s his other hand that draws interest however, he liberated Thanatos, spared Hades after defeating him, assisted Persephone in retrieving her illegally made sword. None of these things came free, other demigods typically are sent off with recognition and little else. But Percy is a hardened veteran of undersea battles, defeating creatures older than Olympus and fighting against Oceanus prior to the Battle of Manhattan. They had no choice but to give him tribute for his actions. Hades and Persephone groaned about it, Thanatos gladly gave it up, and yet having a box filled with rings of allyship, fealty, and loyalty he’s never used them. But what people always forget is that Percy and Annabeth are a pair, whatever one has the other does as well. Best believe it, Annabeth has many plans that could use some godly touch.

[tyriq-edits]

In the Plain of Nysa

Millions Knives

Nai, the God of War

God of War and Vash’s twin brother

Younger brother of Tesla (Goddess of Victory)

Raised by Rem (Goddess of Wisdom)

Based on Ares and partly Demeter

Respected and rather well liked among the other Olympians (except Meryl)

After the death of his sister at the hands of mortal Soldiers during the Trojan war and Vash losing his left arm to the same soldiers, he became fiercely protective/possessive of his twin brother

Some time after the end of the Trojan War he built a giant "cage” under Mt. Olympus and locked Vash inside it for nearly a Millennium.

When any of the other Olympians asked him regarding Vash’s whereabouts he’d tell them his brother was travelling through the mortal realm, which seemed to shut the majority of the other gods up regarding this issue and the Golden Cage beneath their feet remained a secret only he and Vash knew about.

After Vash managed to escape the the golden Cage with the help of Meryl and Roberto, rather than an eternal Winter like Demeter in the Myth of Persephone & Hades, Nai, overcome with rage, created a giant war that would slowly spread across all of ancient Greece.

For more Information/lore about this AU just look at the in the plain of Nysa tag on my page or just send me an ask in my inbox.

As always thanks to my friend Stephan for helping me with this drawing of Nai and this AU in general. Please check out his art on instagram!

Please do not Tag this AU as Plantcest

[More ramblings about Nai’s design under the cut.]

Nai’s Design as you may have gathered is very much based on your typical Greek Hoplite Soldier

He was supposed to also wear a helmet but i was so proud of how the hair had turned out that I did not want to cover it up haha.

Around the time that this story takes place in, classical greece, bronze armours like these had actually fallen out of fashion in favour of iron ones so I just like to think that Nai, being over 1000 years old, is just very traditional or never fully mentally moved on from the Trojan War so he kept his old Bronze Plate Armour all those years while still adopting the newer Hoplite Warfare system (which used spears and Phalanx formations in comparison to the open battle fields and sword fights of the Mycenean Age/the Trojan War)

As for Nai‘s spear, an actual Dory could be up to 4 meters high, especially in the case of Macedonian ones. But making him run around with one of those would be impractical for many reasons as you may assume. The half-moon shaped spikes right underneath the actual Spear‘s spike is the part I stole from ancient greek hunting spears. The point of them was to keep wild animals like boars at a safe distance from you. Because boars, even if you pierce their skull with the actual spear‘s tip would just keep on running towards you even if it meant impaling their own brain on the entire spear Dracula Style. If you look closely you can kind of see it on the Meleager Sarcophagus.

[pjohoo-reclists]

30k+ Completed Percy - Centric Fic Recs

Request: Anyone have any good, long, finished stories that focus on Percy? Really any variation, other than him killing everyone. No Percy/Nico, Percy/Jason or Percy/Rachel.

Here's a few. Just a heads up, a couple of these fics are completed but their series aren't. Posted 11/8/23. Enjoy!

I am not what I expected (The poison just didn't take) by dcninja for Sappho_of_Space

M | 30k | Complete

Percy Jackson & Hermes, Percy Jackson & Hades, Percy Jackson & Poseidon, Percy Jackson & Kymopoleia

Post Second Giant War, Powerful Percy Jackson, Ascension, Hermes is a good friend

After the War against Gaea, Percy finds himself struggling in the life he worked so hard to get back to. The more he tries to fit back in, pushing down his powers and emotions after the war, the more things seem to fall apart. As Olympus prepares to officially reopen at the Winter Solstice, Hermes takes notice that something is off with the Savior of Olympus. But when he asked for help from Hades, none of them could imagine what Percy’s trip to the Pit led to and what it will mean for the hero. Or Percy finally reckons with the consequences of challenging Akhlys with a little help from his immortal family, who he might be around for a lot longer than he thought.

Of Gods and Men by plottingalong

T | 40k | Complete

Annabeth Chase/Percy Jackson, Paul Blofis/Sally Jackson, Paul Blofis & Percy Jackson

Post-Tartarus, Immortal Percy Jackson, Sad Percy Jackson

The order of things are changing. Old rules are shifting, old gods awakening. Percy Jackson must come to terms with his own mortality, or rather, the lack of it.

Trading Tomorrow by Darkmagyk, loosingletters

T | 44k | Complete

Luke Castellan/Percy Jackson, Annabeth Chase/Percy Jackson, Annabeth Chase & Percy Jackson

Time travel fix it, Luke Castellan Redemption, Childhood Trauma

Percy Jackson arrives at Camp Half-Blood bruised and bleeding, with the knowledge that he's the son of a god and his mother is dead. His little display with the Minotaur has caught the attention of the camp. But he’s not sure it is good attention, yet. Only the Hermes Cabin's not-quite Co-counselor Theseus, ‘call me Theo,’ doesn't treat him like a fascinating zoo exhibit. Which would be a relief, except he looks exactly like Percy: same green eyes, same trouble making smile, same black hair. The only differences are the fact that Theo is six years older, covered in battle scars, and the black tattoo on his arm. A trident and the letters SPQR. Theo is eighteen, powerful, and unclaimed. And his resemblance to Percy could set a dangerous precedent.

We shall meet again in the morning sun by iwillpassthis

T | 55k | Complete

Percy Jackson, Chiron, Gods and Goddesses (Percy Jackson)

Time Travel, Ancient Greece, Post-Canon

Percy is eighteen when the gods disappear. Percy is not even born when he has to save them. OR Of Percy's journey to Ancient Greece. Saving the world is a trial and error process isn't it?

Bloodlines by peachsocks

T | 61k | Complete

Annabeth Chase/Percy Jackson, Nico di Angelo & Thalia Grace & Percy Jackson, Nico di Angelo/Will Solace

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Post-The Blood of Olympus (Heroes of Olympus), Angst with a Happy Ending

After a year of avoiding Camp Half-Blood (and his friends, and everyone, and everything) in the aftermath the Giant War, Percy returns. He quickly realizes that the gods never change, running from the past never works, and family is the one thing that might make all of the nonsense worth it.

Camera Shutters by nlpiersee

T | 66k | Complete

Percy Jackson/Apollo, Percy Jackson & Annabeth Chase, Percy Jackson & Grover Underwood

Post Trials of Apollo, Coping, Moving on, Percy opens up

Percy is working in a cafe, living that demi-god college life. Or trying to. He's still not certain what he's going to school for just yet, but he's enjoying the swim team and being able to see his friends in a place he doesn't really have to worry about monsters. But he catches the attention of a photographer who thinks that Percy is what the world needs to see. And since Percy is impulsive, he decides, why not?

Fishing in Alaska by CaffeinatedFlumadiddle

G | 112k | Complete

Percy Jackson/Annabeth Chase, Percy Jackson & Triton, Percy Jackson & Poseidon

Family Feels, PTSD, Triton is a Good Sibling

[Note: fic was deleted from ao3. Link is to a google drive copy. The hassle is worth it].

"This... this would qualify as a mental breakdown right?" Triton asked, frowning over his shoulder to where Percy was still fuming gin the corner. The lady at the counter curiously glanced over before lifting a questioning brow. "My brother - half brother, technically, I have much better breeding - decided to run away from home to where our father can't reach him and now he won't leave. And now I can't leave unless he leaves," Triton continued. Percy opened his mouth to object that wasn't what happened at all, but the tyrant only waved a hand to silence him. "He's seen war or whatever, so if you could maybe just drug him and I'll throw him into a suitcase and we can be out of here by the Summer Solstice!" Silence. Finally, the woman cleared her throat and turned to Percy. "I'm guessing he's the one you want checked into the metal hospital?" She asked. Triton gasped as Percy punched the air in victory. "Aha!" Or Getting in trouble works a little differently when your parent is an all-powerful god. Sometimes you have to escape to the land beyond gods and get your immortal brother turned human to drag you back so you can be exploded into a million pieces. You know, normal teenage stuff.

Hold Tight and Pretend It's a Plan by Rynna_Aurelius

M | 112k | Complete

Annabeth Chase/Percy Jackson (Past), Annabeth Chase & Percy Jackson, Percy Jackson & Sally Jackson, Percy Jackson & Triton

Time Travel fix it, Dysfunctional Family, BAMF Percy Jackson

Olympus has fallen. The second Gigantomachy has ended far differently than the first, and in Gaea's triumph, the world has been torn apart. But the Fates have seen what ends their failed meddling have brought, look on at the dead—and undo what should never have happened the only way they possibly can. Perseus Jackson, son of Poseidon, is returned to his twelve-year-old self, memories intact and determined to save everyone he can. But he is not alone. The Moirai underestimated the strength of the Lord of Time when stealing his power, and there is something about this particular demigod brat that intrigues him. . . Perseus Jackson came roaring to life with a violent gasp, green eyes wild. After a moment of panicked flailing and struggling to breathe, his fear-filled gaze settled upon a girl with blonde hair and stormy grey eyes, her face stern and unimpressed. "You drool in your sleep."

Stars on the Water by liketolaugh

T | 116k | Complete

Percy Jackson & Thalia Grace, Percy Jackson & Sally Jackson, Percy Jackson & Annabeth Chase & Grover Underwood

Percy Jackson Goes to Therapy, Past Child Abuse, Percy Jackson Needs a Hug

"I dunno, I just think it would make a lot of things easier for a lot of people," Percy said to Thalia, when she just stared at him. His cheek rested in his hand, a rare pensive look leaving his eyes distant and unfocused. "Mom has Paul now, so it’ll be easier on her if she doesn’t have to worry about me mucking things up. Dad won’t have to keep threatening war every time Zeus gets his toga twisted. The prophecy’s done, so I won’t be bringing it down on Nico. And no one will have to worry about me blowing up another volcano."

Who Would Dare? by PunkFlame

T | 120k | Complete

Percy Jackson & Triton, Percy Jackson & Poseidon, Poseidon & Triton, Amphitrite & Percy Jackson

Extreme Medical Trauma, Prince Percy, Seafam

"Listen." Triton's voice cut through Percy’s haze "We both know you're hurt, but you don’t have to play the hero. Now let me see your damn wound." Percy nodded, opening up his stance and allowing Triton to approach him. He lifted the hem of Percy’s shirt carefully, to reveal an inch deep gash that stretched from the top of his shoulder to his upper thigh. Triton froze, eyes widening in disbelief, but he remained silent. He reached out but stopped himself just short of touching the wound. When he finally spoke, his voice was low and grave. "Tell me who did this to you... Now." ________ Triton, at Poseidon's request, goes to seek out Percy; however, he finds him on the brink of death, and brings him back to Atlantis in an attempt to save his life. What will this mean for them, what will this mean for the royal family as a whole, and who would dare to have done this in the first place?

Green Day, Aerosmith, Vitamin C (and other cliches): Stories from Senior Year by No2Ticonderoga

M | 200k | Complete

Percy Jackson/Annabeth Chase

Post Heroes of Olympus, High School, Sally Jackson is a Good Parent

Percy and Annabeth navigate the second half of their senior year, sweating out their grades, avoiding hallway hoodlums and the occasional monster. And there's that constant worry that something's gone wrong out west, since nobody seems to be able to communicate with them from out there. But it's not all bad. They finally get to do some normal high school-ly things. Like prom! And graduation! Still, they've got a lot on their minds. And nosy parents. Of both the mortal and the godly variety. A mostly fluffy look at their post-BOO relationship. Cameos by lots of folks. Rated mature, because high schoolers use bad language in real life. Shocking I know. *fans self like Hazel* And they get up to things when they're alone. Also, some nightmares and post-Tartarus trauma to deal with, in later chapters. See chapters for specific content warnings.

Nothing to make a song about but kings by iwillpassthis

T | 201k | Complete

Percy Jackson & Amphitrite, Percy Jackson & Poseidon

King!Percy, Undersea politics, Atlantis

Percy knelt before Atlantis’ throne, feeling the ancient power of the sea run through his veins in an uncoordinated dance. You are the sea now, it whispered, and the sea is you. A crown of gold and emeralds was placed on his head. Long live the king. Long live the king. . It’s a fortune that Poseidon has a mortal son, because when an ancient curse hits his kingdom and all the sea gods disappear… well, someone must rule.

alone at the edge of a universe by Sarcastic_Metaphor

M | 281k | Complete

Annabeth Chase & Percy Jackson, Percy Jackson & Sally Jackson, Percy Jackson & Poseidon, Percy Jackson & Grover Underwood, Nico di Angelo & Percy Jackson

Chaos!Percy, Powerful Percy Jackson, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence

The sea is not unlike the abyss; it is deadly, destructive. It hides secrets in its depths and threatens even those that know it well. The sea easily swallows life with no trace left behind. The sea can be quite similar to oblivion. But when the mood strikes them, both the oceans and the abyss can be tempted to create life instead. Or, a complete AU rewrite from pre-canon through all five PJO books: Percy is born a little less human and a little more otherworldly than healthy. With powers he was never meant to have, and a third parent he never wanted, the plans that the Fates originally made for him will be torn asunder.

[cryptonite-exe]

i see you’re taking request!! would you be willing to write some more dating rev head cannons? maybe how he’d treat you during downtime with everyone else? :) so far i’ve fallen in love with your crypto content!

dating the devil | revenant headcanons

𓆩♡𓆪 pairing ; revenant x gn!reader

𓆩♡𓆪 a/n ; AAAA MY FIRST REQUESTTT thank you so much you kind soul!! really hope you enjoy this! (apologies it took long) <3

the mellow afternoon sun slowly descends, the light of day fading. the hazy atmosphere and silence of the dropship’s clinic was comforting. you sigh deeply and shut your eyes. you relish in the peace of this unoccupied area of the ship, the vibrations of the moving ship was soothing to you. you were hooked on an iv bag to get the fluids you needed to make a full recovery. with an arm taped with wires and strict orders to rest there, you recall the events of the past day as sleep dawned onto you. the match today did more damage than good. your entire shield batteries and med kits being completely shredded by the damn charged rifle ash kept poking you with. the bandages on your waist fit you tight, the inflammation on your skin was no joke. perhaps having personal relations to the other simulacrum has its cons.

the recent schedule of back to back matches took a toll on you- no, rather all of you. octane, who lives for the adrenaline of battle, even expressed how he needed a breather after the recent games. quoting “more stim’s been going than coming, my stunts won’t be as cool without my stim!”. after the complaints, the syndicate announced a week long break with olympus being the stopping place. the legends rejoiced and gushed about their plans for the week filled with partying and clubs, and some choosing to remain in the comfort of their closed quarters.

the next thing you knew, you were coming to your senses. your attempt at going back to sleep was futile, the pillow your head was laying on was so uncomfortable you were convinced it was a brick. no amount of shifting and turning can soften that so called pillow. the white lights of the dropship nearly blinded you when you attempted to open your eyes. you groan and rub your eyes. now pissed and awake, you tried sitting up because you don’t remember the clinic’s pillows were this hard. you immediately stopped midway as a sudden shock of pain presented itself. the pain had you yelling before you can even register where it was. “easy there human” a familiar voice greets you. your hand lays on your abdomen but your eyes pan to him. “what the hell are you doing he- wait, where even am i?” you ask when you saw the unfamiliar room. it was the standard room the syndicate assigned to everyone but there was nothing.

“my room. how idiotic of you to simply sleep there. have you no regard for your safety?” he spoke, standing up. “you were looking for me?” you asked with a laugh, tilting your head to the side. “don’t get all cocky with me, human” he defensively replies. despite his relentless remarks, he places a hand on your back and offering the other to you. you accepted it immediately, he helps you stand up and walk. he doesn’t let go, perhaps waiting for you to tell him off. but you just lean in further into his gentle embrace, one that showed he was scared of harming you. “oh my knight in shining armor.” you gush, half jokingly. he only groans in response.

‘this will be a fun week’

he's a literal 6'8 (semi) gentle giant

there are the usual homicidal remarks here and there but never towards you

he'd be bored AS SHIT during the break

he complains that "skinsuits are to be killed"

he ends up following you everywhere like a curious cat, always looming over your shoulder to watch whatever you're doing

he doesn't care about pda at all, he let's you do what makes you happy. but when someone points it out he hisses like a cat in water

when the other legends saw him walk behind you everywhere, someone was bound to make fun of him for it

it just happened to be mirage

"who would've guessed murder bot is a murder PET now hah! hahah..." he laughs, fading at the end when revenant snaps his head in mirage's direction

various curses and profanities were thrown that you had to slap him on the arm for it

"hey- no that was too mean!" you express, crossing your arms

"whatever he deserved it" he murmurs, then stomps away like a literal kid

(is back to your side in 5 minutes)

not the best person to gossip to but he does keep an open ear and sometimes asks for details

he'll groan whenever you're rambling for a long time, but he actually feels bad when you shut up

his form of an apology is sticking by your side until you start talking again

he absolutely cannot be left to do a task unless you want claw marks left everywhere

folding clothes? ripped. wiping down tables? scratches. he wants to hand comb your hair? no you're going bald.

he doesn't understand your liking for kissing him but doesn't oppose it

rev : what are you doing?

: kissing you

rev : disgusting. do it again.

doesn't do pet names. you are clinically insane if you hope he calls you one

the most he'll do is "human" or "sweetheart" and not with romantic intent

is scared to even lay a finger on you, what if those hands do to you what they were designed to do?

you have to initiate any intimacy, placing his hands on your waist reminding him it's okay or resting your head on his shoulder to calm him down

treats you like absolute glass- like you would break at a single push

possessive to the power of 10, and it cannot be overstated

no other legend would dare to even flirt with you, an invisible mark that indicates his property is on you

"mine" he mumbles, pulling your waist closer to him as his other hand grips his scythe- bloody from an entire squad's futile attempt to ambush you alone

some would question your taste in significant others but if they asked, you'd answer

"if only you knew"

if only they knew the quiet moments you had just observing each other, curiosity indulging itself

if only they knew the stories he shared from his memories, how his early days as a human haunted him to a point of endless jealousy and anger

if only they knew how tired he was of waking up from every death he hoped was the final one, how you were the only thing he looked forward to seeing

if only they knew how you were the only person he trusted enough to shut down and sleep

if only they knew how you wake up at 3am to see glowing dots on your ceiling, no hesitation to pat the bed as an invite and just go back to sleep

if only they knew how he nudges his head against yours as a kiss, how he caresses your hands feeling the warmth of being human

if only they knew your selfish thoughts of wanting to be one of his kind to accompany him in his lonely nightmare forever

© this work is by cryptonite-exe, please do not copy and post on any other platform.

[mxnkeydo]

i loved you ‘til my dying day ✧ percy jackson oneshot

✧ summary the war against gaea has finally come. percy and his friends are thrown into the battle, but when something draws him closer to his girlfriend, annabeth, he doesn’t expect it to end like it does.

✧ genre angst, sad

✧ word count 1.4K

✧ warnings foul language, mention of blood

✧ link to main masterlist

✧ a/n ok. so. i actually have no clue what i wrote because the inspo for this came late last night while i was scrolling tumblr and came across this prompt. hope this is okay (even though it is most likely trash heh) also tagging @urfriendlywriter thank you for the lovely prompt! (side note: reblogs would mean the world to me!!)

✧ ✧ ✧

Demigods are merely the gods’ pawns, Percy thinks, swinging Riptide in an arch around him. They were used, they were manipulated, and they were laughed at. Being the son of Poseidon is not as great as they all think it is.

And what’s the point when the Fates have it all planned out, anyway? What is so great in defeating all those monsters when you were just destined to die in the end?

He glances at his girlfriend, Annabeth, through all the commotion. Her blonde curls bounce as she moves like a human tornado, and a vicious scowl is seared onto her face. The demons around her visibly back off, unsure of how to approach in a non-suicidal way. In a daze, Percy proudly mutters, “That’s my girl.”

But a single moment of inactivity could cost him his life; a new batch of giants are gaining on him already, smiling like the devil had descended to take his soul. He slashes through them all with his blade, finishing them in a matter of seconds, soon staring at the empty space where they once stood. Their remains – that black, sparkling dust – float to the ground and settle in the grass. It should give him a good feeling, eliminating all of those monsters, but instead all he feels is a certain uneasiness that makes his stomach churn.

Yet, there is nothing he can do about it other than fight. Chiron said earlier that they are helping the gods, but really, they are only helping themselves. After one Great Prophecy, Percy knows that it’s all a lie, that the immortals needed them to stay alive. They managed just fine when it was only them atop Olympus. They were all just lazy and prideful and indolent and Percy has had enough.

As he’s fighting his way to the middle of the crowd he catches sight of Annabeth once more and Percy feels it again; that anxious feeling that has shivers running down his spine, like there’s a ghost breathing down his back. He turns, but there’s nothing there other than more monsters, more demons, more creatures to kill. Almost instinctively, he slices a charging hellhound in half, wincing a half-second later when he realizes it could have been Mrs. O’Leary.

His own power scares him. Percy has never admitted this truth to anyone, not even Annabeth. Sometimes, fighting in a battle was like being twelve years old again, standing back and watching his seventeen year old self slay the bad guys without batting an eye. He used to think it was some great feat, but not anymore. Death, regardless of who died, is still death.

Suddenly, a wind comes rolling their way and Percy can’t help but ease his muscles as he briefly allows it to wash over him. It’s a short, stolen moment that reminds him that the world isn’t all bloody and violent and full of vengeance. It could be beautiful too, if they let it. If they stop destroying, destroying, destroying, and start creating instead. For the first time, Percy wholly understands his girlfriend’s passion for architecture; it’s all about making something new, building something exquisite for the coming generations to admire.

For the third time, he looks at her. He feels a strange pull, like an invisible force yanking him in her direction. Percy knows his instincts are always right, but…

But nothing. His instincts are always spot on. If they tell him to go to Anmabeth’s side, then that’s exactly what he’ll do.

Percy pushes past demigods, both Greek and Roman, as they fight hard—and more importantly, fight as one. In his peripheral vision, he spots Reyna’s long braid whipping out, smacking a monster in the face. Next to her is Piper, looking like a living, breathing death wish. Put a dagger in that girl’s hand, and she turns from sugar and spice to straight up murderous. Percy thinks he sees Grover too, somewhere. His chest does a painful pang at the thought of his best friend, and that they might not see one another again.

Percy’s closer to Annabeth now, only a few feet away. He opens his mouth to call out to her, to let her know that he’s okay, to tell her that they won’t be separated ever again.

And there it is, fiercer than ever. That ominous feeling that something bad’s about to happen. Before he even knows it, Percy flings himself in front of Annabeth with a savage battlecry that manages to pierce his own ears.

Time stops. The world ceases to turn. All he can see is…

Blood.

Deep crimson blood, coming from… his sternum? Percy presses his fingers to the wound deliriously, and feels a sharp point sticking out of his torso.

Percy Jackson, age seventeen. Cause of death: a spear to the abdomen. It sounds ridiculous; he, the demigod that underwent the curse of Achilles, dying from a spear wound? Percy manages a smile as his knees wobble and bend underneath him. Riptide clatters to the ground.

“Seaweed Brain?” Her voice is distant, like he’s underwater. “Seaweed Brain–Percy, stay with me.”

Vaguely, he hears her shout for medics, for someone from the Apollo cabin, for anyone, anyone, who will help him.

“You’re going to be fine,” she assures him, frantically, but it sounds more like she’s only reassuring herself. “Nothing’s going to happen to you. As long as we’re together, remember?”

Percy tries to utter a word, but instead coughs up more blood, staining the dirt around him a sickening red. “Wise Girl, I’m fine,” he croaks with difficulty. His hand still trembling and weak rises to cup her face. “I’m– hey, look at me.”

And she does. Her eyes are red and bloodshot and grief-struck. Her once-tan skin now seems blackened and gray. “You’re bleeding,” she whispers, grabbing his outstretched hand. Her chest rises and falls with deep, desperate breaths as she laces their fingers together and places them on her heart. “I swear to all the gods, Percy, if you love me one bit you will stay conscious, you hear me?” Annabeth’s voice trembles as she tries hard to push the tears back.

“Don’t scold me,” Percy protests feebly. “Am I not in pain?”

“Percy! Do you hear me?”

“Loud and clear, ma’am.” He grins slightly, then winces once his eyes land on the blood pooling from his stomach. Annabeth must have noticed because she lifts his chin and kisses him hard, a year’s worth of passion and desire poured into it. When she pulls away a split second later, she’s full-on sobbing. She presses kisses to his face, to the top of his head, buries her face in his hair.

“Don’t leave me,” she whispers, and then she’s seven years old again. “Please, don’t leave me again.” She hiccups. Then: “Fuck, Percy, why would you do that? Why would you get yourself injured like this?”

“Because I love you, Wise Girl.”

“Percy—“

“No, wait. I love you. I love how your brain’s always whirring with some new plan, I love the sound of your laugh, I love the way you smile at me. I love everything about you. I want you to know.”

“Percy…stop,” Annabeth says softly. “We’re going to help you, please...”

“Remember when I fell into the canoe lake at camp? That was funny.”

“We’re in the middle of a war and you’re making jokes?” Her eyes suddenly spark furiously behind a wall of tears.

“Oh, and remember the time you nearly killed me during sparring?”

Annabeth snorted at that, her lips turning up into a trembling smile. “I destroyed you, admit it.”

“Annabeth,” Percy breathes. “I—I love you. So much.”

“No, you are not dying on me!”

“Annabeth.”

It takes her a moment to respond. “I love you too,” she says with difficulty, like the words are being ripped out of her mouth.

“Tell my mom I love her too, okay? And—and Paul. And Grover. And Frank and Hazel. Chiron, too. Everyone.”

“Percy, no, stay with me—“

He soaks in the sight of his girlfriend one last time—her stormy gray irises, her princess curls—before closing his eyes.

Annabeth shouts for the medic again—a guttural, anguished call, and it’s the last thing Percy hears before he breathes his last next to the pine tree on the border of Camp Half-Blood.

[banana-breaded]

Percy has always unfairly villain-ized Nico.

Upon learning he was a son of Hades, he assumed Nico was vengeful and corrupt. In "The Battle of the Labyrinth" he assumed that Nico was out to kill him, when in fact he was going after Daedalus, who admitted himself that it was his time to go. Not to mention, Nico's bloodlust was because of Minos’ corruption, which never would have occurred in the first place had Percy stopped Nico from leaving, which should have been the obvious course of action.

You don’t let a 10-11 year old, a powerful 10-11 year old who would attract massive amounts of monsters and has just sustained serious amounts of pain, go off by themself for quite obvious reasons. Percy obviously doesn't get the memo because he lets Nico slink away twice, in the end of both "The Titan's Curse" and "The Battle of the Labyrinth." The second time he even reinforced Nico’s belief that he didn’t belong among other demigods. For lack of better words, that’s messed up.

Nico will then go on to do some arguably shady things, but never with malicious intentions (i.e. letting Hades trap Percy and not telling Percy who he is in "The Son of Neptune") and always redeems himself from such actions. Percy however, uses these decisions to discredit all of Nico's suffering.

For the entirety of the "Heroes of Olympus" series, he basically views Nico as a morally grey wild card. He even expresses contempt and aggression towards him, only reigning such emotions in out of pity for his condition after being captured by the twin giants. He often reflects upon Nico's actions in a way that leaves out context, painting him in a villainous light. I don't think he once acknowledges his broken promise to Nico regarding Bianca in the "Heroes of Olympus" series, nor does he ever acknowledge how hurtful it was to Nico when Bianca appeared to him and not her brother. Additionally, whenever remembering how Nico got him trapped, he never seems to recall that Nico didn’t intend to do so and that he couldn't have escaped without Nico. Furthermore, Nico had made his father promise not to hurt Percy, but Percy responded to the trickery with violence against Nico, not the actual guilty party (Hades).

Also, did I mention that Nico is 4 years younger than Percy? In the Titan's Curse, Percy is 14 and Nico is 10. That's a large maturity difference in the tween/teen years and will continue to be throught the series. This means that all of the things Percy holds against Nico were done by a desperate, child from the age of 10 to 12, who had no support system, no real home, and large amounts of inner turmoil and canonical PTSD.

I know I keep reiterating the whole Nico selling out Percy situation but I just think Percy’s reaction was incredibly awful. He made a point to never hurt demigods on Luke’s side, but when Nico “betrayed” him (not really) he immediately wanted to strangle/behead him. Despite the fact that Nico clearly wanted to help Percy and only wanted to detain him temporarily in exchange for deeply meaningful personal information, Percy doesn’t give him a chance for a single second.

Even when it’s made clear that Hades is emotionally abusive to him, he still later feels no remorse for choking this emotionally vulnerable 12 year old. And while it was still the right decision for Nico to negotiate his father joining the war effort, Percy mainly told him to do so to keep him at arm’s length, even though he was sending him into a place where he was clearly unwelcome and would likely be severely punished.

When most Olympian parents talk about how they regret burdening their children with their heritage, it usually doesn't mean much. Yes, they have to fight monsters but in exchange they become powerful. When the Greek deity Hades says this, however, it makes complete sense. The only 3 children he ever has end up experiencing horrific things, having to sacrifice themselves time and time again (or just the once, RIP Bianca di Angelo). On top of this, even the most congenial demigods become biased towards them whether they deserve it or not.

It's sad that there's a hierarchy within the camps and that its determined by parentage rather than character, at least until the demigods in question prove otherwise.

[stillcarmine]

I know I talk about how Percy and Annabeth should have taken a backseat in HoO but like… they both had intel on how to defeat Gaea that they learned in the first series.

Literally Percy had to fight her son Antaeus in the Labyrinth.

And he won by removing the giant from his source of power- the earth- so he couldn’t heal and could be killed.

Which is how Leo rendered Gaea able to be defeated. And figuring this method out took the Argo crew so. Fucking. Long.

And yet neither Percy or Annabeth brought it up?? They did basically nothing in Blood of Olympus (which is fine in a way, they were tired from Hell) but this??

Percy, you gave the world’s biggest wedgie to your half brother??? Because you knew who his mother was and therefore his weakness?? Which is the same weakness as said mother?? Who is now the main antagonist?? And the others have been asking how they’re supposed to fight her?? One convo, that’s all it’d take.

Percy, I know you remember doing this, it was memorable for the mid grade humor and shook your faith in your father. And you didn’t think that might be something to mention?? Annabeth, girl, you saw this happen. Wisdom in battle, Annabeth. Where’s this wise advice for your crew, Annabeth?

[slutcore-starships]

Hey you should tell us things about the Trojan Horse... 🥰🥰🥰

alright strap in because i have . Thoughts™️™️

so the way the story gets taught - especially when not actually being told through the iliad and the aeneid - is that the king odysseus built the horse as a trap for the trojans and offered it as a gift; however, the wooden horse was full of greek soldiers who erupted out at night and sacked the city. its spawned its own term, a trojan horse, for something that seems like a gift but is actually a trap - its even its own sort of computer virus!!

AND ITS COMPLETE HORSESHIT

the horse isnt a gift to troy!! its a gift to the gods!! and removing that detail, boiling it down, stripping it of that context, fundamentally robs the story of its meaning!! the /entire point/ of /every/ story of the trojan war is built around the same principle - the same principle at the heart of the majority of stories and folktales from the era - and its fairly obvious from the very beginning!!

the whole thing only begins because the goddess eris throws the goddesses of olympus into chaos by pitting them against each other in a glorified beauty competition, which leads to them seeking out a mortal mediator in the prince paris. hera aphrodite and athena each appeal to the prince to choose them in exchange for an incredible reward, and /this/ is where he fucks up!!

if he just says “i hold the utmost respect for all the gods of olympus, which is why i could never be worthy of judging any of you,” then he probably just gets sent home with an olympian gift basket and the whole thing stops there, but he doesnt!! he’s suckered into the competition and takes sides between the gods, which is an /obvious/ fuck up, and pursues the lust offered to him by aphrodite!! he sacrifices his humility and grace in favor of his boner, and in exchange, he is offered the hand of a /married queen/, helen!!

(btw this is why i think the version of the story where he kidnaps her from sparta instead of just having a hell of an affair is the most impactful and likely canonical . the whole thing starts with him pursuing something that was never his in the first place!! the whole point is about his arrogance and greed and having this woman as an active accomplice, even if under some sort of spell, robs the fall of troy of some weight)

and when the war begins in earnest, arrogance and ego and pride are the defining factors of the conflict!! it is a source of division on both sides, it wrecks the greeks, it underpins the politics of troy, it is the number one reason why the named heroes who fall in battle do so!! hand in hand with that, you have the relationship between the gods and mortals!! the majority of the gods in olympus take sides during the battle - with those closest to aphrodite siding with troy and the rest rallying behind the greeks - and leaving their marks on the battlefield!! the only one who can even begin to compete with them is achilles - the most powerful demigod in the world with several gods behind him in his own right - and even though he manages to best ares (who is, quite frankly, the embodiment of arrogance and hubris in this story), he is still felled by an arrow guided by apollo!! even the man closest to divinity is not above the gods, which gives you a pretty good idea for whats about to happen to troy!!

so, when it becomes obvious that greece isnt going to be able to breach troys walls of their own accord and a few too many of their best heroes have been slain, odysseus comes up with a plan: the greeks will move to pull out and leave behind a cornucopia of offerings to the gods - most notably, a giant wooden horse to athena, goddess of wisdom on the battlefield, personal backer of odysseus, and one of the main goddesses scorned in this entire affair. the greeks gather and burn their dead, set up their shrine, pile up the offerings, and sail away.

and /this/ is where the themes of the entire story collide and bring troy to its need. drunk on hubris and the taste of victory, inflated on an ego that could lift them high above mount olympus, the trojan leadership decides that, actually, if you think about it, they /deserve/ those sacrifices, they deserve those offerings, thats a /hell/ of a horse and it should belong to us!! the priests obviously recoil, you cant just /do that/, what the fuck are you talking about, and they and those closest to them feel the way the winds blowing and dont quite drop their guard

once the trojans have looted the offerings and brought them into the city, they proceed to get absolutely shitfaced and party until they collapse, leaving only those with their faith shaken awake and alert. and we all know what happens next: the greeks spill out, slaughter their way through the troops, call the ships back, and sack troy. those who didnt put their faith in paris flee and depart for calmer waters - eventually going on to help found rome. the arrogance of troy sees it burn and the greeks emerge victorious, though a mistake on the part of odysseus - now himself drunk on victory!! - will see his path twist and turn as he must learn the humility that troy so utterly lacked. the /entire point/ of every story told about troy is that you dont place yourself above the gods - no one is infallible and no one is invincible, not achilles, not paris, not odysseus, and certainly not you!! thats the entire point!! thats the whole point of everything!! and that most crucial of themes is always completely abandoned!! the whole heart of the story is left to rot!! the cultural context is stripped away, and for what??

anyways . just a reminder that its never too late to learn something new and that arrogance and greed will never lead to anything but ruin for everyone around you, i guess

[cabin-3-counselor]

i've risen from my slumber for the biggest event of the year (personal opinion)

Perseus 'Percy' Jackson's Birthday

so here follows a incomplete speedrun of his achievements throughout his years as a demigod, Son of Poseidon

Percy at the age of 12 had already gone through 6 schools in six years because of accidents, related to his immortal side, that lead to many explosions in and of said schools

He controlled water to almost choke a class mate that was bullying his best friend, Grover Underwood, at 12

He fought off a Fury at 12

He killed the Minotaur at 12

He killed the Medusa at 12

He sent the head of Medusa to Mount Olympus

He killed a Chimera at 12

He out smarted and killed Procrustes at 12

He went to the Underworld to rescue his mother's soul and prove that he did not steal Zeus's Master Bolt

He survived the trip to the Underworld

He fought the manifestation of Terror in War, The God Ares, and won (he got one hit and Ares got too embarrassed so he ditched the fight)

He and his mother, used the head of Medusa to kill his stepfather, and after turning him into stone, sold his frozen corpse so they could get a better apartment and so that Sally could finally finance her college degree

He managed to fight off Luke Castellan and the venom from Orion's Scorpion so he could get to a river and be brought back to Camp Half-blood

Percy, at the age of 13 got into a new school and befriended a new outcast there, later on, said outcast, is revealed to be a monster whose race is considered particularly dangerous for demigods, but Tyson, said friend, turns out to be the sweetest cyclop to ever walk the planet

He fought a group of gigants at this new school with Tyson's help (in Portuguese, one of the gigants is called Zé Mané, which is the best piece of translation in a book I have ever seen)

He fought the Khalkotauroi, Colchis Bulls, right after fighting the cannibal giants, at Camp Half-blood's hill

This isn't much of a achievement but well he also did realise that Poseidon had other children and that Tyson, a monster, was one of them

He ventured the Sea of Monsters at 13

He saved Annabeth from the siren's songs at 13

He fought the cyclop Polyphemus, another half brother of his, at 13

He fought Luke Castellan, again, and won, again

He was in the mission, and a crucial player in said mission, to retrieve the Golden Fleece, that not only made the Pine Tree heal, but also brought Thalia back from the comatose/half dead state

He helped Groved in mission to rescue two demigods, children of Hades, at 14

He fought the Lion of Nemea at 14

Battled Talos, but eventually, Bianca Di'angelo, Daughter of Hades, Huntress of Artemis, was the one who actually destroyed Talos, it costed her life

He fought Atlas, the Titan sentenced to hold up the Sky (Ouranos) for all eternity, to ensure he never laid nor hurt Gaea (the Earth) again

He, for a brief moment, also held up the sky

With Annabeth, at age 15, he discovered one of the many entrances to Daedalus's Labyrinth

They, Annabeth, Grover, Percy and Tyson, faced the minor god Janus in a mission in the Labyrinth

They meet Briarea, the Hundred Handed One (personally, one of my favourite moments)

Cleaned Geryon's stables, without a Nymph's help (looking at you Herakles)

This one, this one isn't Percy's, but I need to mention Annabeth outwitting the Sphinx when they were on their way to Hephaestus

Percy and Annabeth go to Mount St. Helens, to aid Hephaestus, they battle the telekhines

PERCY GETS KISSED BY ANNABETH CHASE

Which leads to him blowing up Mount St. Helens and surviving it, at age 15

Ĥ̴̛̙͇͎̜̹͇͓̖̿̾͂̇́̚͝ę̸͉̹͔̻̐̆́͂̎̇̆̃ ̶̮̪̩̼̺̌͂̎̈́̅̽̐̍͛̚ͅg̶̢̫̺̘̳̗̙̖̏͐̒̌̊̀ơ̶̢͚̗̜̟̜͍͉̠̅ę̸͔̲̳̟͐̀̏͗͆͒̊͘̕͜͝s̸̢̟̃͋̀̕ ̵̞̻̭̼͚̖͎̳̬́̾͜ t̶̖̮̗̣̠̘̘̿̇ó̴̬̠̺̈́͌̌̅̾̿̐̕ ̵̛͔̳͇̈́̏͋͑͠ C̶̝̯̠̳͚͔̪̓́̋̀̑̒̂͆͝ͅą̸̹͐̽̀̏̊͗l̸͖͙̪̏̏̈́̇͗̚̚͘͜y̵̞͓͂̌̒̃p̸̹̻͖̝͌̈̕s̴͉̰̹͕̤̹̅o̸̧̤͖̩̮̥͖̊̍̀̈́'̴̭̮̲̉̒̓͒̚͠s̶̲̠̭̣͚͔̤͍̓́̉̐̎͠ ̴͙͛͌̉̒̊̌̚ Ḯ̸̠͊̄̈́ş̴̳͈̲̠̬̙̿̎̇̏̊l̶͒̈̇̅̂͘͝a̷̞̦̝͇̗̖̓̆̒̾̐̃n̸̼̳͙̄̂̕͜d̵̨̛͕̘̎͂͑̐͛͌̿͝ͅ

When he comes back, Annabeth tries one last a expedition to the middle of the Labyrinth, there they end up in Antaeus gladiatoral fights

Percy at age 15 fights his half-brother, a giant, Anaetus, and wins (for anyone keeping score this is two fights now, against giants that Percy won WITHOUT the help of the gods, so either he is that powerful or rick contradicts himself in HoO, I prefer the first option cause I am completely biased)

They meet Pan, and before the God of the Wild dies, he gets blessed by him

Percy becomes a proud father of a demon dog, Mrs. O'Leary

Still at 15 Percy becomes the main general (for lack of better title) of the Camp Half-blood's army in the Battle of Manhattan

He blows up, with the help of Charlie Beckendorf, the Princess Andromeda, a ship used by Kronos and his army

At age of 15, Percy is taken to the Underworld, by Nico Di'Angelo, so that he can go to the River Styx and get to himself the Curse Achilles had

He gets offered the Pandora's Box and refuses it

He makes a deal with the entities of the Rivers Hudson and East to aid Camp's forces and drown Kronos's ships

Percy thought off Kronos, possessing Luke's body in Mount Olympus, and won

He was offered immortality, godhood, and refused it, in it's place he basically demanded the gods to pay child support

At age of 16 he ended the Second Titanomachy War

Percy helps Cater Kane, an Egyptian Magician in a fight against an Egyptian monster

At the same age he got kidnapped by Hera and stayed hidden away for an entire year untill the second great prophecy was ready to take it's course

At age 17 Percy, is sent to Camp Jupiter, by the wolf Lupa, Hera tried to take away his memories, but he remembers Annabeth

He fought off Medusa's sisters, the Gorgons Stheno and Euryale

He even without memory, knows he has beef with Ares/Mars when Mars appears at Camp Jupiter to send his son, Frank Zhang into a quest to release the God of Death, Thanatos

He defeats the karpoi with Frank

Percy fights another half sibling of his, it's a worrying trend

He helps retrieve the pride of the Twelfth Legion in the process of freeing Thanatos

He survives the fall off of a glacier

When they go back to Camp Jupiter, Percy with his memories now intact, he challenges the giant Polybotes to a duel, and now the ridicule rule lf "only a joint effort of a demigod and a god can defeat a giant", and he call upon Terminus, and wins

Still at 17 (my poor boy can't catch a break, I swear to god), he joins the Argo II crew and it becomes official that he is again, a important part of a second great prophecy

Percy almost killed Jason when possesed by Eidolons (it is my truth, jason trained his whole life and his abilities match percy's who barely trained half of the summers he was at camp since he was twelve)

"You dropped this" scene, no explanation needed, not only peak romance but also peak awareness of danger all the time

Percy knocks out Herakles

He outwits Chrysaor by impling that Dionysius is the real captain of the Argo II and that he would show up if the crew didn't complete their task

Percy falls into Tartarus with Annabeth

At Tartarus Percy controls the River Cocytus

Five minutes later he kills Arachne

He battles against the Empousai for like the third time since he was 14

Percy gets almost deadly hurt by killing the Arai, manifestations of the last curses some gives and in my boy's case. . . . he had many curses addressed to him

PERCY CHOKED THE GODDESS OF MISERY, AKHLYS, WITH HER OWN POISON. HE CONTROLLED THE POISO AND MOST CERTAINLY HER TO CHOKE ON IT (unofficially proof that he can bloodbend - like Katara - and control other liquids)

He and Annabeth outwit Nyx, Goddess Night

They fight Tartarus, God of the Pit (Hell)

He and Leo make Nike go bonkers

He is well . . . He is in the battle to stop Gaea and they win

[tsarisfanfiction]

The Absent Thorn

Fandom: Percy Jackson and the Olympians Rating: Teen Genre: Angst/Hurt/Comfort Characters: Clarisse, Michael, Kayla, Will Michael had been a persistent thorn in her side since she was nine. He couldn't just be gone. Clarisse&Michael's relationship intrigues me a lot; I really love these two short-tempered idiots - here we're playing with, of course, the aftermath of Manhattan. Warning for blood/injury, and some canon divergence, I suppose. References to canonical character death.

There were bodies.

It wasn’t Clarisse’s first time seeing bodies.  There had been bodies last summer, crumpled and broken left in the wake of giants and monsters.  There had been bodies since then, and some bodies before, the life of a demigod never guaranteed.

It was the first time she had seen so many, and the guilt gnawed at her.  Your fault, a voice told her snidely.  If you hadn’t been such a fucking coward and actually fought from the start you could have saved some of them.

The voice wasn’t holding back its scathing remarks, and Clarisse didn’t miss how similar it was to a certain son of Apollo’s.  Then again, there were only so many people that had ever dared call her a coward to her face.

There was a reason she’d been staying away from the area of Olympus quarantined as the triage centre and infirmary.  She couldn’t avoid him forever, knew she was once again being that same fucking coward by staying away from him, but she couldn’t deal with another blown up argument.  Not right now.

They’d screwed that up once, already, in the wake of Beckendorf’s death, making Silena feel even worse (and she was certain the asshole had never bothered to apologise to her), and even though it had turned out it was Silena’s fault, the stupid, stupid girl, Clarisse couldn’t screw up like that again.

Not when she was facing so many shrouds, covering so many bodies.

It was a colourful view.  Someone had thought to organise them by cabin, and Clarisse remembered all the makings of the shrouds, pre-battle, but seeing them here, used in a gradient of green-red-gold-orange-pink-grey, most with shapes underneath them, hurt.

There were fourteen shrouds laid out over bodies, and two golden shrouds neatly folded next to the gold-covered bodies as though whoever had organised the dead was expecting two more Apollo kids to not make it.

She’d said she hoped they all died.  She remembered spitting it in Michael’s face, pride and anger warring within and resulting in a screaming match even when he surrendered the chariot, because it was obvious he was only doing it to guilt her into joining the war.

She’d seen eleven Apollo kids board the bus to leave camp.  There were four bodies covered in golden shrouds, and the two empty, waiting, shrouds beside them.

Clarisse couldn’t say she hadn’t meant it, at the time, because she had, but there was no word to describe just how much she wished she hadn’t.  Not now she was faced with the reality, of at least fourteen dead campers and over a third (over half, if she counted the empty shrouds) of the entire Apollo cabin were within that number.

The fact that she had ever meant it when she said she hoped they died, that this happened, made her feel sick.

She couldn’t avoid Michael forever, but for just a while longer, while the Apollo kids were still working tirelessly, no doubt exhausted from a three-day long siege but doing their duties regardless, she could keep her distance and put off the scathing (deserved) words he no doubt had in store for her.

Clarisse ignored the fact that she hadn’t seen Michael once.  She’d barely caught a glimpse of any of the Apollo kids, maybe thought she’d heard Will shouting for help at some point, since Silena and the drakon (and the fucking Hyperborean giant).  But Michael was a midget and none of the bodies underneath golden shrouds were that small, so he had to be around, somewhere, even if he was a shit healer.

She ignored the bodiless shrouds, too.

There were too many bodies.  She knew who lay under the red Ares shrouds, that Silena was the pink shroud, that in another room there was a grey shroud covering Luke’s body, but she didn’t know who lay beneath the others.

She didn’t want to know, for all that she’d been logging the faces she’d seen scurrying around, keeping a subconscious tally of who was still alive, who hadn’t died in the war, but she knew she’d find out, eventually.

Find out who might have survived, if she’d let her cabin fight from the start.

The gold shrouds, outnumbering any other colour – even the grey of the combined Hermes and unclaimed campers – taunted her.  Haunted her.

Clarisse didn’t know why she’d ended up in the shroud room, anyway.  She spun on her heel, abruptly putting the dead behind her, to be faced later, at the funeral when she’d learn who had ended the war in Elysium, and almost ran over the small girl just entering the room.

She was one of the newest Apollo kids, because of fucking course she was.  Clarisse didn’t know the brat well, only that she was young, a skilled archer amongst even her own cabin despite her age, and prone to following Michael around with stars in her eyes.

Her eyes were red rimmed, rubbed raw with beads of drying salt on her cheeks that glistened in the light of Olympus, but the glare she sent Clarisse was no less vicious for it.

“I hate you,” Kayla said, a heartfelt sting in her words despite the way her voice wobbled, lips quivering in the tell-tale warning sign of imminent tears.  “I hate you.”  Her hands, devoid of grime but speckled with blood that she’d obviously missed while cleaning up from her last patient, tightened their grip on the bow she carried, drawing Clarisse’s attention to it.

It wasn’t unusual to see Kayla with a bow – it was more unusual to see her without – but the bow in her hands wasn’t the green one Clarisse had come to associate with the young daughter of Apollo in the scant months since she’d arrived at camp.  It was far more familiar than that, one that she’d seen almost every day at camp for the past seven years – small, for a bow, in the same way its owner was small, for a teenage boy.

Clarisse had never seen Michael let anyone else touch his bow, not even his own siblings – not even Lee, before he’d been killed last year.  Certainly not since he’d learnt to shoot it properly, which had taken him no time at all.

Seeing it in Kayla’s hands now, in the shroud room of all places, made something in Clarisse go suddenly cold.  Her mind unwelcomely reminded her that she hadn’t heard Michael’s voice once, not even to shout at patients that he thought were demanding too much of Will.

None of the bodies were small enough to be Michael, but the bodiless golden shrouds demanded her attention again.

“Where is he?” Clarisse demanded, knowing it wasn’t a fair question to shove on the youngest Apollo kid, but unable to stop herself from suddenly needing to know the answer.

Light blue, bloodshot eyes, fixed her with a death glare even as they started to fill with water for what was clearly not the first time.  That in itself was an answer, but Clarisse wouldn’t accept it.  Couldn’t accept it.

Michael had been an incessant, tiny but persistent, thorn in her side since she was nine.  There were very few other campers that had been around camp as long as they had been, now.  She’d never liked him – fought with him more often than not – but he’d always been there.

He couldn’t be fucking gone.

“Where is he?” she demanded again, taking a step towards the younger – much younger, too young to be delivering shitty news but after seeing his bow Clarisse needed to know – girl and towering over her.

“Why do you care?” Kayla snapped back with a thick voice that wobbled.  “You t-told him to die!”  She drew herself up to her full height – taller than Michael, but still not even coming up to Clarisse’s chin – and her knuckles went white around the bow.  “He f-fell and all we f-found was his b-bow and he’s dead and you told him to d-die!” she shrieked.

Behind Clarisse, the empty golden shrouds mocked her.  Not waiting for dying kids to finish dying, but representing the bodiless dead.

Fuck.

“Where?” she snapped, cutting through Kayla’s sobs.  The younger girl stalked past her without answering, and Clarisse looked over her shoulder to see her kneeling next to one of the empty shrouds, carefully lifting up one corner of the fabric to slip the bow beneath it.  “Fucking where, Kayla?”

Kayla rubbed at her face, smearing more salt crystals onto her skin where they glistened amongst her freckles.  “None of your business,” she mumbled, and it wasn’t, Clarisse knew she was the last person that had a right to know where Michael had fallen, but that didn’t stop her from needing to know.  She whirled back around and picked up the younger girl by the scruff of her tattered camp shirt.

“Where?” she snarled.  Kayla scrabbled at her grip, short nails digging into Clarisse’s skin.  It didn’t hurt, not compared to the pain Clarisse was used to, but it snagged her attention and she abruptly realised what she was doing.

“Shit.”  She let Kayla go, and the younger girl kicked at her shin viciously, face screwed up and still glistening from the tears.

“The bridge,” Kayla spat.  “I hate that bridge.”

She stormed out the door.

Which fucking bridge?  Manhattan was surrounded by the things, and the siege had moved to the foot of the Empire State Building by the time Silena had led the Ares cabin into battle.  Clarisse hadn’t known they’d fought on the bridges at all, let alone which one the Apollo cabin had fought on.

She turned away from the shrouds, fourteen bodies, one empty, and one now covering a bow in lieu of its owner, and followed Kayla out the door.

The daughter of Apollo had disappeared, no doubt back into the infirmary, which Clarisse still didn’t want to go into, but if it was where she was going to get answers-

She smacked straight into Malcolm.

“Clarisse?”

Clarisse almost shoved him out of the way, before recognition kicked in.  Malcolm wasn’t a head counsellor, but he was the undisputed second in command of the Athena cabin, which meant he knew shit.

“Which bridge were the Apollo cabin on?” she demanded.  He blinked owlishly.

“What?  I mean, Williamsburg Bridge, but why-”

Clarisse pushed past him without a second thought.

She wasn’t a healer, wasn’t a fixer, didn’t have a single use in the post-war cooldown where everything was already broken and didn’t need breaking further.  Ever since the fighting had finished, she’d been a loose end that couldn’t do anything useful.

Not that she’d been of much use during the war, either.

The flying chariot – the same flying chariot that had sparked her latest, worst, and final, spat with Michael – was where she’d left it outside the building in the mortal world.  The pegasi munching on a crate of apples that had to have been stolen for them by one of the Hermes kids let themselves be harnessed back without much complaint, and then Clarisse was in the sky.

She couldn’t heal anyone, and things were far past the point of being able to be fixed.

But maybe the guilt in her chest would loosen, just a little, if Michael got a proper funeral – and for a proper funeral, they needed his body.

She couldn’t heal anyone, couldn’t fix anything, but maybe she could at least retrieve a body.

Williamsburg Bridge clearly didn’t qualify as a bridge anymore.  Clarisse gaped as it came into view below her – or rather, what was left of it.  The suspension cables still ran across the width of the East River, but the middle of the bridge was nothing more than rubble piled high in the water.

Six golden shrouds suddenly made horrific sense.  What the Hades had caused that?

Mortals milled about, awoken from their enforced sleep, making noises of horror, distress and disbelief.  Police and paramedics called for order, clearly trying to get the mortals under control above the wailing and screaming.

Clarisse ignored them and set the chariot down near to the jagged edge of what was once a complete bridge.  She didn’t know what the Mist showed the mortals, and she didn’t care as long as they didn’t mess with the chariot as she jumped out and elbowed her way to the edge of the bridge, where it fell away in a jagged mess of cables and metal.

The scale of destruction was ridiculous, and Michael was tiny.  Looking at the wreckage now, it was easy to see why the Apollo kids hadn’t been able to find him – but also why they were so sure that he was dead.  It seemed impossible that anyone could have survived a fall into something like that.

Clarisse set her shoulders and turned away from the gaping hole in the middle of the bridge, stalking back past mortals and ignoring anyone that asked her if she was okay – no, she fucking wasn’t okay, but the mortals wouldn’t understand and she had a task to do.  She had no idea where Michael had fallen from – although she could take a guess, looking up at the suspension cables.  He’d always liked perching on tree branches off the ground – the only way he could ever be taller than someone – and with no trees, the cables seemed a likely substitute.

The cables were the only thing still intact, though, and Michael could have been on any part of it when he fell.  Clarisse glared up at them as she walked, willing them to give her some sort of clue, some sign that a demigod had been perching on them.

Her feet connected with something on the ground and she stumbled, eyes flitting down to see what had tripped her.

It was an arm.

Just an arm, bloodied and torn at the bicep, punctures that could only be teeth marks in the flesh.  Massive ones, the sort that Mrs O’Leary left in the chunks of meat they threw for her sometimes.

The skin, even bruised and battered and sallow, was too pale to be Michael’s, and it was missing the tell-tale paler patch where Michael’s bracer almost always sat on his forearm – or where any right-handed archer’s bracer sat.  Clarisse recalled the other bodiless golden shroud, the other representation of a dead Apollo kid with no body, and grimaced.

There weren’t many left-handed archers in the camp, and Michael wasn’t the only loud Apollo kid whose voice she hadn’t heard in Olympus.  Fuck, Nathan had been a right pain in the ass himself, but he hadn’t deserved to be torn apart by hellhounds.

She knelt down and picked it up, forcing herself to look around in case there was anything else left of the kid.  It was stiff and cold in her hands, detached (killed) some time ago, and Clarisse tore off the bottom of her camp t-shirt to wrap it in.  There was nothing else human nearby, only dark stains on the remains of the bridge and the splinters of a bow.  She picked those up, too, and trudged back to the chariot to wedge them at the front, where they wouldn’t fall out on take-off.

Searching the whole debris area by hand wasn’t going to work.  There was too much of it, and she had no idea where Michael could be.  Had he fallen when the bridge collapsed, or before?  Had the fighting continued after the collapse and he fell then?

All Clarisse knew for certain was that Michael would never have been anywhere except the front line.  He was an asshole and a bastard but he wasn’t a coward, and would never let anything get near his siblings without getting in the way despite being the smallest in the cabin – the smallest in camp, most of the time.

But where had the front line been, when he fell?

She hopped into the chariot again, urging the pegasi into the sky before banking them around in a low fly-by of the debris.  Up close, it looked even worse; gnarled and twisted metal interlocked and reaching skyward.  Some of it looked stained as well, and no amount of hoping it was just rust could shake the thought that some of it was blood.

Alongside Luke the bodies of the demigods that had followed Kronos and died doing it had also been laid, covered in shrouds because the dead were the dead no matter the side of the war they’d fought on.  Clarisse suspected several of them had started their journey to the Underworld here, in the twisted spires of metal of a broken bridge.

She wasn’t looking for where bodies had laid before they’d been retrieved.  She was looking for a body that was still there, hiding in death the same way he’d been too fucking good at in life (Clarisse had been shot many, many times in Capture the Flag by fucking red-and-gold fletched arrows out of seemingly nowhere, and sometimes outside of Capture the Flag, too).

The first fly-past yielded no sign, and Clarisse scowled as she brought the chariot around again, pulling the pegasi to fly as slowly as they could on the next pass, lower and closer to the wreckage until some spurs of metal threatened to snag the chariot as it flew by.

Nothing.

She banked around for a third pass, low enough to skim the water.  The pegasi were straining, throwing their heads in protest as they tried to go faster, tried to leap up into the sky, but Clarisse wouldn’t let them.  They snorted at her, but she held firm, kept looking at the wreckage, knowing it was like looking for a miniscule needle in a giant haystack, knowing that the surviving Apollo kids had failed so Michael had to be hard to spot (and pushing away the thoughts that maybe he was in the middle of the twisted metal, surrounded on all sides and impossible to retrieve until the mortals cleared up the wreckage – if they even bothered searching through it rather than sending it all straight into a metal recycling plant to be crushed.  The thought made Clarisse ill and she forced herself to look harder, because that couldn’t be allowed to happen.)

Something caught her eye.

She didn’t know what it was, a flash too fast to focus, but it had stood out to her and that was enough to direct the chariot back around, landing it on the bank of the river and throwing herself at the wreckage, scrambling up and over metal.  It cut into her hands, more scratches to go with the ones she’d picked up during her brief section of fighting in the war, but she ignored them as she clambered forwards, towards where she’d seen something.

Maybe it was nothing.  Maybe it was just a trick of the light, maybe Apollo was punishing her for her cowardice and the deaths of his children by sending her on a false trail, but Clarisse had to check it out, just in case it wasn’t.  Just in case that something had been someone, had been a sign of the body she was looking for.

It was a hand.

Sticking out from a gap between twisted metals was a hand, limp and lifeless, and Clarisse forced herself not to get too convinced, even if it was closer to Michael’s tanned skin than Nathan’s pale.

Even if it was somewhere she could never have spotted without looking from the surface of the river, where the Apollo kids wouldn’t have been able to get.

Inside the gap was a mop of black hair, and Clarisse lunged for it, kneeling on a faux plateau of metal in front of the gap and reaching an arm inside to push the hair out of the attached face.

His eyes were closed, but she could never mistake Michael’s scrunched up, ferrety features for anyone else.

She’d found him.

Half his face was coated in blood, bringing up memories of Lee’s caved-in skull from the previous summer, but unlike Lee his head still seemed to be the right shape.

“Dammit,” she muttered, fingers curling in sticky black hair until her hand had formed an involuntary fist.  “You weren’t supposed to actually die, you bastard.”  Her grip made his head shift a little, and the metal made a low moan, reminding her that finding him had just been the first step.

Now she had to get the body back to Olympus.

Her fingers wouldn’t unfurl from his hair, so she used her other hand to trace where his visible hand disappeared into the shadows, finding the kink of the elbow and reaching where it met his body.  It felt almost like he was in a hollow of some sort, or perhaps there was a sheet of metal slanting from his body to leave a pocket for his arm.  Clarisse couldn’t tell, but it made it easier to force her hand under Michael’s armpit.

There was another groan as she started to pull and she paused, eyeing the metal in trepidation.  If it toppled forwards…

She looked back, behind her, gauging how far back she could scramble quickly and if that was going to be far enough to not get buried if it did.

The groan came again, and beneath her hands, Michael’s body shifted.  Shit, had she already pushed the metal too far?

The logical part of her brain told her to go, that Michael was dead and wouldn’t be killed by collapsing metal but she would, but instead of obeying that, her hand tightened its grip under Michael’s arm and-

“-uck.”

Clarisse froze.

That wasn’t the sound of metal threatening to fall.  That was a voice.  Weak, but unmistakable.

Beneath her hands, Michael’s body shifted again, and there was another groan, but eyelids twitched and peeled open and-

“Fuck,” Michael rasped.

It was quiet, hoarse and parched, but it was his voice, and his brown eyes that were open and staring blankly – until they weren’t and Clarisse was still frozen, still couldn’t move as they followed her arm up to her shoulder and then his head tilted beneath her grip until he was looking at her, not quite the laser focus she was used to but obviously aware nonetheless.

“’risse?”

Clarisse’s mouth went dry and she felt faint as her hands finally fell limp and slipped away from him, fingers snagging where his hair had snarled around them.  “-chael?” she rasped, the first syllable of his name failing to sound.

He was alive?

It didn’t seem possible; she’d (finally) joined the battle two days ago and the destruction of the bridge had to have been before that because she hadn’t known about any bridge fighting, so Michael had to have fallen at least two days ago, if not three – maybe even four, fuck.  True, he’d always healed fast – and been a smug shit about it – but with no food or water?

Fresh water, anyway.  The surrounding metal was damp, and Michael’s hair hadn’t been dry, either.

“Y’see someone else ‘ere?” he demanded.  The weakness of his voice didn’t stop the sharpness of the words.  “Fuck.”  His eyes scrunched up and a hiss escaped from between his teeth.

“I heard you were dead,” she said, swallowing back the instinct to say something a lot more antagonistic.  Too many shrouds lined up in her minds’ eye, deaths she hadn’t been there to at least try and prevent because her feud with Michael had resulted in her being the exact coward he’d called her.

“S’rry to fucking disappoint,” he muttered, starting to open his eyes fully again before stopping abruptly with a wince.  “You here to watch it happen… or something?”

That hurt, a stabbing sensation in her chest, but Clarisse realised she couldn’t blame him for it, not after everything she’d said and done – and not done.  Michael had no reason to believe she’d do anything except leave him to die-

Fuck, was he dying?  She couldn’t see enough of him to see how badly he was hurt, if he was fatally injured and beyond saving.

Silena’s melted, ruined face crept into her vision and she blinked it away, feeling her eyes dampen.

“No,” Clarisse said, feeling the word tremble as she said it and hoping Michael couldn’t hear that.  She grit her teeth and tried again.  “No.  I’m here to get your short ass to Olympus where it’s supposed to be, you bastard.”

He made a spluttering sound that ended in a wet cough – had he laughed?

“You’re one to talk,” he rasped, “about where people are supposed to be.”  Michael’s sharp tongue, at least, was still operating just fine.  “Where the fuck were you… when we were doing all the ass kicking.”  He winced again, his head jerking a little as though it was a full-body reaction.  “Fuck, is it over?”

“Yeah,” she said, and this time her voice stayed steady.  “The war’s over.  We- You won.”

Michael’s head lolled sideways slightly, closer to where it had been when she’d found him.  “Good.”  His voice was softer, a little more distant, and it felt like the Hyperborean Giant had blasted her chest all over again because Michael never just did that, not talking with her.

“Which means I am getting your short ass to Olympus where it’s supposed to be,” she repeated, more harshly than she meant to.  “Kayla-”

Michael’s head jerked.  “Kayla’s alive?” he interrupted, his brown eyes finding Clarisse’s again.  His pupils were a bit too big, and rather belatedly Clarisse realised the blood half covering his face probably meant he had a head injury, and a concussion to go with it.

“Yeah,” Clarisse told him.  “Your little shadow yelled in my face earlier.”

Michael’s lips twitched.  “Thank the gods,” he breathed.  “She got knocked off.  I thought…”

Shit, it hadn’t occurred to Clarisse that Michael hadn’t been the first Apollo kid to fall, that some of those golden shrouds might’ve been deaths he’d already known about.  Suddenly she regretted not going into the infirmary, if only so she could tell him who was still alive.

The only thing she could do was get Michael back there herself, so he could see for his own eyes.  “And she thinks you’re dead,” she said instead.  “So get out of there and prove her wrong.”

Clarisse didn’t wait for an answer before finding Michael’s wrist again, only for it to weakly pull back.  He couldn’t overpower her even when they were both at full strength, and she frowned when he rasped, “stop.”

“You can’t stay here,” she snapped.  “This metal won’t hold for fucking ever, and the mortals are swarming the remains of the bridge.  It’s me or them, if they even spot you before dragging this shit off to the compactor.”

“I know,” Michael muttered, wincing again.  “But, fuck, you can’t just pull-”  He hissed again.  “I’m pinned.”

“Shit.”  Clarisse tried to peer into the gap, but couldn’t see much past Michael’s head.  “Where?”

“Right arm’s crushed,” Michael reported, and the pain in his voice was suddenly impossible to miss.  “And something in my right leg.”

Clarisse eyed the snarled mess of metal above Michael’s small gap, trying to judge what she could move, but there was so much of it, and she couldn’t see what would and wouldn’t bring the whole stack down on top of both of them.

She crouched back down to get a better look inside the gap, tracing Michael’s arm back to his shoulder again.  This time, she could feel him trembling slightly, and the slight rise and fall of his body as he breathed.

“Got ambrosia?” he asked her, and she shook her head.  She’d been looking for a dead body, she hadn’t been prepared for an alive one.  “Fuck.  Should be some in my pants but-”

Clarisse didn’t wait for him to finish talking, shimmying down onto her stomach so she could reach further into the gap before tracing his torso down.  He gave a cut-off hiss but didn’t protest; no doubt he knew better than she did that without the godly food, moving him with the injuries he’d listed ran a high chance of finishing him off.  Her fingers found the tattered-feeling quiver strap over his hips, then the line of his legs, thankfully curving around rather than going further back so she could still reach.

She found a pocket with something in it just as the fabric of his pants began to get sticky.  Michael let out a whimper and she saw his eyes glisten as she fumbled with the opening before slipping her fingers inside to grasp the familiar feeling of something wrapped to keep it clean.

Withdrawing it was much faster than finding it, and she hurriedly unwrapped the squished package, relieved when the ambrosia still looked fresh despite the wrappings taking on a suspiciously red tinge.

There was no point being coy about it; she broke off a large chunk and held it to Michael’s mouth.  He snapped it out of her fingers without protest and swallowed the dose with another wince.  As soon as her hand was empty, she wrapped the rest of the ambrosia and put it in her own pocket before drawing her knife.

Michael eyed it dubiously, but Clarisse ignored him as she set her hand once again in search of his leg, this time seeking whatever was causing the blood loss.

“Bitch,” he hissed faintly as her questing fingers found the stickiness again.  “Could’ve waited for the ambrosia to- ssssssshit – kick in.”  It didn’t feel like it was bleeding freely; everything was sticky rather than liquid.  Still, that was small mercies when her hand found the wound itself and discovered that Michael’s leg wasn’t just pinned but impaled.

He cursed her out more as she left his leg to find his right arm and assess how crushed it was.  The first probing contact had him letting out a high-pitched shout, and Clarisse grit her teeth, wishing she knew more about first aid.

“What do I need to do?” she asked, because Michael was never the Apollo kid anyone asked for medical help, but he was still an Apollo kid.

“Got a fucking torniquet?” he huffed.  In answer, Clarisse tore off her t-shirt and slashed it apart with her knife.

“This will have to do,” she said, twisting several orange strips together.  Michael grit his teeth.

“Make it fucking tight,” he said.  “Just below my shoulder.”

Twisting fabric around Michael’s upper arm was awkward when she couldn’t see it and there was barely any space between it and the surrounding metal, but Clarisse persisted, tying her makeshift torniquet as tight as it would go and ignoring the pained noises each tightening twist provoked from Michael.  Then she reached to put another one around his thigh, before bundling the remainder of her t-shirt around the metal stuck through his leg.

She was somewhat surprised Michael stayed conscious through it all, especially when she took her knife to the metal and forced Celestial bronze to saw through mortal steel, cutting the impaling spur free of the metal it was entangled with.  By the time she was done, her hands were red with Michael’s blood, and her shoulders were aching from keeping her arms extended so far for so long.

“Any more reasons I can’t pull you out?” she asked him, pushing herself back into a crouch and slipping her knife back into its sheath.

“Can’ tell,” Michael mumbled.  His eyes were closed, and his trembling had worsened considerably.  “Don’ think so.”

“Then it’s time to get you out of there,” Clarisse decided, hooking her hands under his shoulders.  “Don’t pass out on me.”

“No fuckin’ promises.”

There wasn’t much she could do except pull and hope.  Experimental tugs gave some movement in his trapped arm – and some short screams – so Clarisse let go of his shoulder to grip his arm directly, bracing against the metal as best she could as she tried to worm the limb free.  Almost immediately, Michael fell completely limp, and Clarisse alternated cursing the bridge and praying to the gods – her father, Apollo – as she tugged.

It eventually came loose with a concerning clatter of metal, and Clarisse didn’t let herself think as she grabbed Michael’s shoulders again and hauled.  Freed from the metal ensnaring him, and too small to be heavy even as a dead-weight, his body shifted easily and Clarisse almost overbalanced backwards as he spilled out of the gap and into her chest.

The gap shuddered as Michael’s trailing foot left it, and Clarisse all but threw him over her shoulder as she scrambled away.  Blood trickled down her back and metal bit into her free hand as she almost lost her balance.

Behind her, metal shrieked and began to collapse, and Clarisse whistled.

It was a whistle Silena had taught her, loud and sharp, and it brought a fresh wave of grief over her even as she jumped off of the rapidly shifting metal and landed heavily in the chariot as the pegasi pulled it past her.

Michael groaned and Clarisse dropped to one knee, grabbing for the flapping reins with one hand while she let him roll off her shoulder and into a slumped heap by her feet.  In the light, it was immediately obvious that his condition was bad.

Blood coated his leg and arm as well as his face.  What little of his skin could be seen without blood was pale, and he was still shaking like a leaf.  His eyes were closed but with the whimpers he was making Clarisse wasn’t sure how unconscious he was.

“Don’t you fucking die now,” she told him, shifting her stance until he was slumped between the front of the chariot and her legs, safe from the possibility of falling out mid-flight.  He didn’t reply, but she didn’t need one.

A tug on the reins – too much, too harsh, Silena would tell her off for not treating the pegasi better but Clarisse was in a hurry – and the chariot accelerated.  Forces pushed Michael against her shins, and she didn’t know if he was intentionally curling around her legs or if that was subconscious, but her stance was stable enough to be unmoved as the pegasi threw back their heads and strained their wings.

The distance between the bridge wreckage and the Empire State Building passed in the blink of an eye, and Clarisse let the chariot land roughly, mortals jumping out of the way of whatever they saw with outraged shrieks.  She ignored them as she scooped Michael off of the chariot floor, grabbing the bundle of torn t-shirt that wrapped around the sallow arm almost as an afterthought, and bolted for the elevators.

The security guard hanging out awkwardly with some mortals she vaguely recognised as having somehow taken part in the battle looked at her but didn’t make a move to stop her.  Perhaps he realised it would be futile.

Clarisse didn’t care as long as he didn’t get in her way.

The elevator up to Olympus played an irritating, lacklustre version of Stayin’ Alive, somehow melancholy instead of the upbeat peppiness the song usually came with, and Clarisse alternated between glaring at the doors, where the noise seemed to be coming from, and glancing down at Michael in her arms.  His face was twitching slightly, making him seem even more ferret-like than usual, but his eyes showed no sign of cracking open and his arm and leg looked bad in the bright lightning.

Was he dying?  She didn’t know enough first aid to tell.

“Dammit,” she muttered, glaring up at the ceiling.  “Doesn’t this junk go any fucking faster?”

It felt like an eternity before the floor came to a stop and the doors opened with a cheery little ding that sounded completely at odds with the mournful rendition of Stayin’ Alive.  Clarisse was all too happy to leave both firmly behind her as she threw herself into a run across the white and gold rubble of Olympus’ entrance, clinging tightly to the body in her arms as she rushed past occasional startled nymphs and minor gods on a bee-line for the room they’d set aside as an infirmary.

She almost ran face-first into a god as he appeared out of nowhere in front of her.

“Woah!  Easy there!” Apollo exclaimed, catching her shoulder with one hand and forcing her to a stop.  He wasn’t wearing his stupidly bright golden armour any more, but the gold chiton wasn’t much less eye-searing, and he still had golden aviators covering his eyes.

“Lord Apollo,” she gasped, snapping up straight, shoulder blades shifting back as far as they could go with her arms full.

“I’ll take him,” the god said, extending a hand towards Michael – his son, Clarisse realised, this was Michael’s father and while he hadn’t snatched Michael out of her arms, it was clear that it was an order, not a request.

Still, “he’s still alive,” she found herself saying.  “The infirmary-”

“Is overrun and exhausted,” Apollo cut her off, a serious edge to his voice that didn’t seem to fit with her previous experiences with the god.  “They can’t help him now.  Give him to me.”

Could she trust Apollo with his son?  Her own father certainly wouldn’t help her if she was that injured, gods didn’t help mortals.  But the Apollo cabin were definitely exhausted by now, the god – their father – would be right about that.

And Apollo was the god of healing.  That was why Apollo cabin were the camp healers, after all.

She held Michael out to his father.  “Help him,” she said, but it came out more a plea than an order.

His slight weight, even as a dead weight, vanished from her arms and then Michael was laying limply in Apollo’s hold instead.  “That’s what I do,” the god said, flashing her a grin made up of too-white teeth.  It didn’t last long, and she sensed rather than felt his gaze landing on the wrapped bundle still in her grip.  “You also have something for Nathan’s shroud, I see,” he commented, the words jarringly light given it was his dead son’s arm.  “I’ll leave that to you.”

With that last order – and it was an order, Clarisse wasn’t stupid enough to miss when a god was telling her to do something – he vanished in a shower of sunbeams.  When the lightshow died down, there was no sign he or Michael had been there.

She stood there for a moment, staring at the empty spot.  She had no idea how bad Michael’s condition was, if he was dying or if a single touch from Apollo would be enough to fix him, and having him whisked away so abruptly left her mind churning as it tried to work out if she’d just seen Michael for the last time.

It was Apollo, she reminded herself.  He was a god, he was Michael’s father, surely he’d fix him.

She forced herself to start moving again, changing destination from the infirmary to the shroud room.  Apollo had given her an order, after all, and it was something she could actually do.

She couldn’t heal, couldn’t fix things, but she could bring something back for the funeral.

There was more than just Nathan’s arm in the wrappings.  She knelt down beside the empty shroud (and it was empty, unlike the one next to it with the tell-tale bow shape beneath it that didn’t need to be there, but Clarisse was not on the shortlist of one allowed to touch the bow; she’d let Kayla retrieve it, if she got the news about Michael) and let not just the bitten-off arm, but also the bow fragments she’d gathered spill out of the bundle to be covered by the golden cloth.

It wasn’t a full body, but it was something, at least.

This time she didn’t run into anyone when she turned to leave, and with a deep breath she headed for the infirmary.  She had siblings in there that she ought to check in on, and now she’d seen Michael, the Apollo cabin didn’t seem quite so daunting to face.

The look on Will’s tired, drawn face when she pushed open the door was pure despair.

“What the Hades, Clarisse?” he asked, dragging himself up from where he’d been perching on the edge of a table.  He looked paler than Michael, cheeks drawn in and possibly closer to death than most of his patients, but that didn’t stop him trying to stride over to her, interrupted by staggers and stumbles.

Clarisse grabbed his shoulders and stopped him from face-planting either the floor or her chest.  “That’s my line, Solace,” she snapped back.  “Sit your ass down before you fall down.”

“You’re bleeding,” he protested, blue eyes slightly hazy but wide as they stared at her bare arms.  Clarisse followed his gaze and bit back a curse.

Her front and arms were covered in blood – all of it Michael’s, because her only wounds were small nicks from the metal on her hands.  Her sports bra, on full display after sacrificing the entirety of her t-shirt to try and stop Michael bleeding to death, had gained a few shades and a reddish hue.

“It’s not mine,” she told him firmly.

“Then whose?” he demanded, trying to resist as she pushed him back to sit down on a nearby piece of rubble but failing miserably.  He was too tired, and she was stronger than him, anyway.

Michael’s name lingered on the tip of her tongue but she swallowed it down, not confident enough that Apollo would save him to raise Will’s hopes while there was the chance they could be dashed again.

“It doesn’t matter,” she said, instead, a lie because it absolutely mattered, but Will didn’t need to know that.

Will didn’t look like he could handle anything more, right then.

“Go the fuck to sleep,” she told him, turning her back and looking out across the splay of injured and exhausted demigods.

Like Apollo had said, she couldn’t see a single Apollo kid that wasn’t completely exhausted.  Will was the only one that was still on his feet – fuck, he was the oldest, Clarisse realised, finally catching sight of the four other Apollo kids that added up to the original total of eleven when combined with the shrouds.  Kayla, face still crusted with dried tears, was curled up with Austin in a corner, both of them with their eyes closed.  Sam was splayed out on the floor, next to a makeshift bed that held an equally splayed Alice, who had a blood-soaked gauze on her face.  They, too, were both completely out for the count.

Fuck, none of the five surviving Apollo kids were even fourteen.  Nathan had been fifteen, and Robyn and Joy had been similar.  Sally and Elias had both been around the same age as Will, from what Clarisse recalled of them.

Michael was almost seventeen, a few months younger than her and so much older than his surviving siblings.

She looked back at Will, whose eyes had slipped shut.  They needed him.  Clarisse might have never got on with Michael, but she knew the same wasn’t true for his siblings.

He’d been a little shit from the moment he arrived at camp, but when it came to his siblings – especially younger ones – he’d always supported them.  Clarisse didn’t want to think about how much they might have fallen apart when they’d lost him.

There was nothing she could do for the exhausted Apollo kids.  She didn’t want to leave the infirmary now that she had finally entered it, though, and Sherman and Ellis were on neighbouring blankets, both covered in bandages but watching her with half-lidded eyes.

The Apollo cabin weren’t the only ones that needed their head counsellor, and Clarisse strode over to her brothers.

They were grieving, too, the loss of Mark and Louisa a shock none of them wanted to face for all they’d known it was likely that not all of their cabin would survive if they marched to war (it was one of the reasons Clarisse had held her cabin back, too selfish to risk their lives even though it was what they were born for), and when they finally fell asleep she moved on to other injured siblings.

Hours passed.  The Apollo kids slowly started coming around again, and Will banished her briefly to at least clean up and stop getting more blood in my infirmary while Kayla fixed her with a furious glare that Clarisse accepted silently.  Chris appeared with an arm in a sling and fresh – clearly stolen – supplies and tried to get her to talk about “whatever’s bothering you,” but she shrugged him off.

The look he gave her told her the topic was only temporarily dropped, and that he would be pressing later.

Slowly, the hubbub of the infirmary started up, Apollo kids dragging themselves into new rounds of checking on the wounded.  Even Alice pulled herself up and about, despite looking like she should be in one of the beds herself, and Clarisse found herself roped into fetch and carry as Will decided if she was going to hang around the infirmary, she could be useful.

She couldn’t heal, but she could at least follow basic orders.  The help was the least the Apollo kids deserved from her.

Apollo’s sudden arrival brought the infirmary to a shocked halt.  He was still wearing his ridiculous gold shades, but that wasn’t what froze everyone in place.  Nor was the garish, gold-studded choker he’d gained since she last saw him, accentuating the otherwise plain white top and designer jeans he was rocking as though he’d come straight from a catwalk.

It was the short figure standing next to him, one arm tucked in a sling while the other had a crutch jammed under it.  He looked much better than the last time Clarisse had seen him, no sign of the blood that had covered his face and limbs, and brown eyes alert as they scanned the room.  His camp t-shirt and pants were still torn and stained, but he looked truly alive again.

“Michael!” Kayla shrieked, a green-and-orange blur as she launched herself at him.  How he didn’t fall over when she cannonballed into him, Clarisse had no idea.

The other Apollo kids started moving towards him, too, their faces a spectrum of disbelieving relief.

“You’re alive,” Will whispered, as though saying it too loudly would make it not true.

Michael’s eyes met Clarisse’s, just for a brief moment but long enough to be deliberate, before looking at his younger brother.

“Yeah,” he said, a ghost of a smile on his lips, although Clarisse saw him glance around again, gaze settling on each of his living siblings for a fraction of a second before his shoulders slumped a little as he clearly looked for a sixth and realised there wasn’t one.  “Sorry it took me so long to get here.”

He didn’t say anything about Clarisse, but that was fine, because Clarisse realised she didn’t want people to know.  They still weren’t friends, hunting down his dead body and finding his living body instead didn’t change that, and the idea of getting credited with saving him when if it wasn’t for her and her cowardice there might have been a few less shrouds over bodies in another room on Olympus right then felt viscerally wrong.

The five younger kids finished descending on him, burying him out of sight, and bringing attention to the fact that Apollo had disappeared as quickly as he’d appeared.  Clarisse decided it was time to leave the infirmary.

It wasn’t like there was much she could do there, anyway, and the Apollo kids had their own head counsellor to keep them from overworking themselves, now.

Somehow, Clarisse caught Michael’s eye again as she slipped out past the cabin seven huddle.  He still didn’t say anything, but his sharp gaze softened slightly and he gave an almost imperceptible nod.  It was the closest thing to a thank you she’d ever got from him – closer than anything she ever expected to get, or wanted.

She nodded back, just once, and wondered if he could tell that she was glad that he hadn’t been dead after all, that he was still alive to be a continuous thorn in her side the same way he’d been since she was nine.

Not that it mattered if he did, or at least that was what she told herself as she broke eye contact and walked away.  Their relationship wouldn’t change that easily.

Even if there was a small part of her that wished it could.

[megamindsupremacy]

Crossover PJO fics

PJO/DC

Sons of wisdom by darkmagyk

'Bruce has always known he’s meant for war.

As a son of Athena, the gods probably think he’s meant for their war.

They are wrong.'

Bruce Wayne is a Demigod. It changes absolutely everything. It changes almost nothing.

-

The ship of Theseus by zipadeea

“What do you think of the Waynes?” Percy had asked Annabeth the week before. “Seems like they’re in Gotham’s headlines all the time, and not always for great reasons. You think they’re involved with the mob or something?”

“The opposite, actually,” Annabeth had replied, a wry smile on her face.

“What’s the opposite of the mob?”

“In Gotham? What do you think?”

Percy’s eyes had widened. “No. No way. Bruce Wayne is such a goof, there’s no way--,”

“Wouldn’t that be the best cover, though?”

***

Poseidon once told Percy he was his favorite son.

But he's not the only one.

-

Oh my Gods by siren_of_the_ocean

Tim Drake is a demigod in the Battle of Manhattan. He sends Thalia to inform the Justice league about well…Everything. And Kon is concerned.

-

PJO/Marvel

Toil and trouble by silverbird6

The air was thick with magic, so similar to the Mist and yet much more…chaotic. It pulled at the strands of Hazel’s hair and clutched at her mind, trying to convince her she was Betsy, a member of the neighborhood women's club and was very interested in making sure the town talent show went off without a hitch. Hazel was more concerned with the way she seemed to lose time every once in a while and wake up in a strange house, usually cooking or cleaning or tending to the garden.

After the events of Avengers Endgame, Hazel follows some unusual magic to the small town of Westview.

-

The File by denimbeans

The elevator dinging was probably the best sound Hazel had ever heard. Thanking the Gods for Leo and his well thrown screwdriver hitting the button, she had rushed to the Doors.

Clytius got there first.

When a body had collapsed on the threshold, Hazel almost felt like throwing up. It was Percy, it had to be, but…Gods of Olympus, he looked horrible. His hair was longer than she remembered, matted and streaked with blood. His clothes were torn and coated with golden dust. His skin looked like somebody had sucked the life out of it.

-

Can I Write 'Tried to rob Tony Stark' on My Resume? by hyperInactive

Percy was at least happy that this wasn't a prophecy. Stealing back some demigod weapons from a mortal? Sure, Iron Man was a superhero and a genius, but after dealing with Gaea, that was nothing. They just had to steer clear of anyone who might recognize them, and they were positive that they could pull it off easier than most of their quests. And potentially land Leo a job, while they're at it.

But Percy should have known better. Nothing is ever that simple for a demigod.

-

The Battle of New York... the SECOND Battle of New York by Variscite

The Seven (plus Nico and Will) fight in the Battle of New York with the Avengers.

This is set after the Trials of Apollo, so if you haven’t read that you’ll get pretty major spoilers, just a heads up.

ROUND TWO ADDITION:

Ancient History, Modern Times by tearsofsaudade

Clint was the first one to notice the kid, maybe sixteen or seventeen years old, wearing an old blue hoodie over a faded orange shirt and sitting cross-legged on a bench in Central Park eating a sandwich.  All normal things for teenage boys to be doing.  He shook his head and brushed black hair out of his face as he took another bite, completely unconcerned.

Meanwhile, Thor flew two feet in front of him at the speed of sound as a giant robot flung him away from the fight happening literally right in front of the bench.

Or: Percy Jackson meets different Avengers because he's doing things he shouldn't be doing. As usual.

-

And Death Won't Come Knocking by icewhisper

The history books remember Steve Rogers as the son of an Irish immigrant, but the people who saw him every summer remember him as Greek.