#percy’s whole thing with playing with the snakes with the rainbow as he’s fully prepared to be eaten😭😭😭😭😭he is SO unserious

[anna-scribbles]

regained my 12 year old swag(read an entire new percy jackson book in one sitting)

[jflashandclash]

Attrition of Peace

Thirty-Four: Ajax

Still Not the Creepiest Way I’ve Been Hit On

             Getting hit by a car wasn’t originally on Pax’s bucket list, but he decided to add it and a happy checkmark on his mental record.[1]

           He had run away from the fight, leaving the steam, flames, and storm behind. Percy and Leo were too enraptured to notice him. Well, Percy probably noticed, but whole flaming taco torpedoes deal was a bit distracting for him.

           Flaming Taco Torpedoes: a great name for a band, and a great name for both the best food experience and worst bathroom experience of your life.

That’s when the Paxmobile sidelined him, taking him off his feet and onto the pavement. Breaks squeaked. A familiar voice shouted, “Cho!” from an open window. [2]

           Pax wanted to wallow in misery and whine, “Ow!” loud enough for Croesus’s son to hear, but got a half a second of wallowing before almost getting stomped.[3] Pax rolled to the side to avoid a golden hoof. He found himself between the Paxmobile’s front and a distressed automaton donkey’s rear. One definitely ready to kick.

           “Holy Titans—Ajax! Help!” a voice called beside him. Jack was trying—unsuccessfully—to scoot away from the hooves using his jaw.

           For an instance, Pax didn’t feel like he could move again. Weirdly, hit by a vehicle wasn’t in his repertoire of things he was mentally prepared to handle. He snatched Jack’s head by his hair and rolled them away from Luke the Donkey’s shuffling feet, hearing a pancake-smashing pang from where his head had been.

Pax stayed crouched on the ground panting as Jack blathered, “—barely hit us. How am I supposed to write a sonnet about that?”

           The driver’s side door slammed shut and Axel took two long strides to them.

           “Ajax—that—that is you,” he said.  

           Axel knelt beside Pax and cautiously ruffled his hair, which showed a strange amount of resistance. Pax didn’t understand Axel’s confusion until the caramel locks fell all over his arms and shoulders.

           He was still Calypso.

Pax opened his mouth to speak but felt like his words were made of too many marshmallows—normally an awesome problem if he wasn’t struggling to express himself. Finally, he managed, “I think I look like a pretty princess.”

           “Yea,” Jack complained, “And like someone I used to bang. It’s weird and uncomfortable for everyone.”

           Pax tried to laugh that off. He knew he should change back, but the thought of it made him tremble. How easy would it be someone else forever? To walk away and create a new identity, complete with a cool back story and costume change.

           A chilly breeze wafted the scent of flames to him. Trees had collapsed. Windows on nearby houses had shattered. Panels had ripped off. Shingles were aflame. Pax hoped their cab driver had gotten out of here okay and wasn’t a sizzling pile of demigod collateral.

           “I wish I could make rainbows appear,” Pax said. He stared through Axel’s firm expression. He thought about the tears that spilled down Leo’s cheeks, the ones that evaporated immediately into the night air, about how Leo had screamed in pain. “Or be really awesome at weaving. Or make people want to party. I—I h—hate being… I hate being able—”

           Axel pulled Pax into his shoulder with one arm.

           Pax choked on a sob and clutched at his brother. As he wailed, he felt the hair along his shoulders recede, becoming lighter until his normal jagged length returned. The cute work jacket morphed into a sweater and bronze breastplate. He was him again. Just a stupid, horrible godly thing that… that was meant to…

           To hurt those I love the most.

           No wonder Axel was going to play pin-the-dagger-in-the-demigod with Pax’s hand.

           “Aw, my boys just need to hug it out. Axel, Ajax, pull me up against your shoulders to simulate cuddling,” their decapitated friend requested.

           “Nope, we’re good,” Axel answered.

Pax had to agree. As desperate as he was, he just found his line on where he’d go for affection: corpses or undead things.  

Axel withdrew, making Pax want to cry more. He ruffled Pax’s hair again, puffed up his cheeks, and popped them.

           “Why did you hit me with your car? Was it because of the Reyna-condom thing?” Pax asked. As far as he was concerned right now, there were plenty of other reasons to hit him with a car, but he figured that’s the most likely one for Axel. After all, Axel was too awesome a driver to do so on accident without some major distractions.

           Pax glanced over Axel’s shoulder towards the van, noticing how a stalk of corn had sprouted through the open driver door.

           “Euna—” Axel started uncertainly, apparently willing to overlook the Reyna-condom thing in Pax’s current pathetic state.

           “—turned into corn,” Pax finished for him.

           “Something is wrong with her,” he said.

           “I’d be upset too if I were turned into corn. That would be like reverse engineering for our people.”

           Axel scolded. Before Pax could dodge, Axel snagged his ear and twisted it.

           “Aye! Okay! No mercy for the sacrilegious!” Pax whined. His voice almost sounded normal again, only cracking once with physical pain instead of emotional.

           “We need to get out of here to meet up with Calex and Merry—before others come for us,” Axel said, “It shouldn’t take too long to get to camp since we can use… donkey travel.” Axel looked annoyed at having to say it.

Although Pax knew Axel was trying to distract him, he wondered how often Axel said stuff like that to distract himself.

Not that someone like Axel would ever need to pretend everything was okay since he could warp reality with his sheer awesomeness… but in a universe where Axel was less perfect, Pax wondered how often Axel kept a poker face when he felt like the world was crumbling.

           Axel shifted like he was going to throw Pax over his shoulder. From the way Axel’s arms shuddered, Pax had a strange feeling Axel would struggle to lift a kitten right now due to battle exhaustion.

           “Don’t try to pick us up. You’ll kill all three—“ Pax paused to stare at Jack. “Two of us? Jack, are you dead? Should I consider you dead again?”[4]

           “I don’t know,” Jack admitted, then proceeded to use that grating gurgle of a voice to sing the lyrics to Michael Jackson’s Thriller. If Jack had shoulders, Pax knew he’d have shrugged.

           The Pax brothers helped each other stand up. Pax felt sore from the car hit, but not Hercules-punched-me-sore. It was more like a little car love tap. Something Pax felt like Hephaestus would do to Aphrodite if he could.

Axel hesitated, then picked up Jack by his dirt-smeared red hair.

They needed to build Jack a carry case. Or at least a towel. Pax could imagine it now. “Nice pet carrier. Is that a cat inside?”

At least they’d have the best Halloween prop ever.

           They shuffled towards the back of the van, listening to Jack as he supplied some entrance music.

           Before Axel opened the doors, Pax could hear Euna’s icily tight voice, “—to wear off by now. It won’t stop though. It’s so loud—it’s too loud—”

           When Pax saw the inside, he gasped.

           The far corner of the interior, behind Axel’s driver seat, looked beautiful, or as beautiful as a beat up utility van’s interior could look. The carpeting near Euna’s feet was covered in mosses, ferns, and flowers. Vines had wrapped wildly about her legs, torso, and Backbiter’s scabbard, like nymphs had given her a makeover. Pax couldn’t tell that Euna was sitting on a bench until she slammed her fist into the frame with a solid crunch. Some of her moss indented to show where she’d damaged metal structure under the cushions and plants.

Her legs were pulled up against her chest. Her other hand covered her ear. There were pieces of bent precious metal littering the moss in a circle around her. Her black hair trembled with each of her twitches.

           Kally was in midstep towards her, one hand clutched tight to her chest, like Euna had tried to bite it when Kally reached out.

           The look on Alabaster’s face said he’d slap Kally if she tried to pet another rabid demigod. Well, he would, if his hands weren’t decorated in the world’s most expensive blocks.

           Relief washed over his and Kally’s faces when they saw Pax, making Pax feel the tiniest bit fuzzy and less dead on the inside.

           “Ajax, rouge satchel. Vial seven,” Alabaster instructed before the fuzziness could fully settle.

           Pax’s muscle memory kicked in before his brain did. As he hopped into the van, he could envision the Witch Boy’s ingredient cabinets at Camp Othrys. All the powders, preserved skins, miscellaneous liquids, and bones had been color and shape coordinated since his little half-Mayan lab assistant could barely write his own name let alone read Latin nomenclature. Back when Pax had a place in life, had a full family, and all he had to worry about was how he and Matthias were going to prank Prometheus when the Titan kept predicting every whoopee cushion and paint bucket that they set up.

When Pax regained focus of the present, he had his hand in one of the satchels around Alabaster’s neck, and was withdrawing a rounded vial with two dots and a bar along the side.

           A vial of pills.

           Pax stepped towards the trembling daughter of Demeter. “Euna, these will make you feel better.” He paused. “Or kill you.” Pax glanced back at Alabaster. “These are going to make her feel better, right?”  

           “Ajax,” Alabaster growled.

           “Right, question after potential crisis.”

           A vine snaked from Euna’s leg to snatch the vial away from Pax. Apparently, she was on the act now, think later train with whatever was “too loud.”

The vine squeezed the vial until it shattered into her palm. She caught some of the raining pills.

           “Only take two,” Alabaster snapped.

           Pax hoped she’d heard before she tossed her head back. No water necessary.

           The pills worked fast.

           Euna went rigid for a moment. Then her eyes rolled up in her head and she collapsed back into the plant-filled bench, her black hair spilling across her face. Her skin seemed to glow dimly in the van’s yellow light.

           Kally hesitantly took a step closer to Euna, putting a hand up to Euna’s forehead.

           At Kally’s worried glance, Alabaster said, “They’re a derivative of the formula I use for Ajax’s sleep darts. I’ve been using them for my studies on the effect of lucid dreaming on prophetic dreams, so I can immediately plunge into uninterrupted REM sleep for an hour. Think demigod-powered Nyquil.”

           “So, this is the best time to draw on her face?” Pax asked, knowing this was an opportunity he should not take lightly.

           “Ajax,” Axel snapped from outside.  With a much more inclusive and less chastising tone, he added, “We need to leave. Everyone settle in.”

           Pax wanted to ask about the urgency, but he could hear what Axel meant. The steam, flames, and hurricane had stopped behind Alabaster’s house. Everything had gone quiet.

           “Vroom vroom,” Jack agreed. Although he couldn’t turn to see, his eyes darted in the direction. “I call shotgun.”

           As Axel slammed the back door shut, Kally stared after them. She took a seat on the tiny part of the bench still poking out of Euna’s plants. Her movements were slow, like she’d tried to carrying a grizzly bear before realizing grizzly bears weren’t for bench pressing.

           “Why is he still with us?” she asked softly. She bent down to pull something out of her messenger bag. From the slow movement, Pax guessed she’d gotten the coolest injury someone could get from a battle: a pulled back muscle.

           When Kally withdrew a medical kit that Will must have given her, her eyes watered. “I saw what he did to Annabeth and Piper when I dragged Frank and Jason over—“

           The driver’s door shut. From over the seats, Pax watched Axel set Jack’s head in the passenger seat, then paused to debate on a seatbelt.

“Please, it was only mono for Annabeth,” Jack said from the other side of the seat. “It looked like you’ve been healing people though. So you are one of my siblings—”

           “Jack,” Axel growled, deciding against the seatbelt.

           Although Axel feigned mild irritation, Pax knew how scary Jack’s awareness was. It made Pax want to hug Kally and make her a safety bubble of teddy bears and a soundproof safe room.[5]  That was probably the only thing the Fates had left to dangle in Pax’s face. Please don’t hurt my not-girlfriend, Pax thought. She was the only one remotely adjusted in the group and they needed someone who was properly freaked out by a talking head.

           “I can behave myself. She’s a friend or a lover or something, right?” Jack asked.

           “Flash,” Alabaster said softly, “If you do anything to her, I’ll bring your punishment from Tartarus here.”

           Jack made a choking sound.

           As though Alabaster hadn’t threatened him with whatever his eternal nightmare was, he continued, “Kally, you said Euna had droplets that invoke godly powers?” Alabaster went from looking like he wanted to strangle Jack to his I’m-fascinated-at-the-expense-of-my-life face. Pax loved that face. It meant he could get away with stupid stuff. “I’m impressed how her mind and body can handle that. I wonder if she’s acclimating.”

           “Acclimating?” Kally echoed, eyes widening with alarm. She withdrew ambrosia squares from her messenger bag and some unicorn draught from New Rome, handing a cube to Pax and painfully leaning forward to give one to Axel. She pointedly ignored Jack, who was now humming Hysteria.

           “She said it wore off faster last time,” Alabaster said with a shrug. His hands and feet were still encased in metal. His shoulders were slumped with exhaustion and—although Alabaster tried to hide it—confusion. Pax knew Alabaster well enough to see that he hadn’t had enough time to process everything, from the Pax brothers being alive, to why Jack wasn’t dying, to going towards Camp Half-Blood… which Alabaster probably didn’t realize yet.

           Pax was very willing to not point out their destination. As the van began to accelerate, Pax flopped down onto the bench beside Alabaster, aware Alabaster would be too tired to move away when Pax nudged him with his knee.    

           Pax set Nietz’s cage on the ground and opened it, hoping the weasel would frolic out. Instead, Baller scrambled over, evoking a soft call of delight from Pax.

           The weasel hopped around Pax’s feet once, then dove after Nietz, nipping and biting at his unconscious brother’s ear to no avail.

           “Nietzsche…” Alabaster frowned in concern.

           When it became clear that Nietz was nonreactive, Baller bit him and dragged him across the van floor towards Pax and Axel’s trunk by the front seat. Beside it, Pax could see Axel’s surplus army jacket was on the floor, with Hunnie curled in the center. Baller deposited Nietz next to the other unconscious sibling.

           “I don’t have enough energy to help them…” Alabaster muttered.

Kally’s teary eyes were scanning all of them, either taking inventory of who was the most injured, or trying to figure out which of the Triple A Chimera was the hottest. Clearly Axel.

“You’re doing that thing,” she said, examining him, “You… Pax?”

Pax jumped. The end of that first sentence was, “where you stare really seriously.” He couldn’t have people taking him seriously. He’d start crying. His cheeks would puff up and he wouldn’t look nearly as adorable.

“So, you evaporated Hazel. That was cool,” he said to Alabaster, keeping his voice even. Ways to distract both of them!

“I banished new shadows from appearing on or near my property. She needed to either fight us without feet, or she had to completely shadow travel away,” he explained robotically, “I almost performed a similar spell to keep Lamia’s essence from reforming, so I already had the mechanics of the incantation worked out.”

Kally paused when she went to hand Alabaster an ambrosia square and realized he didn’t have mobile fingers to take it from her. Alabaster glanced over at the movement and saw the problem. Kally blushed; Alabaster looked puzzled.

Pax thought about the two of them sitting at a café in some fancy European town, sipping tea while Alabaster circled mistakes in a scientific journal and Kally hashed out the details of a chapter.

Pax reached out for Kally’s wrist and pulled her carefully into his lap.

Old people¸ he thought while trying to work around her injured back.

“Pax—” Kally protested. Her blush intensified when she was unable to catch her balance.

“What are you doing?” Alabaster asked, annoyed at the invasion of personal space on the bench.

Once Pax had Kally comfortably against him, he nuzzled into Alabaster’s shoulder. “It’s called sharing,” he said. All he’d wanted all night was a hug from someone that didn’t try to kill him in dream land. This would suffice. “Didn’t either of you go to kindergarten? Besides, at this rate, you’ll both scream in horror the first time you accidentally hold hands. And it will be an accident. It’ll be worse than that time I told Morpheus to give Axel a sex dream with Reyna.”

They were entering a highway. Axel missed a gear shift, the van jerked, and Pax could smell burnt clutch from the back. “You asked him to do that?!” he demanded.

“Yep,” Pax said, trying to sound proud instead of numb. “For your birthday.”

“Wow—Axel,” Jack piped up, “Alabaster’s dream was right? Ramirez? And you never told me? Have you two—”

“No,” Axel snapped, scowling at Pax in the rearview mirror. Pax forced as much of an impish smile as he could manage. “We’re not talking about this, and you’re never to talk about Reyna like that, and it doesn’t matter anyway because it’s over.”

Jack laughed. “All that time of you rejecting girls, boys, monsters, and gods I sent your way? Na-uh. Our chaste warrior falls to the sweet blessing of Eros’ kiss, and you think I’m going to but bite mine tongue at such a celebration?”

“Jack, I’ll throw your head out the window.”

“No, you won’t. You missed me too much.”

“I’ll find Matthias’ playlist and play dubstep the entire way back to camp.”

“You wouldn’t dare, foul demon.”

While the two in the front argued, Alabaster had leaned down and bit the ambrosia square out of Kally’s fingers. If Pax had to guess, purely to spite him.[6]

In an attempt not to evolve the art of embarrassment into a new, more powerful emotion, Kally went to work cutting Alabaster’s sleeve off so she could attend to his wound. Although Pax’s presence made the process slower, they worked around him without complaint. Whether from exhaustion or kindness, Pax was happy for the proximity.

Pax waited patiently to see which of them would break first.

It was Alabaster. Pax could see him become conscious of how close he was sitting to Kally and Pax before he asked, “Wait—mono? You had the opportunity to kill Annabeth, and you gave her the kissing disease?” He looked at the seemingly empty passenger seat for distraction.

Instead of singing to heal where Hazel had slashed Alabaster’s arm, Kally very pointed started to stitch him up. Not gently either.

Yea, their whole group needed some real talk time about the whole killing Percy and Annabeth thing.

“I’m not gonna kill Luke’s creepy crush,” Jack chastised, “Besides, it’s like a two for one deal. A few months from now, Percy will be obnoxiously exhausted and sick. And—if recent Tartarus fanfiction is correct—so will Jason.”

“Oh, Percy and Jason are not a thing.” Pax felt bad ruining Jack’s plan, but he figured Jack ought to know now. “I once smacked Percy’s ass when I’d morphed into Jason and you could tell he wasn’t into it.”

“Ajax—why—” Alabaster started to ask. He shook his head in disgust. “It doesn’t matter.”

“It did make sense at the time,” Kally meekly assured, finishing up the stitch. She put some gauze and medical tape over the wound. “I’ll sing over what’s left once I’ve attended to everyone else and rested a little from healing…”

She trailed off. Pax knew she was going to say Frank and Jason. The thought of her trying to ignore Frank’s nudity should have brought cupcakes and happiness to Pax’s heart.

Kally glanced down at Pax, frowning.

Pax forced himself to give that devilish smile and wink. “I can take off my clothes if you need to do a full body exam.”

Kally blushed, probably thinking about the time he streaked through New York, then shook her head. “Will everyone be okay?” she asked, standing up from Pax’s lap.

Reluctantly, he let her get to her feet. Kally stretched, wincing.

The pain Pax and Leo shared kept threatening to resurface. That kid of Hephaestus deserved a medal, not a child of Strife rooting around in his head. “Does ‘okay’ include future therapy, hours of hug sessions, and a lifetime of regression on self confidence? Because if it does, then maybe. With 65% in the positive direction,” Pax said, puffing up his cheeks and popping them.

Quieter, she asked, “Are you okay?”

He knew she wasn’t asking if he was injured.

If they were alone, Pax would have burst into tears right there, curled up in her lap—an impressive feat considering their current placement—and begged her to hold him. He was pretty sure he’d never screwed up more than he had tonight.

But he didn’t want Alabaster to claim he was faking it, and he didn’t want to explain to Jack why he’d rather curl up with Kally—a hot chick that wasn’t a decapitated corpse—and he didn’t deserve to have Kally touch him.

Alabaster saved him from turning into a puffer fish of sobs. “Why did you leave the protective barrier around the house?” Alabaster asked. The tone wasn’t angry. More the I’m not mad, I just want to know how you did it, that he used when Matthias and Pax broke into the laboratory for prank supplies. “Does it have to do with that mark on your neck?”

Mark? Pax followed Alabaster’s glance and touched the bruise on his neck. Whatever it was hadn’t healed yet, even with his extra godly blood.

           Icy fingers slipped over his.

           Pax almost screamed, thinking the abominable snowman had somehow snuck up on a moving vehicle and bust through the wall in the stealthiest explosion possible.

           Then he felt the warmth of a blanket settle over his legs, one composed of newspaper articles about world catastrophes. The article on his left knee showed a picture of a dead baby panda at some zoo.

           Pax felt like someone had scooped out his heart and crushed it. Well, the tiny reserve of his heart that hadn’t been crushed by the rest of the night. He opened and closed his mouth.

           Alabaster yelped in alarm when something slipped between him and Pax.

           “Have you heard about how Zeus hung Hera over the pit of Khaos, when he learned of her attempted treachery? Even the gods fear the abyss of nothingness and nonexistence,” a familiar voice cooed like a lullaby.

           Pax choked on his own breath—a stupid feat, but impressive within the world of stupidity.

           A girl leaned forward off their bench, one hand stretched back along Pax’s shoulder and one to Alabaster’s, so she wouldn’t fall forward, though it looked more like she was suspended by two chains. Those black locks—streaked with white, red, and purple—were shorter and jagged again, twisting back in chaotic spirals. She wore a leather jacket. A crowbar and a sledge hammer appeared at her feet.

           Atë ignored both of them, her face angled at the slumbering form of Euna.

           Euna mumbled in her sleep. The vines wrapped around her legs unraveled and lifted, hovering like charmed snakes between the daughter of Demeter and the Goddess of Mischief and Ruin.

           “Atë,” Kally hissed. She snatched one of Axel’s throwing sticks off the wall and aimed it at the goddess. “What do you want?”

           “Wow—Kally, put the stick down,” Pax said, his voice coming out a whisper. “Axel will hurt you way more than Atë ever could if you break that thing.”

           Atë shrugged listlessly and tugged Pax’s hand so she could sit upright. Alabaster flinched and scowled as she did the same to him. Smoke still curled off her from her little appearing trick. “Euna asked a question while she was sleeping. It would have been rude not to answer.”

           “I can’t see!” Jack complained, “Is the intruder hot?”

           “It’s Atë,” Axel growled, glaring at her in the rearview mirror.

           “That didn’t answer the question,” Jack grumbled.

           Atë released Pax’s hand and shoulder, sliding her fingers down his bronze breastplate and under the blanket. She dug her nails into his knee. “Don’t go to Camp Half-Blood,” she said, “Lapis sent me. She said you and Axel shouldn’t go back. A chicken lizard told her—”

           “Kukulkan,” Axel snapped.[7]

           Pax wasn’t sure what to expect from Atë. Maybe a, “Sorry for using you to kill Will, cause massive chaos, and trap Nico. Here’s a Reese’s Stick.” That would have been nice. He hadn’t expected her to act as a convoy for his siblings.

           “So, Lapis gave you a stickynote, a high five, and you poofed? No strings or massive chains attached?” Pax asked. “Just out of the goodness of your… whatever organs you have?”

           Atë turned to Pax and stared at him with those blank, red eyes. If she hadn’t… acted how she had earlier, he might have thought he’d stunned her into silence. “She traded the favor for information,” she said.            

           Pax was scared of what kind of information Lapis would have that Atë might want, other than Axel’s workout schedule. She could get a lot of money for that from the nymphs at Camp Half-Blood.

           “Let me take a guess: your mom doesn’t want any of us to go back to Camp Half-Blood?” Kally asked. She took a step back towards Euna, and Pax saw her glance at Backbiter’s scabbard. She was probably debating if she could get it to use Atë’s choker as a cut here line.

           “No.” Atë tilted her head to one side and Pax could feel some of her hair tickle his ear. Part of him really wanted to shove her off the bench. Part of him wanted to cry and whine a, I thought you liked me! and knew pushing a goddess was a bad idea.

           Pax went to shove her off the bench.

           Atë caught his hand. Without revealing any strain, she continued, “Python would be disappointed if you weren’t there, Kally. Euna needs to come to camp. If rumor is correct, she’ll find the answers to some of her questions at Hera’s temple. Jack can come. You can roll his head into Cabin Seven and see who sings the last note. But… Alabaster…”

           She turned towards him. “Are you excited to sit outside the camp that has banned you for having thoughts and for wanting to teach others how to have thoughts?”

           Although Pax couldn’t see Alabaster with Atë between them, he could envision his friend tensing. Atë leaned forward to tap her nails in a walking motion along Alabaster’s restrains. As the goddess’s fingers left the metal, the material tarnished, cracked, and fell away.  

           She continued, “You and the rest of Chimera could go on a play date while you’re waiting. I’m sure there are some nymphs you can hunt down to gather ingredients.”

           “The Association Against Sorceral Subjugation banned nymph poaching in the 1980’s,” Alabaster said evenly. Pax could see Alabaster flex his freed fingers.

           “As they should have,” Axel said sternly from the front.

           Pax would rather fall on another nail than hear that argument again.

“Now, Atë, I want you out of my car,” Axel growled.

           She kicked her feet out, letting her ankles crack against the base of the bench on the backswing. “You are almost at camp. I should leave. After all, children of Strife always hurt those we love the most, especially the more we’re around them.” She frowned and stared at the floor.

           Pax wanted to ask her if she wanted some polish and a rag to rub it in more. He already knew how much he’d hurt his friends.

           Instead, she leaned over and kissed Pax where she’d bit him previously. When Pax gasped, he found himself inhaling her smoke as she poofed away.

           In her place, there was a small box wrapped in her newspaper blanket. It rattled with something inside.

           They sat in stunned silence for a moment, the van’s interior feeling too exposed. Pax wished he had a magical poof ability to avoid unwanted, inevitable questions. Kinda like those trap doors evil villains always kept in offices.

           “Um, Pax, isn’t she your sister?” Kally asked. She set Axel’s throwing stick back on the wall. Her tone was too careful.

           “She’s only my half-sister,” Pax mumbled, pulling at the sides of the newspaper blanket. Maybe he could hide under it.

           “We’re only half-siblings,” Axel said, giving him a concerned glance in the thin slit of the mirror.

           Pax sighed. “I want to wink at you so desperately as a joke, but it just feels too weird.”

           “Ajax, I consider myself a very patient and understanding man when you consider our upbringing,” Axel said, “But, if you ever wink at me in that context, I will beat the incest out of you.”

           “You didn’t—” Alabaster started.

           “Nope. I said nope,” Pax said quickly, opening the box to keep from looking at everyone. “I was a good little boy and told her she had no manners since she hadn’t brought me—”

           Inside, there were pastry sweets. Pax puffed up his cheeks and popped them: they were from his Chiich’s pastry shop. He’d recognize the smell anywhere. Beside them were a bundle of black orchids, the flower his father used to keep all over the club as a reminder of their home country. Lastly, there was a tiny ball of poof staring up at him with panicked, beady eyes. The furry black thing dashed out of the box, fumbling onto the floor.

           Baller’s head popped up from his nest. He dashed after the new intruder.

           They bolted around the van.

           “What is that?!” Kally demanded, scrambling back onto the bench beside Euna.

           “It’s a chinchilla,” Pax explained numbly, “She even gave me a live one.”

           Alabaster pulled his knees up to sit pretzel style on the bench beside him. Cautiously, he withdrew a note from inside. “That’s a low bar, Ajax,” he pointed out before opening the card.

           A voice recording played of Atë saying, “Lo siento muchísimo.”[8]

           Pax flinched at the apology. He reached over and opened and shut the front a few times, making it go, “Lo s-L-L-Lo sient—”

           Alabaster batted him away. He made a face and went to shut the card.

“What does it say?” Pax asked.

Alabaster frowned, glanced at Axel’s seat, then back at the card. He bit his lip. “I wanted to stitch the recorder inside the chinchilla, like one of those Build-A-Bear toys, but Lapis said you would like this more.” He swallowed. “Now you can open this each time I hurt you. And… and it has a heart with her name beside it.”

Pax tried to respond. He wanted to get excited about naming the chinchilla something awesome or about having a tasty piece of home to eat and visualize the way his Chiich would scold them for swiping sweets from her stand.

But he felt too nauseous to eat.

All he could do was pull his legs up against his chest. He thought about how easily Atë restrained his hand when he tried to push her off the bench. He clutched at the sweater under his armor, the one depicting weasels eating humans.

           Maybe Atë was once like him. But everything kept going wrong, over and over, and she stopped feeling like she was made out of cuteness and fluff and forgot how to give others her cuteness and fluff.

           Maybe he deserved to be with someone like her.  

           Warmth encased his side.

           Pax wanted to squeal until he smelled the smallest hint of eucalyptus and mint—Kally’s shampoo. She squeezed onto the bench beside him and wrapped her arms around him. Although she was trying to be sneaky, Pax felt her other hand slip along his back to tug on what was left of Alabaster’s sleeve.

           Pax could feel her tears when she nuzzled into him.

           Alabaster’s fist crushed around the card. Pax wanted to yip in protest—that had been a gift. But the crumbled paper was already on the ground, giving another obstacle for the weasel and chinchilla to dart around.  

           Pax really hoped Baller was trying to say, hi and not nice night for a snack.

           Alabaster shoved the box down afterwards, shaking up the flower and pastry arrangement. “Hades damn it all,” he grumbled. When he leaned forward, putting an arm around Pax and Kally and his chin on Pax’s head, Pax could feel how he fumed and trembled with anger.

           “You know you can’t kill the chinchilla, right?” Pax squeaked. “It’s not Harvey’s fault that Atë chose it for a gift.”

           “We can get one of the satyrs to give it a nature’s blessing to assure it returns home safely,” Kally suggested.

           “Most animals raised in captivity will die in the wild,” Alabaster pointed out.

           “I’m sure some younger cabin members will take care of… Harvey,” Kally said.

           Listening to them talk around him eased some of the tension in Pax’s stomach. He didn’t realize how tightly he’d clenched into a ball, but tried to become less ball-like by snuggling more into them. After a moment, he managed a smile and said, “You know, Atë gave me the sweater I’m wearing too. Are you going to undress me with the power of teamwork?”

           The van decelerated to a stop. At first, Pax thought Axel was parking to hop in the back and yank his ear off.

           Instead, Axel opened his door and paused. Pax could hear him sniff the chilly early morning air as it drifted into the car. Then he popped his cheeks.

           “What is it?” Jack asked.

           Alabaster and Kally sat up. Even Euna stirred.

           Axel inhaled deeply and sighed. When he glanced over the seat rest, Pax could see how exhausted he looked. “It’s Reyna. She’s here. And so are the Romans.”

 Thanks for reading guys! At least you now know Pax survived >>’’ We’ll get to Percy and Leo’s side a little later.

Also! Excitement on this front! For those of you who aren’t on a website that says how many chapters there are: I’m writing the last one this weekend! :D There will be 43 in Attrition of Peace, though I’m hoping to keep the word count below Blood of a Mayan. (It’s already too long T.T) Once that’s done and I finish some school application stuff (*cries* real life), I’m going to hash out some of my writing requests (don’t think I forgot you Calex-meets-his-awesome-step-mother-request :D)! Thanks for sticking with me so far guys!

Footnotes:

[1] The original start for this chapter was in Axel’s point of view with,        When they slid into the Paxmobile, Axel still wasn’t sure they’d made the right choice.

           When a talking head and demigod slammed into the hood of the car, he knew, regardless of the rightness of the choice, at least it didn’t result in Pax’s death.

[2] I am so tired of doing exposition and character building scenes in the Paxmobile. That’s why it disappeared for a full book. I’m straight up going to blow the damn thing up soon. Say goodbye to your home weasels! MUAHAHHA!

[3] His most famous son is deaf.

[4] A question I often get from friends and family when I get into writing moods.

[5] “Preferably covered in pictures of scantily clad Alabaster and Pax boys. You know. In case she gets bored.”

[6] Jokes on Alabaster. You know Pax has no problems with polygamy.

[7] This is hinted at in the second book. Lapis is the only Pax other than Ajax that can call upon the Vision Serpent. More on this—in proper mythological context—in the Pax family’s standalone story.

[8] I’m so sorry.