Chapter Text
Treated like a fish,
Come on man, why knock me out?
Well crud, dēja vū-
We walk for a while. And when I say 'a while', I mean a while. Jane has her cloak-hood thing, and Meg still has her glinting brown eyes, but me? I still had amber eyes. So we have to take a few extra alleys, which led to us taking more time to get to our now apparent destination, causing Jane to mutter a few curses. I walked with my head down, because unfortunately, some untold force decided that me having a hoodie was too easy. No, I apparently had to struggle each step of the way literally.
Meg and I (read: mostly Meg) asked Jane a whole bunch of questions, giving us a bit of information. We were on an island called Bluehaven. Bluehaven was an island found after the surviving people fled from this unknown plague (Meg had shot me a look, and I promise you dear reader, this was not me, nor the nosoi... I think), and the people here are kinda superstitious. Jane didn't talk about her personal life much, except about a few things about young Violet, her father, the Hallows, and why Jane and her father were stuck in the basement mist of the time.
Turns out Janes father, John, was ill. This earned me another glare from Meg and I sent her a helpless look. I didn't have anything to do with this, I swear on the river Styx. But Apollo, you may be saying, didn't you learn your lesson on making promises you can't keep? Jokes on you reader, I HAVE. And this promise I can keep. I didn't have anything to do with this mystery illness.
Ask we talked (again, read: mostly Meg), we learned that there were apparently three great gods. Po, Aris, and Nabu-Kai. The Gatekeeper, the Builder, the Scribe. This sounded like something from an epic book, and yes, howdy had had, this just so happens to be one (is it? Y'know what? It is now). I hadn't read a book so thrilling since Sherlock Holmes from 1887 and 1927.
We also learned that Jane got thrown out of a classroom window as a child for sneaking into a school.
...
Yeah no, where are the phones, let me ring up CPS- screw that, LET ME CALL MY SISTER ARTEMIS, but nooooooo, turns out, this island doesn't have a lot of forms of technology. How was I supposed to listen to the sometimes tolerable tunes on public transport? Heck, I would even listen to Epic the Musical, despite Jorge Rivera-Herrans very inaccurate depiction of me and the others. But, I suppose the musical was pretty enjoyable.
BACK TO THE WALK, we walked, that's the point. No need for spirals. We eventually reach the cove area, and we stick back, out of sight. Jane creeps behind the lobster traps, rather stealthily if you ask me, and Meg follows not even a second later, and I go last. Looks like Poseidon— sorry, not Poseidon, luck had blessed these sailors and us because a new catch must have come in, diverting everyone's attention. There were cats everywhere. Probably waiting for buts of discarded fish.
We duck here, crawl there, and sprint to the cover of a canvas if there is any. Not that long later, Jane is knocking on a door, and she looks particularly mad about being late by about 15 minutes. The place is huge, four stories tall, and window boxes cascading waterfalls of Jasmines.
Nobody answers.
Jane frowns and goes to knock again before Meg proceeds to kick the door. "Open up!" She demands, and Jane gives her an appreciative expression.
"Meg!" I cry, "You can't just kick the doo—"
"What the hell are you doing here, Doe?"
Some guy was behind us, you get than Jane, but older than Violet. "Eric Junior," Jane says, "Yeah. Um. I'm just... Here to see your dad."
The young man looks her up and down before his gaze lands on me, and I try not to squirm, because stop staring at me today please people. "Amber eyes..." He mutters, before looking at Meg, who looks like she wants to bite him, and knowing her, she probably will. "Your normal. Why are you with these freaks?" Meg bristles at his words. "They're not freaks, one of them is my brother, stupid." Once again, Meg defending me warmed my heart.
"Your brother?" The kid laughs as if this was some funny joke. "You can't possibly mean that, look at him,"
"What do you mean "look at me"?"
"Look at your eyes! They're all freakish! So either Freaky eyed Doe infected you—"
Jane cut in with a indignant "Hey!"
"—or you are some separate anomaly."
I go to say something, and Meg grabs my arm, sending me a hard, discouraging face.essgae received: do not make things worse. Unfortunately, I didn't even do anything before things escalated. Jane sighs. "Look, I just need to talk to your dad."
Eric raises an eyebrow. "I'm not sure where he is, but I can call his mates to ask." It was then I knew: we were screwed. There was no way he was giving in that easily, and for some reason I doubted that these so called "mates" would be friendly and give us scones.
"No, don't—" Jane yelps before Eric shouts "Hey everybody, Jane Doe and her new curse eyed friend are looking for my father. Anyone know where he's gone? Anyone want to help them out?" OH MY GODS, SAY IT LOUDER WHY DON'T YOU?!
Everyone, and I mean everyone, stopped what they were doing to look at us, even the cats. I always knew they were evil. "Huh, guess not," this prick. "Actually, how stupid of me. I just remembered he's at Town Hall, working on his speech. It's a good 'un this year." I take it back. He's not a prick. He's a bloody exploding fireball, and those aren't fun. "Pity your not invited." A seagull sqauwks. A cat meows. Some bell clangs off in the distance.
"Just listen," I say into the silence, holding up my hands. "This was just a misunder—"
"GET 'EM!"
The people barrel towards us, so if course the only sensible thing to do was run. Problem was that Eric Junior had grabbed Meg's arm and yanked her towards him, telling her that she'll thank him later, earning him a vicious bite and kick to the shin. He yowls, clutching his arm, and I see the bite mark form and the skin around it turn red, and feel pride. Then, I'm turning and sprinting, keeping up with Jane as people close in from all sides.
Though, where she jumped a barrel, I nearly run into it. Where she slides under a gutting table, I roll over it, and run for dear life. I reckoned we were going to make it, that was until some son of a gun swung an anchor at us, yes you heard that right, an anchor, and we changed course. People screamed, yelled, and cursed. Before I know what's happening, Jane and I, for I simply do not know where Meg had disappeared to, are herded on to this jetty thing. It was very old and tottering.
And we were trapped.
Over water.
We could swim.
"Jane," I say, "can you swim?"
"No," she says, voice shaky. "No I cannot,"
"Oh. That may have been better to mention before,"
"I know," she says.
Too many people where gathered on the jetty now, closing in, and I notice that the jetty was about to give away at any moment.
"Jane, do you trust me?"
"No? Why would I?"
"Because I may have a plan to get us off here, and it may require swimming,"
Our plan making was rudely interrupted by some guy with a peg for a leg. Hey, that rhymed! Peg for a leg!
"We told you not to show yer face here again, little Doe," he looks at me, and a cruel smirk grows on his face. "And looks like you got yerself a little friend."
Meg shouldered her way through the crowd, and spotted me, before seeing Peg and tramping her merry may in front of him. "Oi, old man," she says, hands on hips. "Leave them alone, they did nothing,"
Peg leg regards her before barking a laugh, and the rest of the fisherfolk join in, whacking each other on the arms and whipping away fake tears. Meg doesn't take kindly to this and kicks him in the groin, which causes him to immediately stall his laughed, and double over groaning. The fishermen stop their laugher and break out in a sprint again, and I grab Janes arm before a flying shape slams into us, and we fall into the water.
Silence, though there is movement. Something tangles around Jane and me, taking what little air we had left. But we aren't sinking. We're going upwards, and pulled through the water before we're breathing sweet air. The net swings 'round and plonking us on the deck of a sailboat, and I remember going fishing with Poseidon once.
Some old lady with a red cloak over by the pulleys. She stares at Jane, and looks at me with a confused expression. She reaches into her cloak, and i foolishly hope that she was going to offer help, but wait! Where's Meg? I look around from my spot on the floorboards, and that's when I hear, "I'm sorry you two, your nothing going to wake up with a bit of a headache," before I hear a crack, and then nothing.