Chapter Text
Chapter 1. Hopeful New Beginnings.
As Percy walked through the camp, people clustered together and started whispering to each other. He tried his best to ignore it, but their pointed stares and the fact they stopped talking and looked away when he caught them, proved that he was the subject of discussion… again. He was getting tired of the constant attention. He had hoped for a break after the war had ended but obviously it was not meant to be.
Ah yes the war. It had not been the long, bloody, bitter war everyone had been expecting. Yes they had lost a few people along the way but nothing close to what they had all been expecting. Of course the fact that they had the Romans on their side had greatly improved their chances and they had eventually won. Gaia had been defeated and everyone finally had the peace that had been broken before the war.
Well… everyone except Percy that was.
He had returned from a hunting trip, two weeks after the war and, hoping to surprise Annabeth, had decided to sneak into her room that week with a book on architecture (praying to the Gods it was one she didn’t have and that she wouldn’t be too upset with him for waking her if she was already asleep).
He hadn’t needed to worry about disturbing her sleep, to say the least. Not with the way she and a boy from the Aphrodite cabin had been going at it anyway. Needless to say, Percy hadn’t been all that impressed and left far quicker than he’d arrived and with less grace too. He might have woken some of the Athena kids but hadn’t really cared at that rate. His girlfriend had cheated on him so he wasn’t all that worried about keeping quiet for her siblings.
Then the whispers had started. At first he had only caught snatches of the rumors circulating but people clammed up really quickly once they realised he was hovering around trying to understand what was happening. It hadn’t been all that obvious at first; everyone had tried to be careful. But by the fifth week after the war, they were blatantly staring. Of course they made certain he wouldn’t catch what they were saying but they certainly didn’t bother hiding the fact that they were talking about him. Supposedly he was a monster for killing one of the old Gods and that he was the cause of Silena Beauregard’s death and countless other people who had died. It was his fault they had all died even if he hadn’t had a direct hand in killing them. The fact that he hadn’t saved them made him a killer, a murderer in their eyes.
Percy had wanted to scream in frustration and at the unfairness of it all and the stupidity of the people he had fought with and to help save. These people that he thought he could consider his family, who now treated him like dirt because he didn’t die in the place of one of their loved ones. It was torture.
Sally had moved back to the city and when Percy tried calling her all he got was her voice mail. he gave up calling one day when a voice told him the number had been disconnected. She never gave him her new one. He was also getting the cold shoulder from his dad. Whenever he had tried to talk to him, he would get no answer and always got nauseous and unsettled around the sea. That was horrible. Something that he had always felt a connection with had been ripped away from him because of something he hadn’t or wasn’t able to do. It was like a betrayal. It was a betrayal. And it sucked to the high heavens.
Returning to the present he scowled at the stares, tired of ignoring them. His face was almost constantly in a scowl. It had been a while since he’d had a reason to smile and just simply didn’t feel the need anymore. His emotions were beginning to get the better of him and he was starting to develop a short fuse, snapping at people who so much as looked at him funny. He made his way towards the creek, hoping that the feeling of uneasiness did not extend towards rivers as a well as the sea.
Despite how angry he was beginning to become he was lonely. All of his ‘friends’ were avoiding him and Annabeth was having a competition with herself, to find out how many boys she could screw before the end of the summer. Nico was away visiting his dad at his palace and he missed the guy despite his reluctance to admit it. He had made the journey to the river Styx again, hoping to restore the protection that he had previously had. Surprisingly – or perhaps not so surprisingly – Nico himself, had ended up being the anchor that kept him connected to his sanity. It had been easier and yet so much harder than the first time. He didn’t have Nico this time standing on the banks encouraging him not to give in to the pull of the river, urging him to concentrate on his anchor and memories. Percy knew what to expect the second time but the crushing sorrow of essentially being abandoned had almost pulled him under. He knew he was lucky to have survived a second dip in the river and doubted he’d survive a third, if an occasion ever arose that called for it.
Standing on the bank of the creek he watched as the river flowed past. It was peaceful there. Nobody was around and he felt at ease for the first time in weeks. A sense of relief flooded him as the knowledge that he still had his connection with water hit him. It was like a weight had been lifted off his shoulders, making him feel lighter than before and feeling like he could float off the ground a few inches.
As he stood there an idea began to form in his head. It was a crazy one but he was beginning to get desperate anyway. He would leave that night and set out to find more demigods. He was sick of the two camps that had been looking at him like he was a disgusting insect that had dared to invade their privileged spotless home. He had heard of other demigods over in the west in Europe and he desperately wanted to see what they were like, what their culture and society was like. Maybe they were completely different from the Greek and Roman Gods and he would be able to escape this hellhole for good. Hopefully they would accept him into their culture or community too. He began forming a plan in his head. He could use Mrs O’Leary to shadow travel to Europe and decide where to go from there. Shadow travelling was the only safe way for him to travel. He couldn’t take a boat because of his uneasiness with the sea and doubted Zeus would welcome him in the sky so that ruled out airplanes as well. Nico so far hadn’t been exposed to the rumours being spread about him and they had gotten along well before he had left for the underworld so Percy could only hope he hadn’t said anything disparaging about him down there.
Decision made he swiftly turned away from the creek and made his way back towards his cabin. The sun was beginning to set, casting long shadows across the ground and giving off an orange glow. If he focused very hard, he could see Apollo zooming through the sky on his chariot laughing like a mad man on a sugar rush. He was leaning half out of the chariot with one of his hands extended to the sky. Behind him the sky changed colours, almost like he was pulling the colours along with his extended hand. A memory of the Disney film ‘Hercules’ flashed through Percy’s mind at that point and he shook his head with a snicker. Looking once more, he could see Artemis gliding along behind her brother at a much more sedate pace, calmly guiding the night into place.
Upon reaching his cabin, he flung the door open and immediately headed for his bed. But he hesitated before getting in. He wanted to be able to leave as soon as possible. He changed direction and decided to pack a bag with the necessities so he wouldn’t have to stumble around in the dark when the time came for his escape. He couldn’t risk turning a light on as that would draw too much attention to the fact that he was up and moving around. He packed a few pairs of socks and underwear into a sports bag and grabbed his toothbrush and some tooth paste too and shoved them in as well. In went two t-shirts and a spare pair of shorts just in case. He wasn’t going to take much. He wanted to leave as much behind as possible to help facilitate his ‘fresh start’ in another country… another continent if he was lucky. Deciding he had packed enough he set an alarm for two o’clock in the morning. The camp had become more lax about patrols since the war was over so he was positive no one would be awake at that time, making it easier for him to manage his disappearing act, especially for what he had planned.
He practically collapsed in to the bed, asleep before his head hit the pillow.
Hours later, he was wrenched from his sleep as the alarm he had set, not even that loud, woke him. Despite how silent it was, it sounded almost obnoxiously loud in the quiet stillness that had settled over the camp. Reluctantly he staggered from his nice warm bed and pulled on his shoes. Rubbing, his bleary eyes, he headed for the bathroom, intent on splashing some water on them to help wake himself up.
Once he was ready he slung the strap of the bag over his shoulder and picked up his sword, disguised as a pen, Riptide. He placed it in his pocket and quickly made his way to the arena where his favourite hell hound was sleeping. Her giant head was placed on her paws and she appeared to be asleep as he approached but as the wind changed her ears pricked up and she took a giant sniff. Immediately her head lifted up and her tail began wagging, thumping the ground slightly. She saw him then and a rumble began to emanate from her chest, almost like a growl but nearly like a purr. Percy smiled and patted her head, scratching behind her ears and the sound intensified. He laughed quietly and she yipped, a strange noise coming from a beast her size. Despite how fearsome she looked she really was just a puppy at heart.
Carefully he untied her from the chain around her neck that was embedded in the ground and led her over to the trough of water that was usually left for the horses. She drank and as she did he took out Riptide and examined it. It looked so delicate as a pen. He tilted it towards the light of the moon and it caught a beam, glinting slightly. Mrs O’Leary finished drinking and sat on her haunches beside him, watching with a curious tilt of her head.
Poseidon had never told him before, but he knew that a lot of his power had been bound to the pen come sword. Because of the problems surrounding half-blood kids from the ‘Big Three’, his dad had to ensure that he didn’t appear as strong as he actually was. That was why he had bound his power. So despite how powerful Percy was, it was still only a fraction of the power that he was able to access, which was why he was planning on breaking the sword. He had to be quick though. As soon as he broke the pen/sword, Poseidon would know and would not be too impressed with his little half-blood, unbound, flouncing around freely.
Turning to Mrs O’Leary he contemplated his next move. She stood up before him and he made his decision. He climbed on to her back and held the pen before him. He sought out the bond in him that linked him to his father, like all demigods had with their godly parents. He found it and saw that Poseidon was distracted with something. He was relatively calm which was good; he didn’t need him in a bad mood when he pulled his crazy stunt.
Percy braced himself and snapped the pen before throwing it into a pile of Pegasus dirt. It broke surprisingly easy for a mythical, powerful sword. He could feel his power flooding back into him almost knocking him off of Mrs O’Leary’s back with force of it. He gasped and shuddered, desperately holding on to the scruff of her neck as she whined uneasily. She knew as well as he did that things were about to turn ugly. He quickly got a hold of himself and leaned down to whisper in her ear. Just before they left, disappearing into the shadows, Percy saw a flash of lightning and heard a roar of anger. He heard the waves crash angrily against the beach and knew for certain that he had gravely offended his father.
Good… he deserved it as far as he was concerned.
Mrs O’Leary barked as she heard the name of the place they were leaving for and not even a moment later they melted into the shadows, gone. Percy knew that seconds after they’d disappeared, Poseidon would appear standing in front of the place they had just vacated, his face twisted and slightly deformed in his anger. That tended to happen when he was completely enraged.
He smirked to himself. No doubt he would be picking up the pieces of the sword, disowning him to Tartarus and back. Maybe Percy would be lucky and in his blind rage he would disown him. That would make it harder for Poseidon to find him. Without the bond between them as father and son he would have no link to search for Percy with. That was thing about disowning someone. You could disown them without their permission, but Poseidon would need him present and have Percy’s acceptance before adopting him or accepting him back into his family.
Almost as if the Gods had decided to give him a break, a sudden wrench in the bond alerted Percy to the fact that something was happening. Poseidon seemed to be struggling with himself trying not to give in to the temptation of disowning him, when suddenly the bond snapped and Percy’s connection to his father was lost into the ether. It was done, he was disowned. Poseidon would be kicking himself later, when he realised Percy wouldn’t be crawling back to him begging for his forgiveness and he would not know where to look for him.
He was finally free now. Nothing could stop him and knowing Hades and his hate for his brothers, he would fail to mention his shadow travelling to Poseidon. No doubt it would most likely ‘slip his mind’. Percy wasn’t complaining though as it merely benefited him and his want for anonymity and freedom from the hell that he had called home.
It took a while, and they had to stop off a couple times so Mrs O’Leary could take a break but it was late morning by the time they arrived in Cairo. The sun was beating down from the sky as they stepped on to the streets. Mrs O’Leary walked beside him and people hurried by not even sparing them a glance. It was refreshing not having anyone stare at him for once. Yes there were a few that did look, but they dismissed them almost as quickly, probably assuming they were tourists. Despite the heat, he didn’t see many people walking around in shorts and he cursed himself for not researching the dress code. It seemed that showing a lot of skin was not approved of and he was glad that he had not decided to change out of his jeans before leaving the camp.
They wandered around for a while, Percy hoping to find some sort of shop where he could buy some food. Eventually he came across one resembling a coffee shop and bought himself a bottle of water and a sandwich. He picked out the meat and threw it to Mrs O’Leary, who snapped it up in her giant jaws and looked to him for more when she finished, eyes wide and pleading. Percy laughed and set out again looking for a butcher shop. He came across an open shop with cuts hanging from giant hooks. Upon finding the owner he did his best to haggle with him, but still felt like he had been ripped off. The butcher slapped him on the back and gave him a toothy grin pulling down a smaller cut than the monsters outside and began to wrap it up in paper. Percy stopped him before he could continue and shook his head pointing to the hellhound who was waiting patiently outside. The butcher looked out and blinked before shrugging and walking outside with it. The mist played with the eyes of the mortals and Mrs O’Leary merely looked like a large Anatolian Shepherd. She whined when she saw the meat and Percy gestured for the man to throw it to her. He nodded and did as Percy requested. Mrs L snapped it up without hesitation and ripped into it like a starving animal. Percy thanked the man in broken Arabic. He grinned and waved goodbye, returning to his shop.
Percy continued on with Mrs L, amused by the way she smacked her lips in satisfaction. They found a small park and Percy sat down on a bench under the shade and tried to relax. He thought perhaps he would be better off waiting for the demigods to find him rather than trying to find them. After a while, the hairs on the back of his neck started to prickle and Mrs O Leary whipped her head up and looked at a point beyond his shoulder, a low threatening growl beginning to form in her chest. He turned around to look for what had caught her attention.
Behind him was a group of teenagers roughly around his age, three boys and a girl. They were dressed in long loose shorts and long sleeved tops. To anyone looking they would just look like average local kids, at least they appeared that way to Percy. But then he caught sight of the deadly looking knife strapped to the calf of one of the boys and the two push knives strapped to both of the girl’s wrists. He smirked across at them and raised a hand in a wave.
It looked like they'd found him.