Work Text:
Being the son of the God of the Seas had its perks. Going on what seemed like an endless amount of quests was not one of them. He was sick and tired of having to do an endless amount of chores for the Gods and not having any time to relax. He finally snapped. He was called to Olympus and asked to do another favor, but before they were able to finish their request, Percy fought back and walked out of the throne room steaming. By the time he got back to Long Island Sound, he thankfully cooled down enough to avoid questions from Chiron. He didn’t even bother to change before wading straight into the sound down to the bottom to brood. He curled up and hugged his knees as he calmed himself down. While curled in on himself, he suddenly felt a change of water pressure around him and looked up to see his father just a few inches from his own face.
“AH! Dad? What are you doing here? Don’t you have more important godly things to do?” Percy asked sarcastically, even though he was confused by his father’s sudden appearance.
“I heard about what happened on Olympus.” oh...OH. Percy looked away, with a flush on his face. Of course his dad would come to chew him out for acting out like that towards the other Gods. “Are you doing okay, Percy?” That drew the demigod’s attention to look in his eyes. In the sea green orbs he didn’t see criticism, but a loving compassion and care.
What was he supposed to say? ‘No you and your siblings are driving me crazy because one of you is popping up every five minutes for me to do an errand!’ He finally settled on the perfect response “Yeah, I’m fine.” Poseidon looked at him skeptically, but came to the conclusion that Percy must not have wanted to talk about it, so he moved to just sit next to his son and look out into the distance.
“Pretty good view, eh?” Poseidon joked as he nudged his elbow into his son’s side to get his attention. What the God didn’t expect was for Percy to flinch away with a squeak and an inkling of a smile. “What was that? Did I hurt you?” The demigod quickly dismissed it and settled back into his sadness. The immortal’s curiosity piqued: if the jab didn’t hurt his son why did he flinch? The Earth-shaker began intentionally prodding his son’s side to further examine his reactions and following as Percy fell away onto his side.
“D-Dad! Stohop!” Percy made a fatal mistake: he laughed. His father heard the laugh and saw the smile that adorned his son’s face and concluded that Percy must be having fun! “Dahad! Ihit tihickles!” So that’s what was making him laugh. It didn’t matter too much though, because Percy was going to be laughing one way or another. The kid was too stressed lately and deserved a chance to relax and be...well a kid!
“It does? I had no idea!” Poseidon pulled his son closer and attacked both of his sides now at full finger-wiggling capacity. His son, in turn was left laughing and squirming in the sand at the intruding digits. The hero squirmed onto his side to escape, but let out a scream as his father’s fingers made contact with his Achilles heel, the small of his back. He quickly arched away, but not fast enough for Poseidon to realize what just transpired. The God struck gold by finding his son’s most ticklish spot. He quickly wrapped an arm around Percy and trapped the demigod’s arms and hands in the half hug. This was followed by Poseidon wiggling his fingers on the sensitive skin and causing his son to erupt with a scream so loud he was sure the entirety of the camp could hear it. He kept his son in hysterical laughter before deciding to go for the kill. In one easy swoop he lifted Percy up and blew a huge raspberry into the skin. The young demigod thought he was going to die as he let out a broken scream that quickly went silent. The God of the Seas took mercy on the hero and laid him down on the sand. “I thought you would have had more energy than that!” The father only received an eye roll and a light punch to the arm in response, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t threaten a round two!