Archive of Our Own

The day starts off well. He wakes up, makes himself a coffee, doesn’t bother with breakfast – Bobby will probably have something for A Shift at the station – changes, slips his dagger into his boot, and grabs himself a bell pepper for the road. He makes sure to check his phone and the mail for postcards or messages before he leaves the apartment. Just in case.

It’s an easy routine, one that he’s somewhat happily fallen into post-Abby’s departure.

It doesn’t hurt that he’s dropped a half percent in body fat since his last DXA scan. Hot firefighter calendar, here he comes.

The drive is even easier than his wake-up routine. He makes good time, traffic isn’t actually all that terrible – a miracle in LA – and he’d managed to get the Jeep’s cooling fixed last week just before the heat wave hit the city.

It’s all easy. Too easy, even.

When Buck gets within one block of the station, the air shifts.

To most people, the kind of shift he’s talking about is one that’s imperceptible. A shiver down the spine, the hairs on the back of the neck rising in alarm, the uncomfortable feeling of being in an odd fog – things people explain away as an odd feeling or exhaustion or paranoia.

To Buck, it means that something is Wrong. He doesn’t mean wrong as in, oops, I got a math problem wrong. No. When he thinks Wrong, he thinks of Monster Donuts and the one-eyed daycare teacher who tried to eat him when he was a kid Wrong. Wrong is a field trip to the AACA Museum that ended with Buck driving off in one of the vintage Camaros after he’d asked the museum attendant very nicely for the keys (though that one had ended with the car catching fire when a very angry harpy decided to chase after him).

Okay, so maybe Buck’s life is a little weird. He gets it. But the weird has taught him to pay attention, to focus on the Wrong.

Ignoring Wrong gets people killed.

Complacency gets people killed. Good people. Sometimes bad people, too, but things aren’t always that black and white when it comes to gods and monsters.

And Buck’s never been all that great at ignoring problems. He’s caused his fair share of them, sure, but ignoring a problem when it’s staring him in the face? No. He’s not great at ignoring problems.

The Mist is wrapped so tightly around Station 118 that Buck feels like he can barely see the building through the haze. It’s almost as if he wants to look away, like the building itself is too blinding, too present, for him to see. He wants to drive past. He thinks about pulling out his phone (flip phone, obviously, because a smartphone is one heck of a Bad Idea) to call Bobby and say, hey, I’m not coming in today –

He frowns, shakes the thought away, and pulls into the parking lot.

And then he immediately tries to pull out, suddenly struck by the urge to take another lap around the block. It wouldn’t hurt anything, would it?

But then again, he’s spent the past few months working hard to prove himself to the rest of the 118. What would they say if he were to just not show up for his shift? He’s worked so hard recently, and he hasn’t even used his mom’s gift to do it.

It wouldn’t be that big of –

He pulls the dagger from his boot and quickly slices a small cut across his palm. The urge to leave instantly dulls into a gentle prodding at the back of his mind. The familiar building snaps into focus. The fog is still there. It tugs at him, gently dulling his senses in a manner only the Mist can. He’s never really been the best at controlling it – he’s not a Hecate kid, and he’s got no affinity for illusion work – but he knows enough to protect himself from its influence.

Somewhat, anyway.

He slips the dagger back into his boot and frowns. Something’s brought the Mist to his metaphorical front door. Something powerful if it’s affecting him this badly. A part of him wonders if everyone else at the station feels the effects, too.

He steps out of his car and grabs his duffel bag, quickly pulling out his recent DXA results so that he has something to crow about when he makes his appearance. Hopefully, he’ll be able to gauge everyone’s level of awareness based off their reactions.

He smiles as he walks into the engine bay. Everything seems to be normal. C Shift is finishing up their work as scheduled, Bobby and Hen are talking over by the locker rooms, and Chimney’s still not in yet, but that’s not entirely surprising. The Mist is still present, annoyingly so, but it’s not impacting normal station operations.

“I got another DXA scan,” he calls loudly both in the hopes of catching his coworkers’ attentions and finding whatever it is that’s brought the Mist into the building. Hen and Bobby turn to him. Buck waves the papers with his results in the air once he gets close enough to them. “Guess who dropped another half percent?”

“What?” Hen asks, her eyebrows furrowed as she squints at the papers. “Wait, Buck, is that blood?”

Buck glances at the papers that are rapidly turning red where his palm meets their edges. Ah. Right. That.

“Uh, yeah,” he says, his smile faltering a bit. Bobby’s own smile has fallen into a concerned frown. “I cut myself making breakfast this morning, was running late, so I didn’t have a chance to take care of it.” He grimaces, mostly for show, and purposefully glances back towards the parking lot where he’d left his Jeep. “I’m going to have to wipe down the steering wheel later.”

Bobby gently pulls the papers from his hand so that Hen can snatch the offending injury and get a better look at it. “Buck, you could have called,” he chides. “I would have been alright with you being a little late if it meant you’d take care of it properly.”

“You know I only use my phone for emergencies, Cap,” Buck replies with a shrug. “And I knew I’d have access to some awesome medical care when I got here. Not a huge deal.”

“I’d say this qualifies as an emergency, Buck.” Hen looks up, clearly about to order Bobby to go get something, but she stops when something catches her eye. “Chim! Can you get me some gauze, wipes, and some antibiotic cream?” She levels Buck with her best glare and says, “Who knows what you’ve been touching since you injured yourself. Does that fancy scan of yours check for brain cells? Because I’m a bit worried about a deficiency.”

Buck grimaces for real this time. Chimney’s already scurried off towards one of the ambulances so he’s safe from razzing for a bit, but Bobby’s already giving him the Disappointed Dad Glare and honestly, that’s worse. “No,” he says quietly, “a DXA scan measures your body fat. You can see your percentage in every part of your body.”

“Oh yeah?” Chimney asks as he walks up to them, Hen’s requested items in his hands. “Did they measure the fat in your head?” He glances down at Buck’s cut and sucks in a loud breath. “Ouch. I hope that’s not as bad as it looks.”

It really isn’t, Buck thinks to himself. He knows his body; he knows injuries. He knows his body and injuries. It’s really not that big of a deal.

The old scar along his side twinges painfully at the reminder of a time something was a big deal.

But there’s a difference between a sword going through your side and a dagger barely cutting your palm. Buck knows – he’s had both happen. He’d much rather take the dagger.

“Ah, see, the fat joke would be funny,” he says quickly, hoping to change the subject as Hen begins poking and prodding at the wound on his palm with a wipe. “But we’re about a week away from submissions being due for the Hot Days, Smoldering Nights: Men of the LAFD wall calendar.” He lets a bit of smugness drip into his voice. “And I’m already at my goal weight, so it seems my head is working perfectly.”

Hen scoffs, none-too-gently scraping at a bit of dried blood on Buck’s hand with her wipe. Buck almost yelps when she literally rubs his skin the wrong way, but he bites down on his tongue before it can escape. “Do you really need to use the whole title?” she asks. “You could just say ‘that idiotic, reductive, sexist calendar that insults the dignity of this organization and furthers the myth that all firefighters are male.’ Chimney, the antibiotic please.”

Chimney wordlessly hands over the cream with a she just went there look on his face.

And Buck? Well… Buck doesn’t really have an answer for that. Neither does Bobby, who shifts awkwardly from one foot to the other.

Definitely the Mist’s fault. Mhm. Yep. That’s what he’s going with.

He internally breathes a sigh of relief at the fact that his coworkers seem to be unaffected by the Mist – on the surface, at least. His mind wanders just for a moment back to the Princess Andromeda in the early days of the war.

Back then, he’d thought the mortals were funny as they’d stumbled around in what seemed like a drug-induced haze. Now, he gets how truly fucked up the Mist had made them.

“Yeah,” he finally says, “that’s not any less words.”

“Hen, come on, it’s for charity,” Bobby cuts in with an amused grin.

“No, Bobby, you too?” Hen despairs. She hands Chimney the cream and takes the gauze from his hands without even looking.

Bobby shrugs. “Well, why not? They say a man is at his sexiest when he reaches fifty.” And it’s then that Buck knows Bobby is joking.

…probably.

“Is that what they say?” Hen asks, her voice heavily laced with disbelief. She carefully tapes off the gauze and releases Buck’s hand with a gentle pat. “That’s what they say.”

Buck wisely, in his opinion, stays out of it.

Chimney coughs lightly. “Okay, you’re both wrong.” Everyone’s attention quickly turns to him, and he continues without even a moment of hesitation. “Alright? You see, I think sorority houses all across this great nation are ready for a new Asian sex symbol.” He waves the antibiotic cream and package of wipes around in the air for emphasis. “It’s our time.”

Buck grins. “I think it’s great. Y’know, I like that you’re both going up for it.” Mostly because in comparison, he’s got a better shot at making it – not that he’s hoping they’ll be rejected, he’s just got a feeling about it. That’s all.

Bobby in all his infinite wisdom calls him out on it. “Oh, because you don’t think that we have a chance.”

Buck opens his mouth to refute that admittedly true statement, but his thoughts cloud over before he can get his mouth to properly vocalize them. The fog is back, pressing against his consciousness like a wall. Chimney’s got his focus elsewhere – the locker room, probably – and Buck knows that he should turn to look with him. Something has Chimney’s attention. Something is probably wrong.

But there’s no need to look that way. Chimney’s probably focused on something unimportant. That happens sometimes. Buck has no reason to turn around.

"Plenty of things can happen when your back is turned," a voice that isn’t his reminds him sternly. "Don’t make a habit of it. Not here."

"Castellian’s sword is called Backbiter for a reason."

“Okay, that is a beautiful man,” Chimney says, and the pressure on Buck’s mind releases almost instantly.

Acknowledging what’s beyond the Mist can release the effects, any demigod worth their salt knows that. Not for the first time, Buck wonders if Chimney can See.

He whirls around before the pressure can return and immediately prepares himself to reach for his dagger. “Beautiful” combined with the Mist is never a good thing. For all he knows, there could be an empousa waiting for him to be alone so she can have herself a snack. Or worse: his mother could be making a visit.

Things never go well when his mother shows up.

Luckily for him, or maybe unluckily, it’s not his mother (probably) and definitely not an empousa (because those are usually much more feminine in appearance). Nope, it is actually a man. Just a man. Probably, anyway – he’s heard stories of the Chimera looking like a chihuahua and a fury being an old math teacher, so just about anything’s possible when it comes to the Mist. But, while his mind is screaming at him to look anywhere but the admittedly gorgeous specimen of a man, he’s almost certain that he actually is just a man.

Ugh, it’s like the Mist can’t make up its mind. Buck’s not sure if he desperately wants to look away or rush to the hunk and ask him everything under the sun.

He distantly hears Hen’s response – something about liking girls and lying – but di immortals, all he can think right now as the man pulls a shirt over his head in what feels like slow motion is: please, for the love of Olympus, tell me he’s not my brother.

Demigods have learned to look past most of the fucked up family tree, but godly siblings? Big no-no.

Tanned muscles, thick brown hair that’s just the right amount of unruly, a bit of stubble around the jaw – oh, and Buck’s sure that face is sporting some to die for chocolatey brown eyes – this man is something else.

He can almost smell his chances of making the hot firefighter calendar going up in smoke right before his very eyes.

And the sad part is, he’s not sure he’d mind.

Fuck, forget my brother. Please don’t let him be a monster. Killing this much pretty? Ugh, someone would curse him just for taking the eye candy from the world.

He can almost hear Silena now, chiding him for what is, apparently, a bit of a gay panic.

Bi panic? He’s never really been one to be picky.

Of course, it takes a few moments for him to realize that beyond this whole internal Mess (and yes, that’s in capital letters. Defining things as a demigod makes them a requirement) he’s figures out the reason for the Mist.

“Who the hell is that?” he asks, mostly so that he can finally put a name to the new Wrong that’s wormed its way into his life.

Buck doesn’t see it, he’s too busy staring at six-pack candyland to turn around, but he can hear the smile in Bobby’s voice as he says, “It’s Eddie Diaz. New recruit. Graduated top of his class just this week.” He goes on to talk about something else. Station Six. Dying to have him. All sorts of stuff that Buck just doesn’t want to listen to.

He’s a bit busy mulling over this scrap of information.

See, Buck officially has a Problem. A Mist using enigma of a Problem.

And his name is Eddie Diaz.

9-1-1 | 9-1-1 | 9-1-1

The last thing Buck’s admittedly frazzled brain needs is to be trapped on a rig with Eddie Diaz, but the Fates tend to hate him anyway, so Buck ends up on the other side of the cab from the source of his pain right off the bat. It’s not great for his mounting anxiety in the slightest.

And yes, he’s anxious. Sue him. There’s enough Mist lingering around this guy to hide almost anything – it’s perfectly reasonable to wonder when he’ll suddenly transform into a harpy and tear Buck’s eyes from his skull.

Of course, Chimney’s ever-present curiosity doesn’t help.

“So, Silver Star, huh?” Chimney asks.

Buck doesn’t want to hear it. He doesn’t want to hear anything about this man. He doesn’t need to. Eddie’s perfectly fine where he is and is going to fit in so well with them, there’s no reason they have to –

Buck’s fingers dig into the gauze on his injured hand just hard enough to agitate the wound. He needs to hear this. He needs to hear the alibi. What’s this guy’s story?

“Yeah,” is all Eddie says.

Chimney just has to press further. “You save a platoon or something?”

Buck bites his tongue to keep himself from snapping. Chimney’s right to question. Chimney’s right to question and why is he the only one?

Eddie suddenly looks uncomfortable. “No, no, nothing like that.” Buck almost pounces on it, just to get under the guy’s skin and really press for information. He doesn’t quite get there before Eddie continues, “Uh, just a convoy.”

Buck wants more details. Buck doesn’t want more details.

Buck would like the godsdamned Mist to go away so he’s not questioning himself every second.

“Eddie, you heard about the hot firefighter calendar?” Hen throws out when the awkward silence begins to feel pressing. Buck glares at her – this he can think about without the Mist coloring his thoughts, thank the gods – but she grins like she hasn’t just stabbed him in the back.

“Sorry, the what?” Eddie asks.

“It’s for charity!”

This is really happening right now. Buck stares blankly ahead and tries not to feel too hurt. It’s the Mist; it has to be.

“So is your full name ‘Eduardo’?” he asks loudly, desperately trying to save the conversation somehow. He doesn’t want to ask the question, but he does. He wants to probe. Eddie should feel welcome here. He should feel like he’s being pressed because he is being pressed. He doesn’t look in Eddie’s direction mostly because his head hurts just looking at the man.

Buck has a headache named Eddie Diaz.

“No,” comes the terse response.

Buck would like to scream.

“People ever call you Diaz?”

“Not if they want me to respond.”

And maybe I don’t want that, Buck thinks darkly.

“Something’s gotta give,” Buck presses just for the hell of it. “We got… we got Cap, Hen, Chimney, Buck – we can’t just call you Eddie.” If that’s even this dude’s name, anyway.

Maybe Buck can get away with just calling him dude.

“Can’t tell if he’s being serious or not,” Eddie says. Buck glances at him out of the corner of his eye and tamps down on his wince as pain flairs behind his eyes once again.

Chimney snorts. “I like to always operate under the assumption that nothing he says is serious.”

And ouch does that hurt. He may be a bit airheaded at times, but he’s not stupid. Stupidity doesn’t get you through two wars. It doesn’t help you survive thirteen years on your own in a world full of monsters and vengeful gods.

Buck isn’t an idiot. Not in the ways that matter.

He stays silent all the same, and Chimney keeps of a steady stream of chatter.

9-1-1 | 9-1-1 | 9-1-1

Their first call of the day brings several jokes to the forefront of Buck’s still-too-hazy mind, the first of which being: looks like I’m not the only one stuck with a pain in my ass. 

He immediately discards that train of thought because he’s not Buck-pre-Abby anymore, thank you. He has tact.

It’s only when Eddie stops him mid-procedure that Buck’s newfound tactfulness gets tested. “I’d go lower,” he says with an infuriatingly authoritative voice.

“What? Um, no. Second intercostal space. Midclavicular line,” Buck insists. He’s not an Apollo kid, sure, but he’s trained just like every other firefighter. Eddie might have a Silver Star, but Buck’s been in wars too – even if they were wars nobody knew anything about.

Eddie’s face is calm. “The chest wall is thinner at the fifth intercostal – at the anterior axillary line.” Buck has to actively force himself to keep looking at Eddie. He keeps wanting to look away; the pain of actively looking at him is almost unbearable. “There’s a decreased chance of injuring any vital organs.” Eddie finally looks away, and the pain in Buck’s head fades somewhat. “I’ve treated guys with collapsed lungs in combat.”

“Do it,” Bobby says before Buck has a chance to respond, and suddenly, Buck finds himself handing the equipment to Eddie without even realizing it.

Eddie knows better. Eddie’s the new guy, Buck should be leading. Eddie needs a chance to prove himself. Eddie’s not even supposed to be here.

It hurts. The betrayal from Chim, Hen, and Bobby, the new guy coming in and stepping all over everything like he just belongs, the Mist fucking with him every second – it’s just…

It’s all too much.

They make it through the call, Buck doing everything Eddie asks like an idiot, and are back on the rig before Buck can even process what’s just happened. It’s like his brain has finally just shut down.

He’s so tired.

He manages a brusque, “Yeah, good call,” to Eddie just before they all climb into the rig, but from there he’s just silent. He doesn’t have the energy to fight anymore.

9-1-1 | 9-1-1 | 9-1-1

Walking back into Abby’s apartment at the end of the day finally drives off the last of the fog. He still hasn’t shaken off the feeling of Wrong that’s managed to pervade his very sense of self, but he can finally think clearly.

And the first thing he thinks when he hears the shower running is someone’s in Abby’s apartment. His second thought is: there’s an open bottle of wine on the table in Abby’s apartment.

He puts two and two together and comes up with Abby is in Abby’s apartment. 

Abby’s home.

So of course, Buck undresses and heads straight for the bathroom, because sexy times with Abby would be incredible right about now.

In hindsight, he’ll think back on this decision and chalk it up to a mixture of Mist brain and Eddie Diaz frustration clouding his judgement. In the moment, however, he’s all for surprising his incredible globetrotting girlfriend in the shower.

Who is, in fact, not his incredible globetrotting girlfriend.

Maddie understandably freaks when he pulls aside the curtain. Buck understandably freaks when he pulls aside the curtain. No one needs to see that much of their adult older sister.

Now he not only wants an Excedrin for the migraine building behind his eyes once again, but he also would like a large bottle of brain bleach to go with it.

“You think there’s any way we can unsee that?” he asks once they’ve both gotten dressed and sat down to a meal.

“Oh, come on, I used to give you baths,” Maddie says with a smirk.

Buck grimaces. “Yeah, when I was two.” He’s suddenly struck by a thought. “Hey, how did you get in here?”

“I told the building manager I was your sister,” Maddie replies easily.

Buck’s brows furrow as he hands her a plate of food. “And he just… believed you.” He should probably talk to management about that.

Maddie smiles, accepting the plate with the same grace he’s always admired. “Well, having boobs doesn’t hurt.”

“How’d you know where I live?” is the next question that falls out of his mouth. He hasn’t sent her a Christmas card since last year’s, so he knows he didn’t tell her.

Maddie’s smile falters. “Well, first, I sent an Iris to camp, but no one had heard from you in a while, so then I went to the address the Christmas cards kept coming from and the guy said you were here.”

“I haven’t been back to camp in a long time, Maddie. Besides, I don’t think I know anyone there outside of Chiron and Mr. D – and even then, I’m not exactly on their list of favorite campers.” He stops, eyes narrowing in thought as he realizes something. “Wait, so you did get those Christmas cards?”

Maddie nods. “I’m sorry I haven’t been in touch much lately,” she replies softly. Her head tilts to the side. “Why haven’t you been back to camp? I thought they’d changed the rules after Gaia?”

“They did,” Buck confirms with a wry grin, “but the rules don’t change for former traitors. I’m lucky if Terminus decides to let me past the Pomerian Line, and I don’t think I’d be able to get past the dragon guarding Half-Blood Hill.”

“There’s a dragon?” Maddie asks. “An actual, giant, fire-breathing dragon?”

Buck shrugs. “Technically, there are two dragons at camp. There’s Peleus who guards Thalia’s tree and Festus the bronze dragon. Peleus is still technically a baby. He’s gotten pretty big over the years, but I wouldn’t call him a giant. Festus is huge and can turn into a flying ship, but a Hephaestus kid fixed him up a long time ago and took him away from Half-Blood Hill.” He thinks for a moment, trying to remember what happened after that, but he can’t seem to draw much more from his memories.

He shakes his head. “Honestly, I don’t know much. I wasn’t really around for that part of the war. Last I remember, the Hephaestus kid blew himself up to put Gaia back to sleep. I left camp after that. Haven’t been back since.”

He hadn’t felt particularly obligated to stick around. He’d showed up with a few of the other surviving Kronos kids, fought for the right side this time, and left. It wasn’t like anyone was throwing out the welcome mat.

He had his own dead to bury.

“I feel like I should be asking you for more stories,” Maddie says quietly. “From your postcards, it sounded like you’d seen your fair share of adventures.”

Buck cracks a grin at that. “Well, there was a pack of Krokottai in Peru,” he says with a shrug. “Imagine a strange hyena-looking dog that can mimic voices – and the only things that can kill them are Celestial Bronze and Imperial Gold.”

Maddie grimaces. “Okay, that’s just creepy,” she says.

“It got weird when the pack leader used my own voice to taunt me,” Buck replies with a frown. “That was around the time I decided to head to LA. For one thing, there was a chance they’d come back – I didn’t manage to kill the whole pack. For another, being a firefighter just… called to me. And I was becoming too easy to find. One demigod in a sea of mortals? Mostly a good idea, but once word gets out that a defenseless demigod of Olympian blood is ripe for the picking that good idea quickly becomes a nightmare.” He sighs. “I can handle a lot, but wave after wave of monsters headed my way? No thank you. LA is somewhat safe because Camp Jupiter isn’t too far away. Most monsters steer clear of anywhere along the coast of California.”

“That’s good,” Maddie remarks quietly. “At least I won’t be seeing anything too crazy while I’m here.”

Buck’s mouth curls into a wry grin. “Three years of no contact, and you show up only to say you’re leaving again?” He leans over the table so that he can look her in the eyes. “I haven’t heard from you in three years. Not even an Iris Message. Y’know, I got a phone for you, just in case you couldn’t explain to Doug why you needed to make a rainbow to call your brother.” He lets the grin slide from his face. “I got a phone, and I sent you a number. You, my boss, and my girlfriend are the only ones who have it. The least you could have done was use it.”

“I know how dangerous phones are for you, Evan. I haven’t called because I didn’t want to put you in danger.” Maddie’s mouth flattens into a thin line. “I know I haven’t been in contact for a long time, and it’s not what I wanted.” She leans back in her chair. “And I left Doug. It’s why I’m here.”

Buck’s eyes go wide. “You left him?”

Maddie nods. “Finally.”

“Geez, Madds,” Buck says softly, torn between yelling for joy and leaping over the counter to give his sister a huge hug. “What took you so long?”

“What can I say,” Maddie remarks bitterly, “Mom was right.”

“Do they know?” Buck asks.

Maddie shakes her head. “No one knows, and please don’t tell them. If anyone calls, I don’t want them to know that I’m here.”

Buck huffs. “I don’t think anyone’s going to be calling me,” he says, nodding to his flip phone on the counter by the door. “I don’t give out my number lightly, and most of the time, that thing isn’t even on.” He cocks his head to the side and squints. “Besides, it sounds like you’re hiding out. That’s kinda my specialty, remember?”

“I’d call it less hiding out and more laying low,” Maddie replies easily. “So, what happened to you? Because this place? Not what I think when I think of Bachelor in His Twenties Who’s Been Living on the Road Since He was Seventeen.” She looks down at the plate in her hand and chuckles. “And you just cooked me food. Actual food.” She grins slyly. “I didn’t think you ate anything other than Monster energy drinks and protein bars.”

“Okay, I would never drink Monster, there’s all sorts of stuff in there that demigods should not be drinking – y’know, because Monster is made by actual monsters.” He shudders. “Pretty sure the company is run by Cyclopes.” At Maddie’s surprised expression, Buck quickly shifts the conversation. “But uh, yeah. My boss at work is like Guy Fieri. He’s been teaching me, but we ah, haven’t made it past breakfast.”

Maddie settles onto the couch and smiles encouragingly. Something in Buck’s heart melts at the thought of someone actually being interested in him for once. It’s a good feeling.

“And – uh, lemme show you,” he scrambles for a picture he keeps on one of the living room tables of him and Abby, “this is my girlfriend’s place. I’m looking after it while she’s out of town for a couple of months, but she-she should be back soon.”

Maddie smiles when she sees the picture. “How soon?”

“I’m uh, not really sure,” he says quietly. “Um, she was in Ireland, and now she’s in Italy – she’s decided to visit Rome for a bit now that the ban’s been lifted on Roman demigods traveling through the Mare Nostrum.” At Maddie’s odd look, Buck quickly corrects himself. “Ah, that’s the Mediterranean Sea. The Romans have kept away from there for centuries because it’s considered dangerous. Y’know, the birthplace of all things monsters, gods, and things that want to kill demigods.”

“Thank you for the clarification, but I’m more concerned with Roman demigods. I knew about them from your post cards, but I didn’t think you’d started a relationship with one,” Maddie remarks.

“Oh, uh…” Buck feels his face heat up. “Well, she’s a Somnus legacy. Not necessarily a demigod, but demigod adjacent. Her mom was the demigod.”

“There’s a distinction? I thought only demigods entered the demigod world?” Maddie asks. The that’s what they told me goes unsaid.

“On the Greek side, yes, though the rules are a bit more relaxed since the Second Giant War. The Romans are a bit different. You have to remember, they have a standing army – the Legion. There aren’t enough demigods to go around, so they pull from legacy families, too.” He grins. “I think they had a Praetor who was an Apollo legacy. He’d had a son of Apollo somewhere five generations up his family tree or something.”

“So Abby, she was in the Legion?” Maddie asks.

Buck hisses. “Not exactly. She grew up in New Rome and left when she was eighteen. At the time, you could only live in New Rome past eighteen if you had or were planning to spend a few years in the Legion.” He shrugs and thinks back to when he and Abby had sat down and really talked about all of this after she’d discovered his spear in the closet. “It wasn’t really for her, so she left.”

“And now she’s traveling around the Mediterranean while you stay here and watch the apartment?” Maddie asks softly.

Buck nods. “I mean, she said I could do whatever I wanted while she was away, but what I want is for her to come back.” His gut twists anxiously. “I like the me that I am with her.” There’s a tense silence in the room as Maddie nods her head in thought. Buck fidgets with his wine glass and quickly says, “So how long are you going to stick around?” It’s a desperate bid to change the subject, but he really doesn’t want to talk about Abby right now. It’s just… not what he’s looking for. Not now, anyway.

“I’m just passing through,” Maddie replies with an apologetic smile. “You know what it’s like – I can’t stay for too long.”

“There’s a difference between monsters hunting you for their next meal and running from your ex,” Buck remarks dryly.

Maddie frowns. “And sometimes, monsters aren’t pulled straight out of myths and fairytales,” she snaps.

The room practically buzzes with energy as they stare at each other, neither Buckley backing down from the silent fight brewing between them. Maddie’s face quickly turns hard and closed off, the exhaustion clearly evident beneath her eyes. For the first time this evening, Buck looks, really looks, at his sister and sees the weariness hidden just beneath the surface. He’s seen it. He’s lived it.

Buck sees the loneliness in Maddie Buckley’s eyes and backs down.

“Well,” he says softly, letting a small smile that doesn’t reach his eyes slip onto his face, “even if you’re only staying for a few days, welcome to LA. It was getting pretty lonely around here.”

The tension slips from Maddie’s shoulders, and Buck knows that he’s made the right choice.

9-1-1 | 9-1-1 | 9-1-1

In all the excitement of Maddie’s visit, Buck had almost forgotten his recent Problem.

Then he got to the station for his next shift, felt the Mist invade his sense of awareness, and everything came rushing back to him.

Eddie fucking Diaz and his stupid Mist.

At this point, he’s hoping that Eddie’s some sort of malevolent being just so he can shove his dagger – or the collapsible spear he keeps tucked away in his duffel bag – into Eddie’s perfect face.

He’s able to stay away from Eddie pretty much the entire shift, but then they both decide to hit the gym at the same time, and suddenly, Buck’s confronted with the look of Eddie’s huge biceps. Which he does not look at. Nope. He keeps his eyes firmly on his own workout.

So what if he adds an extra twenty pounds that he doesn’t need to the bar? It’s not like anyone’s going to call him on it. They might call him on trying to work out with an injured hand, but again, he’s dealt with worse.

There weren’t off days in the Titan army. He’d fought, and he’d fought often. Not fighting meant liability. Liability meant death.

And if he gets a little irked when Eddie snarks about his lighting when he takes some workout selfies? Well, that’s between him and Olympus – if they’re even watching. Which, they aren’t. Zeus has made it clear where Buck stands with Olympus, and he’s just lucky they didn’t leave him to Alabaster’s fate after Kronos.

“Some of us don’t need lighting to look good,” Buck replies none-too-kindly to Eddie’s commentary.

It irks him further when Chimney walks up to the guy and asks for advice. Serious betrayal there.

Of course, Eddie knows everything about lighting. Warm side light, he says. Too blue. It’s infuriating how much he knows. It’s incredible how much he knows. Buck should really listen to him.

And Buck really needs this guy gone. Now.

“These are the ones I sent in for the calendar,” Eddie says, pulling out his phone and swiping through the photos. It’s a smartphone – which surprises Buck more than anything. He can’t help but gape at the sight. Mythological beings, half-mortal or otherwise, don’t work well with smartphones. Heck, they don’t work well with phones in general. Smartphones are just that much more dangerous. Their ability to connect to wi-fi and constant connections make them difficult to monitor, and one false move can send out the wrong signal to every monster in a ten-mile radius.

What the hell is a guy with Mist affinity doing with a smartphone of all things? It’s dangerous enough for Buck to have a generic flip phone with minimal connection capabilities.

Another wave of jealousy crashes over him. “It’s uh… cheating,” Buck says when Chimney sends him a curious glance, “to have your pictures done by a professional photographer.” He walks off, mostly to put distance between him and the phone just in case.

Eddie snorts. “Photographer’s twelve.” He glances at Chimney. “My niece,” he explains.

“Your niece did this?” Chimney says, clearly impressed.

“Yeah,” Eddie’s smile broadens, “she’s a master at the iPhone filters.”

The conversation devolves from there until Buck finally gets fed up with it all. The smartphone still hasn’t gone away, and Buck can’t help but eye it warily even as he begins lifting some barbells. One touch, one text, and monsters will be on him in a matter of hours. He’s built a good place here – he doesn’t want to explain fighting off monsters with a spear in the middle of the day to his coworkers. He’s spent enough time being labeled the crazy guy in his lifetime. He’s not looking to continue the trend here.

So, he says, “Ah, y’know, you shouldn’t really get his hopes up like that,” when Chimney asks for Eddie’s help. “No offense, Chim,” he says, holding up a hand.

Chimney deflates. “Yeah, none taken Evan,” he replies bitterly, stalking off to go pout for a bit.

And yeah, Buck was definitely the asshole here, he’ll admit that, but he needs that phone gone yesterday.

Unfortunately, Eddie doesn’t get with the program. He wanders over, the phone still clutched in his gloved hands, and says, “What’s your problem, man?”

Evan glances at the phone that’s just inches from his face and gets up to put himself out of reach. “Okay. You,” he admits. “You’re my problem.” Eddie stares at him silently, clearly waiting for him to continue, and di immortals does Buck wish this weren’t in a public place. He can see Chimney pretending not to watch in a corner, and he’s pretty sure Stan is listening in from the water fountain. “Your comfort level,” he finally settles upon. “Y-You’re not supposed to just walk in here like you’ve been here for years.”

You’re not supposed to bring the Mist here, to my home. You’re not supposed to magic your way into my family that I’ve been building for a year now.

That’s what he really wants to say.

That’s what he can’t bring himself to say.

I’m afraid of you.

What he will never say.

“It’s meant to be a getting-to-know-you period,” he continues. “You’re meant to respect your elders.”

“You’re not his elder, Buck,” Chimney chimes in helpfully from where he’s setting up another piece of equipment. Buck wonders for a moment how his coworker had moved without him noticing, but he quickly turns back to the conversation at hand when Eddie suddenly moves again.

Eddie looks at Buck like he’s crazy. “Look, I in no way meant to, uh, be too familiar or step on anybody’s toes.” He smiles placatingly. “I know you’re going through some personal stuff right now.”

“What personal stuff?” Buck asks suspiciously. By this point, he’s looking Eddie directly in the face, and he can feel his eyes protesting. He just can’t listen to the pain, right now.

Eddie’s smile slips for just a moment. “I know your girlfriend recently broke up with you, and you’re coming to terms with that.”

And that makes Buck’s blood boil. The phone? That’s an annoyance and a problem he can deal with. The headache Eddie causes by just being around? He can work with that, too. Minimal eye contact works wonders. Eddie asking about him and his coworkers, his supposed friends, talking about his personal issues?

Buck’s never been a private person. It’s part of who he is to be social, maybe confide a bit too much in others, but telling the new guy about his business? Seriously?

Or, even worse, Eddie coercing them with the Mist to get them to talk about him?

To say Buck is angry is an understatement.

Buck’s furious.

“No, I’m not,” Buck says through gritted teeth. “And she didn’t break up with me. Who told you that?” He glares pointedly at Chimney, who he knows has loose lips.

Chimney very quickly pretends to focus on his workout.

Buck’s not buying it for a second.

“I’m just saying I hear you’re a good guy, and I know you’re going through a lot of pain, but you don’t need to take it out on me – or be threatened by me. We’re on the same team,” Eddie explains.

“Why would I be threatened by you?” Buck mutters.

Eddie smiles, his shoulders dropping. “Exactly, there’s no need to be. We do the same thing.” He gestures between the two of them with his phone hand, just barely missing Buck’s arm. “I’ve just done it while people are shooting at me is all.”

He starts to turn, but Buck grabs him by the arm and pulls him close before he can get too far away. “Don’t think I don’t know about what you’re doing,” he murmurs lowly so that Chimney can’t hear. “I can feel it. How you’re swaying everyone. How you’re trying to sway me – keep me off guard. I know what it feels like, and you won’t win.”

Eddie stares at him, eyes wide. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, but I’m going to give you five seconds to get your hand off of me before I break it,” he says.

Buck releases the arm with a small shove and huffs. “It’s fine, I’m done anyway. Just know I’m onto you, whatever you are, and I won’t let you hurt them.”

Eddie walks away, and Chimney stares at Buck with a mixture of shock and horror on his face.

Good. Let him be afraid.

Buck glares at Bobby from across the room.

Let them all be afraid.

They’ll forget Eddie when he finally leaves. The Mist works wonders that way.

9-1-1 | 9-1-1 | 9-1-1

It’s night by the time they get a call.

Some guy with a grenade launcher managed to shoot himself in the leg – not the weirdest call Buck’s been on, but definitely one of the stupider ones.

It only gets worse when Cap sends him and Eddie along in the back of the ambulance on their way to the hospital.

“I guess you’ve seen a lot of shrapnel wounds,” Buck says, partially for the conversation, but mostly just as an opener for a fresh volley of insults. He’s not thrilled about being stuck in close quarters with Eddie. There’s so much Mist in here that it feels like he’s swimming in it.

“My share,” Eddie replies guardedly.

Buck grins. “You ever seen a guy with a length of rebar stuck in his skull?”

Okay, maybe bringing up one of Chimney’s darkest moments isn’t the best strategy here, but it’s payback for Chimney airing Buck’s dirty laundry. That’s what he tells himself, anyway. And, if the story outdoes Eddie, then it’s double the revenge.

“What are we measuring here, Buck?” Eddie replies quietly.

…Buck doesn’t have an answer to that.

“Need to change these dressings,” Eddie finally says when the silence hangs long enough. “They’re soaking through.”

They spend the next minute or so going through the motions until Eddie pushes Buck back with a hand. “Hang on, I thought you said this was a practice round.”

And that’s the moment Buck’s heart takes a swan dive into his stomach.

“Uh what-what-what’s going on?” he manages to stammer out.

“See the cap?” Eddie says quietly. “Practice rounds have blue caps.”

Buck’s mind flickers back to overzealous Ares kids and their weaponry. “Live rounds have gold,” he finishes quickly. He bangs on the cab before Eddie can think to ask how Buck knows that piece of information. “Pull over!” he shouts. “Pull over!”

It takes a bit for LAPD to get out there, but once things are moving, it isn’t long before the officer tells them that yes, there is a live round embedded in the patient’s thigh and no, they’re not going to be able to help until the military gets to their location.

Which will take time the patient doesn’t have.

Buck says something to that effect, and of course, Eddie is the first one to pop into the conversation with, “I can do it.”

All heads, including Buck’s, swivel towards Eddie Diaz, and suddenly, Buck’s not sure if he’s impressed or annoyed with the man. There’s a few technical terms thrown around, but then Buck finds himself volunteering for this mess of a call, too.

This one, he can’t really blame on anyone but himself.

He’s mostly curious. He’s also not afraid to die.

Bad combo, that.

They end up in special bomb squad vests, and when Bobby tells him he doesn’t have to do this, Buck can only quip, “You wanted us to bond. We might end up real close.”

And yes, he knows it’s terrible gallows humor, but that’s the way demigods cope. When the prevailing advice for being a demigod is don’t find out you’re a demigod or you’ll ruin your life, there’s really not much else you can do but crack jokes about your impending demise. It’s sardonic. It’s terrible. It’s pretty concerning. It’s a sign most, if not all, demigods need therapy.

Buck really doesn’t care.

So, he climbs into the ambulance with bomb guy and Eddie fucking Diaz and tries not to think about the fact that his last moments might be with a monster. Or a very unconvincing god.

But, against all odds, Eddie pulls the explosive out of the guy’s thigh, and they get off the ambulance with little more than one heart attack inducing moment when the bomb rolls.

The ambulance explodes in the end, but hey, the patient is off and getting treatment, and neither Buck nor Eddie flinch at the sudden kaboom – it really is a win all around.

Now, if only the goddamn Mist would get out of his head, he’d really win.

9-1-1 | 9-1-1 | 9-1-1

“Hey,” Eddie says as they’re leaving for the day. Bobby’s already gone, and Chimney and Hen are still talking about something in the locker room, so it’s just Eddie and Buck.

Well, correction, Eddie and Buck and the stupid magical smokescreen that Eddie’s brought into their lives.

“What?” Buck grouses. He’s had a long day – a long shift, really, and he’s not prepared for a confrontation right now.

Eddie raises his hands in surrender. “Hey, I don’t want to fight you,” he says quickly. “I just wanted to ask. What did you mean by you’re onto me, whatever I am?” He shrugs. “It was just… a weird thing to say, I guess.”

Buck frowns. “Don’t act all innocent. You can’t just control the Mist like this and think I don’t know what you’re doing.” He glances around the parking lot just to be sure no one’s listening and leans into Eddie’s space so that he can lower his voice. “I don’t care if you’re a god sent to check and make sure I’m being a good little demigod or a monster sent to make my life miserable, I’m not letting you win.” He pulls back and hikes his duffel further up onto his shoulder. “So you can tell whoever sent you to back off. I’m not causing any trouble. No need to worry about a Titan uprising or anything.” He chuckles bitterly. “Not like there’s many of us left. The gods made sure of that.”

Eddie, for the second time today, simply gapes at him. “Buck, I don’t know what you’re talking about. No one sent me.” His mouth tightens into a thin line. “And I don’t know anything about a mist. Or gods. Or monsters. Or Titans.” He shakes his head. “But I am thinking you might need help.”

Buck laughs darkly. “Help? I need help.” He puts a hand to his forehead and fights the urge to bang his head against something. “I don’t need help, I need to not have a headache when I look at you. I need to stop second guessing myself every time I make a decision because the Mist is coloring everything I do so that you can stay here. I need to be able to live a normal fucking life, because I’m pretty tired of godly interference and being a pariah everywhere I go for making the mistake of picking the wrong side in someone else’s war.”

Eddie’s eyes are wide now, wide and afraid. And Buck… Buck likes it. A lot.

“I need a lot of things, Eddie, but help isn’t one of them.”

Buck leaves him there, walks to his Jeep, slides into the driver’s seat, and leaves without another word.

9-1-1 | 9-1-1 | 9-1-1

It’s only when he gets home that he realizes how royally fucked he just made himself.

Sure, Buck. Out that you know something’s off to the probable monster. That’s going to end well.

Maddie, bless her, doesn’t say much when he gets back. She simply lets Buck close himself off in his room so that he can sleep.

Of course, demigod dreams aren’t exactly normal.

No. They’re worse.

9-1-1 | 9-1-1 | 9-1-1

“Evan Buckley,” the voice of Zeus booms. Evan tries not to flinch where he kneels at the feet of his mother. “Your actions have wreaked havoc upon Olympus.”

Technically, they weren’t his actions. He just helped. A little.

Gods don’t deal in technicalities.

“And yet, he fought for Olympus in the end,” his mother argues. “His actions directly led to our victory. That should count for something.”

“If we were to weigh his misdeeds with his good on a scale, the bad would outweigh the good,” Athena remarks tonelessly. Ah yes, Goddess of Wisdom, logical as ever.

Evan shifts awkwardly from one knee to the other to relieve some of the pressure on his tired kneecaps. He’s never been a huge fan of kneeling, and the cracked, uneven marble beneath his knees digs painfully into his exposed skin.

Ares snorts. “I think we should just smite the brat. I can’t say I approve of how he picked his battles.” Evan finally lifts his head at that, his mouth already open to snap out a retort as Ares continues, “Come on kid, I’m the god of war, and you decided to be a spy. You weren’t the most entertaining demigod.” He shrugs. “No big loss if you die.”

“You do realize it’s attitudes like that that make your kids want to kill you?” Buck snaps. No big loss. Mortal lives are no big loss. It almost makes him regret rejoining the Olympian side of the war.

But then he thinks back to Kronos. He thinks back to dust in his mouth and bloody hellhound teeth. He thinks back to his realization that Kronos wouldn’t be any better.

“You will watch how you speak in this chamber,” Zeus thunders. The scent of ozone fills Evan’s nostrils, and it takes everything he has not to glance up at the sky in alarm when a clap of thunder booms above his head. “We haven’t yet decided whether or not to kill you.”

“What about exile?” Hermes throws out. Evan’s head whips towards the god so fast his neck pops. Hermes leans forward on his throne, his hands placed beneath his chin as he stares Evan down appraisingly. “He fought against us, true, but he also fought for us. He made the difficult choice to betray Kronos.”

Just like my son doesn’t need to be said. Everyone can feel the unspoken words reverberating in the tense atmosphere around them.

“Grant him the favor of a life,” Artemis says slowly, as if she’s turning the idea over in her mind, “but still the punishment of betrayal.”

“Better than outright killing him,” Hephaestus grumbles.

Apollo hums. “Might make a poetic ending,” he remarks.

His mother says something above his head, but the voices in the chamber are quickly dissolving into white noise. All around Buck, the scene is greying and becoming fuzzy at the edges. The colors twist and churn into angry splotches of browns and blacks like a paint pallet with too many colors being mixed on its surface until eventually Buck stands alone in an empty room, inky blackness all around him.

“You know, it would be so easy,” a dry, creaky voice whispers somewhere in front of him.

A shape, humanoid, moves back and forth through the ink.

One, two, three, four, five, turn.

Pacing. It’s pacing.

“You’re right,” someone responds. The voice is young, bitter. Buck’s reminded of his own teenaged years when he was angry at his parents. “It would be so easy. It’s not like it isn’t hard to find the instructions.”

The creaky voice laughs. “Humans – you’re so good at collecting information and just leaving it out in the open to find.”

The figure stops. “You said you can make me strong? Make me powerful enough to do this?”

“That and more.”

“Then I –"

The scene shifts.

Water fills his nostrils. His lungs burn. He’s floating, suspended in water as chunks of metal float past his head and sink into the depths below him. Salt stings his eyes.

The woman from the plane is already on the rescue craft above him, but Bobby is still down here. Sinking. Falling with the plane to the depths of the ocean.

At least, that’s what Buck had thought.

He sees a woman dragging a body down, down, down into the liquid darkness, and Buck knows without a moment’s hesitation that the body isn’t a body at all.

He dives, fighting against the current and his exhaustion to reach the woman – an oceanid, most likely – and his captain. He makes it a few feet when hands grip his ankles and yank them down beneath him. He’s reoriented so quickly that his ears pop and his head spins.

What are you doing? He internally howls at the nymph holding onto him. His whole body screams at him for air that he knows isn’t coming any time soon, not with the way that this nymph is holding onto him.

She looks up at him and bares her pointed teeth, her watery body jilting like Jell-O when he kicks out to dislodge her. You humans brought pollution and poison to our waters. We are simply taking what we are owed.

You’re not owed anything! It was an accident! He reaches down and unstraps his dagger from his boot. The blade slices awkwardly through the water, but it’s enough to make the oceanid scream and back off, her body dematerializing. Buck shoves the handle into his teeth and dives before she can reform.

He’s not a Poseidon kid, but his family still has some gifts of the sea. His body needs air, but it will hold out just long enough.

He hopes.

He hears another shriek behind him, and within moments he has the dagger back in his hand and is slashing out towards the source of the voice. He feels his blade connect with something, and when the malevolent presence fades, he slips the blade back through his teeth and begins his descent once again.

Bobby’s body floats like dead weight, and lucky for him, physics is on his side here. The oceanid dragging him can’t move nearly as quickly as she probably would like, and while Buck isn’t close enough to strike directly…

Well, there’s a reason he was well known for his aim.

His dagger slices through the water, quick and deadly, and severs the oceanid’s watery hands clear from her body. Bobby’s body jolts, but then it begins to float up towards the surface only ten or so feet above them. Buck grimaces when the glint of his Celestial Bronze weapon fades into the black waters beneath him. He’s never getting that back.

The oceanid below him hisses. Demigod!

Well, it wouldn’t be the first time he’s made a nymph angry.

You’re going to pay for that, a voice hisses just behind him. Buck whirls around and kicks out at the presence – the original nymph who’d tried to kill him earlier. He uses the momentum from the kick to propel him upward.

If he can just get to the surface –

His lungs scream in protest. An icy cold grip wraps tightly around his ankle.

He’s not going to make it to the surface. He looks up to see Bobby’s body vanish from the water. At least he’s done what he came down here to do. Bobby is safe. Alive.

And Buck… Buck’s okay with dying. The water around him churns and bubbles as he’s pulled down, down, down towards the inky depths awaiting him. He can only hope Poseidon won’t get too pissed about Buck dying on his turf.

Dark spots dance before his eyes.

The water above him twists and contorts. A hand clasps tightly onto his own outstretched fingers.

The water melts away. He’s no longer floating.

He’s sitting.

“Hello, little one,” a voice croons. It’s soft, sweet, warm. It fills his body with heat all the way down to his bones. He feels safe, possibly the safest he’s ever felt.

The world around him is dim, but he hears leaves crunching beneath his feet. Crickets sing all around him, and an owl hoots nearby. There are stars, brilliant stars, shining above his head.

He hears and smells the crackling of a fire nearby. He feels its warmth, but he can’t see the flames.

“You’re a bit lost, aren’t you?”

The crickets sing louder. Buck’s shoulders loosen – he hadn’t even realized they’d been tense.

“It isn’t often that people come my way. You must be truly worried to come here.”

The pain in his head fades.

His troubles feel like a distant memory.

"The Hearth can do that for a lost soul. I’m glad I can be here for you.”

He’s tired.

“Then why don’t you rest for a while? I’ll send you back when the time is right.”

That… that sounds like a good idea.

“Rest, Evan Buckley. Rest, and know that you are safe.”

And Evan rests.

9-1-1 | 9-1-1 | 9-1-1

The next night, his sleep is dreamless. Whether that’s due to Morpheus giving him a break or some other deity helping him out, he’s not sure, but he’s grateful.

9-1-1 | 9-1-1 | 9-1-1

He wakes feeling better than he has in a long while. Probably the best he’s felt since Abby.

Maddie’s still asleep by the time he’s managed to get out the door, so Buck bids the guest bedroom a soft goodbye and makes sure to make as little noise as possible. A part of him feels guilty. He’s offered his home to Maddie, but his weird shift schedule has made it difficult to be a proper host.

He’s not entirely sure what he’s expecting when he gets to the station. A large part of him is worried that Eddie’s reported him for their conversation yesterday, and Bobby’s going to fire him again. He definitely could have handled that better.

But, when he arrives at the station, everything seems to be normal. Well, as normal as they can get. The Mist’s effects have faded – the fog in Buck’s head isn’t completely gone, but he no longer feels the need to leave the station the moment he drives into the parking lot.

Maybe that talk yesterday was for the best. Hopefully the Mist is just residual from Eddie’s departure, and that Problem is out of Buck’s hair forever.

He walks into the station and swallows the crushing disappointment he feels when he sees Eddie Diaz laughing at something Chimney’s telling him in the locker room.

Eddie’s shoulders tense when he catches Buck’s eye, but he doesn’t say anything. In fact, he doesn’t acknowledge Buck at all, even when Buck steps into the room to change for their shift. “I’m telling you, man, you’re super photogenic,” Eddie remarks loudly. “I bet if you showed Hen, she’d agree with me.”

Chimney hums tunelessly. “You think?” he asks, tapping at the laptop in his hands with his fingers.

“Definitely. I think she’s here already – Cap brought in donuts from some shop near his house, so she’s upstairs taking first crack at them.”

Chimney grins delightedly at the mention of donuts. “Oh, I love it when he brings donuts.” He looks at Buck and winks. “We used to get them from the Monster Donut a few blocks away, but both Cap and Buck aren’t huge fans of the place.”

Buck shifts uncomfortably at the reminder of how close the monster-run chain is to their location. “Cap says they over fry their dough,” he says quickly, “and I had a bad experience with their customer service when I was in New York.”

“Bad experience” really means almost got eaten by a hydra and “when I was in New York” translates to when I was fighting a war that decided the fate of the world while every mortal in the tristate area was asleep, but Buck doesn’t mention those parts of the story.

Eddie nods slowly. “And an experience in New York would absolutely translate to an LA branch.” Buck does not appreciate the dry sarcasm.

“Yeah, well you don’t know Monster Donut,” Buck mutters, pulling his work boots from his duffel bag. He’d thought about changing at home this morning, but his boots are loud. He hadn’t wanted to disturb Maddie.

Unfortunately, that gives Eddie the chance to look into his duffel. “Is that a sword?” he asks incredulously.

Buck blinks. Well, shit. “No,” he says, his voice dripping with sarcasm. “It’s a pen.” It’s a dagger, actually. More specifically, it’s the dagger he keeps in his boot just in case he comes across something on a call that he really doesn’t want to deal with – which has happened a couple of times.

He shudders at the memory of the angry ocean spirits that had nearly killed Bobby at the plane crash. He remembers their long, clawed hands wrapped tightly around Bobby’s legs as they pulled him down, down, down into the depths as retribution for pollution that hadn’t been his fault.

He remembers the flash of bronze in the murky depths and the feeling of cool hands tugging harshly at his legs.

Chimney pushes past both of them to peer into Buck’s bag. “Dude, it’s just a Swiss Army knife,” he says between smacks of gum in his mouth. “Some firefighters carry them in case of emergency. It’s just a personal thing.” He pats Buck on the back. “Besides, swords are for LARPers. Not really Buckaroo’s scene.”

He chuckles to himself and walks out the room with a wave, leaving Buck and Eddie to themselves.

“But,” Eddie mutters, “that’s not a Swiss Army knife.”

Buck slams his locker closed, taking great pains to ensure that Eddie can’t see his combination and go snooping further. “Maybe you should get your eyes checked,” Buck replies darkly. “Those iPhone filters don’t seem to be doing you much good.”

He stalks out of the room and lets the door slam behind him.

At least he was right about Chimney; he doesn’t have the sight.

It’s a small comfort.

9-1-1 | 9-1-1 | 9-1-1

Eddie and Buck do their best to avoid each other for the rest of their shift, which suits Buck just fine. The effects of the Mist may have lessened, but every once in a while, he’ll catch himself wanting to go apologize – though he really doesn’t want to apologize to Eddie at all.

They get a call involving three “friends,” though Buck uses the term loosely because, well, one of the three kids has his head trapped in cement.

Darwin award? Thy name is Shay’s Army.

But then the kid in question falls into the pool, and before he can even think about it, Buck is diving in after him. He sees someone else enter the water right after, and the moment Buck lays his hands on the container housing the cement, he feels the cold clammy hands of an oceanid wrapping around his ankle.

We are simply taking what we are owed, whispers darkly in his mind.

A hand, warm and smooth and human taps on his own, and suddenly Buck is looking into the concerned eyes of Eddie Diaz.

Buck shakes his head, and together he and Eddie pull the kid out of the pool with what might be seconds to spare. He busies himself with unscrewing the metal from the kid’s head, and when Bobby finally hands Buck the hammer, Buck says, “I can do this.”

It’s mostly reassurance for himself, but the nod Bobby sends his way warms his chest.

He almost doesn’t feel the wet hands still wrapped tightly around his ankles.

It’s fine. He’s fine.

He ignores Bobby’s questioning look when he stalks back to the ambulance, determined to put as much distance between himself and the pool as he can.

He’s fine.

9-1-1 | 9-1-1 | 9-1-1

“Alright everybody, listen up,” Bobby calls into the crowded loft. It’s around the time of day where B Shift is starting to filter their way into the station in the hopes of grabbing some of Bobby’s cooking before A Shift heads out. “I’ve got an announcement to make.”

Buck grins and rubs his hands together in anticipation. He’s pretty sure he knows exactly what this announcement is about, and he’s so ready to rub his win in Eddie’s face.

The Mist can make everyone like you, but it can’t influence the people it can’t touch. Finally, he’ll have the proof he needs to show everyone definitively that Eddie doesn’t belong with the 118.

“I just got off the phone with the people from the calendar, and they have made their choice,” Bobby continues, a small knowing smile on his face.

“Well, no hard feelings, no matter who won,” Buck says, not bothering to hide his smug grin.

Bobby’s smile quirks into a smirk. “That’s good, Buck, ‘cause they didn’t pick you.”

Buck blinks. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” he mutters, glaring over at Eddie, who looks back at him with a neutral expression. “They picked him? The new guy? He’s only been at the station for a week!”

Bobby’s eyebrow rises. “They didn’t pick him either.”

Buck’s tension immediately drains from his shoulders, and he doesn’t fight the smile that creeps up his face. “You?” he asks. Bobby wouldn’t be so bad. At least it isn’t Eddie.

Bobby shakes his head, the knowing grin still etched firmly on his face. “No.” He looks away from Buck – who’s been draped over the couch pretending to read a book for the past hour so that he can avoid Eddie’s unwanted staring (not that it’s been helping much) – to Chimney and the celery stick poking out of his mouth.

Buck’s first instinct is to think, really? His second is to feel terribly about his comments from the gym a day ago.

Obviously, he’s been proven wrong here.

Chimney glances behind him as if to look for some other celery eating shmuck. “No way, you’ve got to be kidding me,” he says through the hunk of greens in his mouth.

Bobby smiles. “No. Congratulations, Chim! Or should I say, Mr. April?”

And that, makes Buck smile. He climbs to his feet and hoots with excitement. He’s proud to say he’s the first one to get to the kitchen. It feels so easy, so natural to pull Chimney into a side hug that screams bro, I got you.

“You go, I go,” the firefighter on the TV in Peru had said.

You go, I go.  

He hasn’t felt like this since the war. The first war, anyway.

If he closes his eyes, he can almost imagine the warmth of Luke’s hand patting his shoulder and Alabaster’s powerful presence at his side. Almost.

You go, I go.

9-1-1 | 9-1-1 | 9-1-1

Hours later, the sun is beginning to set, and Buck’s unlocking his Jeep with the press of a button.

And Eddie, the bastard, is waiting for him. He’s leaned up against the driver’s door of Buck’s vehicle. Clearly, he’s been thinking about this for a while.

Buck internally groans. He’s not going home any time soon.

The feeling of wrong wrong Wrong creeps slowly up his spine.

“I know what I saw,” is what Eddie says, his tone devoid of anything but accusation. “I don’t know how you got Chimney to see a Swiss Army knife, but I saw the sword in your bag. That wasn’t a normal knife.”

Buck huffs and crosses his arms over his chest. “Actually, it was a dagger, not a knife. There’s a difference.” He grins lopsidedly. “And it’s not my fault you can’t tell the difference between a dagger and a sword.”

Eddie’s face screws up into an annoyed grimace. “It’s still a dangerous weapon,” he points out. “And you didn’t answer the question.”

“You didn’t ask a question,” Buck remarks coolly. “You made some statements, but nowhere in there was an actual question.” The muscles in his fingers twitch. He needs to move. To do something. He wants to crawl out of his own skin.

The hairs on the back of his neck stand up on end when Eddie’s fist slams into the metal door at his back. “I don’t really care much about the semantics,” he growls. “Look, you got Chimney to see a tiny little knife, you nearly had a panic attack in that pool today, you’ve accused me of using ‘mist’ to manipulate people – I’m sick and tired of all the games, Buck. You make no sense!”

“Can you not slam on my car?” Buck snaps. “And you know what, I’m sick and tired of you.” His entire body feels like a livewire, ready to snap and spark with electricity at the slightest touch as he steps forward into Eddie’s space. “You come into my station wrapped so tightly in the Mist that I’m surprised you’re not choking on it. You manipulate my friends, my coworkers, into liking you and spilling all of my personal information. You strut around and butt your head into all sorts of places you don’t belong like it’s your little kingdom to own –“ he cuts himself off with a strangled grunt and dutifully ignores Eddie’s wide-eyed stare. “And you keep pretending like you don’t know about any of this! Like you have no clue about what you are – but I know, Eddie Diaz. I know about you, so why don’t you drop the act and tell me who you are?”

The words slip like honey over Buck’s tongue before he’s able to stop them, and he sees the exact moment the magic washes over Eddie. His chest loosens, the muscles in his neck release, and the look in his eyes goes from hard fury to glazed and distant in seconds. “I don’t know,” he says softly. “There’s no act. I just don’t know.”

Buck’s stomach twists. The Mist around them vanishes. The humming feeling in his body increases in intensity. Di immortals, what has he done?

“Eddie,” he says quickly. He swallows down the panic rapidly rising in his throat. Oh, he’s fucked up. He’s really fucked up this time. “Eddie I need you to –”

“Why don’t you stop right there?” his own voice interrupts.

The humming, tense feeling in his muscles causes them to ache. Every nerve in his body is on fire. His mind goes everywhere at once.

He turns quickly, already reaching for the dagger tucked away in his boot until he realizes he doesn’t have his dagger. He’d left it in his duffel this morning after Eddie questioned him about it.

A four-legged, doglike creature saunters in their direction from the street. Its powerful muscles ripple beneath dusty brown fur. The black spots along its hide stretch and thin with every step. Its back is arched, almost as if it has a hunch. Big round ears frame the creature’s head. Its muzzle extends to an open jaw that shows off a sharp, boney ridge in place of teeth.

He knows from experience that the ridge is strong enough to snap bone with one easy crunch.

“Yeah, why don’t you stop right there?” Hen’s voice calls from his left. A second creature stalks forward, ridge bared in a feral grin.

A peal of laughter comes from above them – somewhere to their right. “To think, we were tracking one tasty demigod, and then a second pops up out of nowhere!” Bobby’s usually reassuring voice calls. Buck looks up to see a creature perched on the edge of the roof. Without hesitation, it leaps from the building and lands easily on the concrete. “Hello again, Evan Buckley. I must say, it’s great to see you again. And you’ve brought us a snack that smells even better than you!”

“Buck,” Eddie murmurs, “how are they doing that?”

Buck steps in front of Eddie and thanks whatever god is looking out for him that he’d neglected to zip up his bag before he’d left the station. “I’m surprised you’re not asking what they are,” he remarks casually. “That’s usually the first question out of a newbie’s mouth when they meet their first monsters.”

“I was going to ask that, too,” Eddie grumbles. “But the voice thing was throwing me off.”

Buck pulls two items from his bag with one hand. “Krokottai, basically hyenas that can mimic voices. Aelian was the first Greek historian to write about them, but the Byzantines discovered them first.” He places his middle finger between the two items and mutters, “Take the dagger.”

He can’t see Eddie from where he’s standing, but he feels the other man tense. “I have my own,” he replies.

“And steel can’t touch these things,” Buck snaps urgently. “Take the bronze dagger, or we’re both going to die.” The Krokottai aren’t exactly moving quickly, but they’re moving fast enough that the gap between them and the two demigods is closing quickly. “Now, Diaz.”

A warm set of fingers pries the dagger from his hand, and Buck is impressed by the lack of a tremor in them. Not bad for a first timer.

“Buckley, Buckley, Buckley,” the third Krokotta says in Eddie’s voice, “you had a hard enough time defending yourself from us in Peru. Do you really think you can defend both yourself and a fledgling demigod?”

He thinks back to Peru and –

Hang on.

Peru. Krokottai.

His mind puts the pieces together almost too late. “Get down!” Buck orders Eddie and prays that the other demigod will follow his orders as he whips himself around to face the Jeep. He doesn’t have time to put his spear together all the way, but he’s able to extend it far enough so that it hits the Krokotta that had been creeping over the top of the Jeep square in the chest.

There had been four Krokottai that survived in Peru.

The Krokotta on the Jeep howls in agony and explodes into dust that rains down upon both him and a crouching Eddie.

“EVAN BUCKLEY!” Bobby’s voice screams in anguish at him.

Buck turns back to the original Krokottai and grins. “What? Did I ruin your big plan?” he asks with all the nonchalance of a demigod who’s seen way too much combat.

To be fair, he’s lived through two Great Prophecies and thirteen years on the run. It’s not exactly an exaggeration.

The Krokotta coming straight at them from the center screams, “YOU WILL PAY!” And then Buck is bracing the shaft of his now fully extended spear against the rabid fury of a fully grown wild dog.

“Eddie,” Buck groans between grunts of exertion, “move.”

“Already on it,” Eddie says from somewhere to his left. “Hey ugly!”

Buck wants to look over and check on him, but he’s still locked in combat with his own monster. He grits his teeth, brings his leg up, and shoves against the Krokotta with all his might. The monster tumbles backward, giving Buck a chance to follow through with a stab of his spear. The tip of the spear sparks against the concrete where the Krokotta had just been standing.

Buck growls. He sees movement out of the corner of his eye and quickly swings his spear in an arc. The Krokotta jumps backward out of range and snarls. “I don’t remember you being this annoying,” it says through a wicked snarl.

Maddie’s voice. It’s using Maddie’s voice.

Buck sees red.

“I remember you dying pretty easily last time,” he says with a grin that’s more teeth than lip. “Didn’t you know? I love it when a good movie gets a sequel.” He leaps forward, pulling the spear back behind his shoulder so that he can jab at the monster when he’s on his way back to the ground. The Krokotta yelps, clearly not ready for the attack, and doesn’t move fast enough. The monster bursts into dust with a soft pop!

“Buck, I don’t mean to distract you,” Eddie calls, “but could you come help me out here?”

Buck’s attention quickly turns to the other two Krokottai he’d momentarily forgotten and grimaces. The monsters slowly circle an exhausted looking Eddie, who’s brandishing the dagger in his hand like it’s a toy sword.

It is in this moment that Buck makes a note to teach Eddie how to fight. This is mildly embarrassing to watch.

“Buck!”

“Right, right,” Buck replies, quickly running over to help with the other fight. He swings his spear in a wide arc that easily breaks the Krokottai out of their pattern. He joins Eddie in the center of what was the old ring and positions himself so that they’re standing back-to-back. “Sorry about that,” he says over his shoulder.

Eddie snorts. “Do me a favor and zone out after we kill the monsters trying to eat us?” he replies, his voice sdripping with sarcasm.

Buck grins and jabs at one of the Krokottai that’s getting a little to daring with his spear. “I make no promises.”

Buck makes another jab with his spear, and this time, the bronze blade easily slides home between a Krokotta’s ribs. The creature yelps and disintegrates.

“So that’s three of your friends down,” Buck quips. He turns around and steps out from behind Eddie so that he can face the monster directly. “You sure you want to stick around?”

The last Krokotta growls angrily. “Shut up, demigod!” It leaps into the air, its claws aimed straight at Buck’s heart. He pulls his spear up to block, but he knows he’s not moving quick enough to defend himself.

He’d gotten too cocky.

He’s going to die.

But Eddie is faster than both him and the Krokotta. He steps in front of Buck and sticks the dagger directly into the monster’s gut. The Krokotta’s momentum makes it so that Eddie doesn’t have to move at all. Instead, physics takes over as the dagger slices through the monster from the top of its chest to its hindquarters.

The Krokotta whimpers when it hits the ground behind them, entrails spilling out onto the concrete with every labored breath. “You think you’ve won, demigods, but He is coming,” the creature says between rasps of air. It smiles. “Good luck hiding,” it says in a chilling imitation of a child’s voice. He doesn’t recognize it, but Eddie freezes at the sudden change, “You smell –"

Gold dust swirls around the monster until there’s nothing left but a soft, mushy lump on the ground.

Metal clatters to the ground, and Buck looks to his right to see Eddie slump to his knees, the dagger discarded on the ground in front of him. His breaths come out in heavy gasps as he stares blankly at the lump on the concrete that had once been a raging monster.

“Well, that was different,” Buck says with a small grin.

Eddie doesn’t move. “Obviously that thing never watched Star Wars,” he says.

Buck blinks. “What?” he asks incredulously.

“Y’know,” Eddie explains, leaning back on his heels, “’It’s over, Anakin. I have the high ground.’”

…well.

“Actually, I don’t know,” Buck admits, sitting himself down on the ground next to Eddie. He drops his spear at his side. “I’ve never seen Star Wars either.”

Eddie’s head snaps to him, and Buck cringes at the look of abject horror on the other demigod’s face. “You’ve never seen Star Wars?” He shakes his head and grins. “What are you, an alien?”

“No, actually,” Buck snarks, “I’m a demigod.”

Eddie glares at him. “Well, despite what you may think, that’s something I don’t know much about.”

Buck ducks his head. His cheeks burn, and he just knows he’s blushing like crazy right now. “Yeah, sorry. I –“ he pauses, searching for the right words, “I made a bad assumption, and in the process, I fucked up.” He puts his hands down on the ground for support and pushes himself to his feet. “I can explain everything. If you want me to, anyway.” He holds out a hand to Eddie, which Eddie takes somewhat grudgingly.

“I’d like that,” Eddie replies with a touch of wariness that Buck appreciates.

Yeah, he’d probably be a little aloof too if it were him on the other side of things.

“I think I’d like an explanation, too,” someone else cuts in from the bay doors only ten feet from their urban battlefield. Both Buck and Eddie turn to the voice, Eddie already scrabbling for the dagger he’d dropped, but this time, the voice actually is Bobby.

Who’s looking very angry.

And a little more than worried.

“Uh… some stray dogs –" Buck begins, but Bobby’s already shaking his head.

“Don’t feed me some line about stray dogs. I know what I saw,” Bobby reprimands sharply. “Want to come inside and explain?”

Buck shuffles nervously, but Eddie’s already pulling him along, dagger in hand. “Yes. Yes, we do,” he answers. His voice leaves no room for argument.

Buck grimaces. The last thing he wants is to be grilled by his Captain and a fledgling demigod.

The warm hand wrapped tightly around his wrist doesn’t give him much of a choice.

9-1-1 | 9-1-1 | 9-1-1

Eddie shoves him into one of Bobby’s guest chairs, but when he doesn’t take one for himself, Buck knows this this isn’t going to be a quick and easy QnA. No, this is an interrogation.

He wants to slam his head on the desk and groan outwardly.

He resists the urge. Barely.

Eddie takes up a position against the wall behind Buck that’s conveniently right next to the door. He idly plays with the leather-wrapped hilt of Buck’s dagger with his hands, but his eyes don’t leave Buck’s face. Bobby leans back against the front of his desk.

“So, who’s starting us off?” Buck asks with resignation. With the exit blocked, he can’t make a quick escape – and he still has to come into work at some point. Granted, he’s got one other option, but the idea of it makes him nauseous.

Bobby sighs. “Buck, I’ve put up with a lot from you. You had a spotty work history, but I chalked that up to being a free spirit. I saw the knife, and I thought that maybe you liked roleplaying, or maybe you were just into knives. I saw the spear and didn’t say anything because hey, no one else seemed to mind.” He levels a shrewd look in Buck’s direction. “But after everyone’s odd behavior the past week, yours included, I knew I couldn’t stay silent anymore.”

“Wait, you noticed?” Buck stares at Bobby with wide eyes. “And you didn’t say anything?”

“I saw it. Hen’s not usually that quick to hand off a medical case to someone who isn’t a paramedic, even if that firefighter was an army medic.” Bobby nods at Eddie. “No offense, but that air pressure call should have been Hen or Chimney’s, not yours.”

Eddie grunts in response, but he doesn’t reply.

Bobby’s mouth quirks into a small smile. “And Chimney has a big mouth, but he wouldn’t talk about Abby to someone he’s only known for a day and a half,” he continues. He finally looks at Buck with a wary expression, like he’s waiting for Buck to jump out of his chair and run at any moment. “What really clued me in was how distracted you were this week, Buck. You were walking around like you had your head in the clouds, and you were reading a book today.” The smile widens into a wry grin. “You have severe dyslexia. You don’t read; you listen to audiobooks.”

Buck winces. “That’s fair,” he says quietly. “I just didn’t think anyone would notice.” The admittance hurts because, in a way, it’s true. Everyone on the team except Eddie knows he’s dyslexic. He’d thought at least someone would call him on pretending to read a book.

He hadn’t really wanted to think about how everyone just glossed over it.

“Well, whatever it is that’s been messing with my team, you seem to think it’s coming from Eddie,” Bobby says without any heat. “Tell me why.”

Buck glances over his shoulder at Eddie who still looks infuriatingly collected where he’s leaning against the wall.

“It’s… complicated,” Buck finally replies.

“So uncomplicate it,” Eddie orders.

Buck throws Eddie a glare over his shoulder. “I’m getting there, I just have to explain something first.” He shifts uncomfortably in his chair. “Gods are real.”

He’s pretty sure he could hear a pin drop, that’s how quiet the room gets. He tries very hard not to notice how his incredibly sharp dagger glints in the light of Bobby’s office.

“What kind of gods?” Bobby asks after what feels like far too long for Buck’s comfort. He doesn’t look like he entirely believes Buck, but at least he isn’t arguing or ordering him to see a therapist (especially since the first one hadn’t worked out all that well anyway).

“From what I can gather, just about every pantheon you can think of,” Buck answers quietly. “I have the most experience with the Greek and Roman sides of things, but I’ve stumbled across traces of the Norse and Egyptian pantheons, too. I’ve also heard some rumors of the Aztec and Mayan gods existing, but I don’t know if they’re true.”

“Greek and Roman gods here?” Eddie cuts in incredulously. “Why not in Greece? Or Italy?” Okay, so Eddie believes him – or is at least humoring him. That makes this easier. Probably.

“Because Western Civilization has traveled here, to the US,” Buck responds. “Olympus is at the top of the Empire State Building. New Rome is in San Francisco.”

Eddie lets out a strangled noise. “New Rome?”

Buck turns around and grins apologetically. “Yeah, New Rome, complete with a full Roman Legion.”

Bobby hums tunelessly in thought. Buck uses the brief lull in the conversation and pushes his chair back so that he has a good view of both men. “That explains the giant eagles I see when I travel out that way.” Bobby looks at Buck and tilts his head to the side. “Eagles are the symbol of Rome, right?”

Buck nods. He hates to admit it, but he’s actually a little impressed. Most people, demigods included, probably wouldn’t put that together so quickly. “Yeah, it’s a thing,” he confirms.

“But what does any of this have to do with what’s going on here?” Eddie asks. “Gods, pantheons – what does that have to do with me?”

Buck coughs. “Um, well,” he scratches the back of his head, “sometimes the gods get bored with their existence. They find certain mortals… interesting.” He shrugs, dropping his hand back to the arm of the chair. “And sometimes, they have children with them. Half mortal, half god. Demigods. Or half-bloods. We’ll call ourselves pretty much whatever.”

“And you’re a ‘demigod,” Bobby says matter-of-factly.

“Uh, yeah,” he admits. His cheeks are burning again, and he’s kind of tired of feeling like a rat under a microscope. “My dad is mortal. My mom is Aphrodite.”

Bobby snorts. “That explains a lot,” he says with a knowing smirk. “She’s the goddess of romantic love and beauty, right?”

“And seafaring! And the Spartans worshiped her as a war goddess,” Buck is quick to add before Bobby can start trying to connect his mother to Buck 1.0. She may have had something to do with it, but most of that was his own fault. He knows that.

“So what,” Eddie cuts in, his voice taking on a dangerous edge, “you’re saying I’m a demigod? A half-blood?”

Buck shrugs. “If the shoe fits.” He fidgets with the fabric of the armrests as Eddie levels a dark look in his direction. “You grew up in a single parent household, right?”

“No, actually,” Eddie remarks coolly, “my parents are happily married and have been since before I was born.”

“Sure, but do you have slightly different features from the rest of your family that you’ve written off as recessive genes? What about severe dyslexia and ADHD when there’s been no family history of them? Did one of your parents travel around a lot when you were a kid?” At that last point, Eddie’s eye twitches, and Buck knows that he has him. “Got it. So, mother or father?”

“I don’t see how that matters,” Eddie utters through gritted teeth.

“Of course it matters,” Buck replies smoothly. He leans forward in his chair so that he can rest his elbows on his knees. He places his head on top of one palm and lets his body list lazily to the side. “Was it your dad or your mom?”

Eddie snarls. “My dad, but again –"

“Your dad probably had an affair with a goddess while he was gone. He either came back with you or you appeared on his doorstep, and your family took you in quietly and never told you the truth to keep up appearances.” Buck finally leans back and smirks with satisfaction at the way Eddie’s face has gone blisteringly red. “I’m betting you’re the oldest kid, and your parents have always held you to an impossible standard, like they expect incredible things from you. But those expectations eventually broke you, so you left and moved to LA.” Maybe that last bit is him projecting. Just a little. Eddie doesn’t need to know that.

“Buck,” Bobby says, his voice laced with warning.

And Buck knows he’s pushing it. He’s wheedling at Eddie now. Payback is sweet.

Now that he’s had a taste, he just can’t bring himself to stop.

“But what you never realized is that you’ve been under the protection of anonymity. Your parents lying to you all this time was better than them outright telling you the truth. In fact, you probably would have been better off if I’d never told you anything.” He looks at Bobby now. “You can see through the Mist, so it wouldn’t have affected you, but Eddie? Eddie reeked of it.” He holds up a hand. “And before you ask, the Mist is a magical smokescreen that hides stuff like monsters and magic from mortals. You know, so people don’t start asking questions about things they’re not ready to understand – like why a coworker has a bronze dagger in their work bag.”

Bobby opens his mouth to say something, but Buck shakes his head sharply. “I’m getting there, I promise,” he says. “So, Eddie comes to the station, and the Mist shows up with him. For me, it made me confused and agitated. I knew the Mist was changing my perception of Eddie – at first it kept trying to make me go away and avoid him, but then it started trying to get me to not ask him anything – I couldn’t do anything about it. So, I cut myself.” He holds up his bandaged hand. “It worked, somewhat, but it didn’t stop the worst of it.”

Bobby nods, but Eddie is still watching him in silence.

Well, at least he’s not storming out of the room. Or attacking.

In all honesty, Buck thinks he might prefer a reaction to the silent glaring.

“For Chimney and Hen, it made them more agreeable and friendly. Chimney wanted to know everything about Eddie because he was fascinated by him. He wanted Eddie to like him so badly that he gave up private information without even thinking about it. He was practically a groupie.” Buck chuckles and shakes his head. “As for Hen, she was quicker to jump to your defense and encourage you to do things you wanted to do. She also conceded to your judgement in medical calls despite having more experience in the field.”

He turns to Bobby. “As far as I can tell, you weren’t affected at all, Cap. You can see through the Mist, so it couldn’t influence you to like or hire Eddie.” He glances over at Eddie and nods his head apologetically. “You got here fair and square.”

He falls silent, but neither Eddie nor Bobby make a sound. He glances around nervously and tries not to gulp too audibly. “But then I ruined it by accusing you of using the Mist,” he finally admits beneath their heavy stares. “You got suspicious, and eventually, I made you realize that something was going on.” He chuckles weakly and rubs at his bad wrist – a nervous habit he’s never been able to drop. “A demigod’s best defense is not knowing they’re a demigod at all. Right after that is living with or around someone who literally reeks of the mortal world.”

His shoulders slump. “When I went after you earlier, asking about who you were – I broke through your protection, which is how the Krokottai found us. They were tracking me, but so long as I was around you, they couldn’t quite figure out where I was.” He can’t bring himself to grin like he normally would, so he settles for a wan grimace. “Your protection was stronger than anything I’ve ever seen, and I destroyed it.” There’s a lump in his throat as he says, “I’m sorry.”

No one says anything, and Buck doesn’t look up.

The next thing he hears is the door slamming.

When he finally lifts his head, Eddie’s gone, and Bobby’s looks like he’s torn between wanting to give Buck a hug or a reprimand.

“You should go home,” Bobby says quietly. “We’ve got the next four days. Make the most of them.”

Buck nods, picks up his spear, and turns to go. He tries to ignore the way his heart is slowly sinking into his stomach. He feels sick. It’s like he’s been flayed open and scraped raw so that all his guilt and regret can seep into the atmosphere around him.

“Buck,” Bobby calls after him. Buck turns. He fights the urge to fiddle with the spear’s shaft as Bobby flashes him a small smile. “Thank you for being honest.”

Buck smiles faintly in return.

He doesn’t feel any better.

9-1-1 | 9-1-1 | 9-1-1

Walking into the living room to see Maddie’s luggage packed and waiting by the door is a sucker punch to the gut. It’s the cherry on top of his rapidly melting ice-cream sundae. It’s the straw that breaks the camel’s back – or maybe just his own fragile heart.

However, it’s seeing Maddie’s sad, pensive face (the same face that led to, “Maybe you’re better off with them, Evan. At least I’m not holding you back anymore.”) that takes his broken heart and really shatters it into a million little pieces.

(If he were honest with himself, he’d acknowledge the fact that his broken heart was shattered a long time ago, and all he’d really done is glued the pieces together into a flimsy facsimile of what it had been.

But he’s a demigod. Denial is stronger than the truth.)

“At least I’m not holding you back anymore,” she’d said right before she’d left him behind.

He mentally prepares himself for what’s coming before he’s able to ask, “Leaving already?” His tongue feels like sandpaper against the roof of his mouth. He’s not ready; she doesn’t look ready either.

“The road ahead awaits,” she says with faux cheer. The entire time he’s been in the room with her, she hasn’t looked at him. Not once.

Part of him wants to snap at her for it – to demand that if she’s going to leave him again she needs to say it to his face and not the living room wall.

But there’s another more mature, more tempered, side of him that tells him to wait. Slow down. Don’t jump off the handle.

“You know why my dad has two faces?” a bright voice rings in the back of his mind.

“To show paths or whatever,” he’d said disinterestedly.

The voice, her voice, giggles. “That’s what a lot of people think, but they’re wrong. My dad looks to the future and the past. The beginning and end.” 

In his mind’s eye, he sees her face – young, bright, cheerful – and his chest hurts.

“We’re so focused on the future. What’s the world going to look like after the war? What’s going to happen when we win, and Olympus is gone?”

So he listens. “I’m more concerned with the road behind you.”

“My dad has two faces because the Romans understood that we should look at the past as much as we look to the future. You never know what might come back to help you or hurt you.”

He quietly walks around the side of the couch so that she can see him out of the corner of her eye. “Maddie, what really happened with Doug? Why are you running away from him?”

She flinches, her leg muscles tensing like she’ll move any second, and Buck is reminded of a scared rabbit that’s ready to flee at a moment’s notice.

Another voice – male, tense, worried – speaks in his memories, “I never know when she’s going to come after me again. It could be in five minutes. It could be in five years. I think that’s more torturous than when she’s actively hunting me – the waiting, knowing that she’s going to come back someday.”

Maddie shakes her head. “No. I’m not gonna bring my little brother into this.”

Alabaster’s exhausted green eyes had stared listlessly into his coffee as he’d said, “The only thing keeping me going is knowing I’m not alone.”

“Standing in between you and anyone who thinks they can hurt you is exactly where I want to be standing,” he says firmly, banishing Alabaster back to his memories. He steps forward and sits himself down on the coffee table just to the left side of her so that she still has the choice to look at him, but she can’t entirely ignore him, either.

He waits for a few moments to give her some time to respond, but when no response comes, he gets straight to the point: “Maddie, are you in some kind of danger?”

Maddie looks up, but her eyes skitter over every wall and surface of the apartment rather than look at Buck as she says, “The stuff that Mom and Dad hated about him, that you picked up on even as a teenager, it all got worse.”

“He’s getting worse. He’s not the same guy we followed – you see that, don’t you? You can’t be that blind, Ev.”

His stomach rolls at the implications of what she’s being so careful not to say. She’s dancing around it all so carefully, and it hurts to hear.

“Much worse over the last year or so, and when I threatened to leave, he threatened to kill me.” She finally looks at him, tears in her eyes, and Evan’s entire body blazes hot with anger. “And he meant it,” she admits.

“This is what happens to deserters!” Thorne had shouted over the shocked cries of the crowd. Evan had done his best to hide his disgust as the boy – barely even eleven – had been ripped apart by the hellhounds in the arena. “Let this be a warning: Kronos demands loyalty. Loyalty will be rewarded. Betrayal will bring death.”

The anger fades into sadness at the memory as Maddie continues her outpouring of everything she’s been keeping bottled inside since she’s arrived.

“Why don’t you just leave?” someone had asked him once a long time ago aboard the Princess Andromeda. “Come back with us when we’re done.” 

Evan had laughed darkly. “It’s not so simple as running,” he’d said, “you don’t just leave. Not here.”

“But leaving Camp was easier?”

“– it’s like, you can’t even believe it’s happening,” Maddie finshes.

“But you broke free,” the Luke in his memories and the Buck of today say in tandem. “You’re here now, and I’m proud of you.”

And di immortals, does it hurt to say. Forget the rough talk with Eddie and Cap. This? This is so much harder. It’s like he’s staring at himself from fifteen years ago: exhausted, angry, ashamed, guilt-ridden, and horrified that it had taken him so long to realize that he’d stuck with something unforgivable until it had truly broken him.

“But now is not the time to be alone, alright?” Evan says with a small smile. He pours his love and affection into every word in the hopes that she’ll hear him and understand. “So-so-so,” the words tumble out of his mouth now, incoherent and stumbling in that way that he’d fought to get rid of during his time with the Titans, “you should stay here. I-I got plenty of room, and if he comes looking, you’ve got a trained demigod fighting for you. I’ve got weapons that can hurt mortals, too – I don’t keep them with me all the time, but I can start. And I know a lot of cops.”

Maddie shakes her head. “He won’t. He doesn’t know you live here. He doesn’t know what you do.” I made sure of that, goes unsaid, and Buck feels a surge of affection for his wicked smart sister at the thought that even when she was doing her best to take care of herself in a terrible situation, she was protecting him the whole time. “It’s a real benefit to being married to somebody who doesn’t ask any questions.” She grins weakly. “He doesn’t even know the family secret.”

Buck blinks with surprise. “Really?” he asks incredulously. “But it’s tradition –"

She shakes her head. “Mom refused to tell him. She said he’d never know, not if she couldn’t trust him with it.” She puts a hand over Buck’s and gently squeezes. “Imagine if he’d gotten you to use your gift – he’d make you do awful things with it. I couldn’t let that happen, and Mom and Dad weren’t going to let it happen either.”

“I don’t think I have to imagine it,” Buck admits sadly.

Maddie’s eyebrow shoots up. “What did you do?”

“I joined the Titans.” He shakes his head. “But that doesn’t matter right now. What matters is that you can start over here, with me.” He smiles softly and pulls her hand into his. “You already said he knows nothing about me, and we’re close enough to New Rome that I can hide you there if he comes looking.”

A brief look of consideration flits across her face, and Buck pushes the advantage quickly. “I can help you get a great nursing job at one of the hospitals here in the city –"

“No,” Maddie interjects. “I miss helping people, but I can’t do that job every day – looking over my shoulder wondering who’s going to walk in the front door…”

“You’re right,” Buck says with a frown. “It’s the first place he’d go looking, and it’s not secure enough.” He sorts through all the places in his mind where there’d be work for Maddie to do that would be fulfilling, but still secure enough that Doug couldn’t easily get to her if he came looking and Buck was on shift.

Maddie isn’t the first responder “type”, hospitals have open door policies for a reason, and being a public servant is too… public. She needs something with restricted access where she can still –

“I can’t get through security without my badge, Buck. We’ve got to find it!” Abby had said one morning he’d come over to pick her up for work. “Someone would have to come down to get me, and Josh will just wheedle at me all day about losing it and the security risk and –"

Buck grins. “I think I might have an idea.”

9-1-1 | 9-1-1 | 9-1-1

Three hours later – after Maddie and Buck have done extensive amounts of “Buckley research binging” and gotten through at least a dozen different application forms – Maddie is officially in the application pool for being hired as a dispatcher, and Buck has a headache.

“Who’d have thought Barnes and Noble would have so many books on becoming a dispatcher?” he grouses tiredly, dropping his head into his hands with a loud sigh. Becoming a 9-1-1 Dispatcher for Dummies rests innocently on the table in front of him, but Buck knows the truth: it’s a weapon of mass destruction cleverly disguised as a cheerfully bound yellow paperback book.

Maddie grins. “It’s not my fault you don’t own a computer,” she chides cheerfully. “Googling is so much easier than buying books.”

“Yeah, but ‘Googling’ – and I can’t believe that’s a word, by the way – brings monsters. I’d rather not be cyclopes food, thank you,” he replies hotly.

Maddie gathers her forms into her hands and stands from the table. “We’ll have to go back to the library tomorrow and scan these into the computer so I can submit them. Maybe we can pick up a new phone and laptop for me so that I’m not relying on rainbows and spray bottles to contact you if something happens.”

Buck groans. “So long as I don’t have to touch it,” he says pointedly. “And there’s nothing wrong with Iris Messages, they’re perfectly reliable.”

“Yeah, if you have drachmae and a rainbow, but those can be hard to come by.” Maddie huffs. “Do you even look at your phone?” She pulls his phone from her pocket – he’d given it to her earlier just in case – and fidgets with the top of it, opening it slightly and letting it snap closed on its own.

“When I need to.” He gathers the discarded books, five in total, and takes them over to the bookshelf by the front door. He’s not sure what he’s going to do with them. Buck doesn’t really have a need for books about a job he’s not planning on applying for any time soon. He doesn’t want to just throw them away, either.

Maybe he’ll donate them when they drop by the library tomorrow. He’s got the day off anyway.

9-1-1 | 9-1-1 | 9-1-1

The scent of freshly ground coffee wafts into his nose. He’s standing behind the counter of a familiar coffee shop. He glances down and sees the muted, flickering image of a barista apron and jeans covering his pajamas. He’s back in Denver from the looks of things.

A young man with shaggy brown hair and green eyes sits across from him. On the stool to the left sits a man with features that seem to shift like they’re made of mist – one second, he’ll have dark brown hair that’s receding, the next he’ll have long copper-colored hair that reaches to his shoulders. His eyes constantly shift colors, like he can’t decide what they should be.

Mistform – a rare, powerful form of magic that only a powerful magician could pull off.

“Baster,” Buck addresses the young man. He looks better than the last time Buck had seen him. His clothes are clean, without any tears or patches. He looks like he’s eaten and slept in the past forty-eight hours, and he’s not nearly as fidgety.

This isn’t a memory dream. The details are too hazy. The world outside the coffee shop’s windows is a cloudy grey, some of the tables are half-formed, more than one chair is just floating with no legs.

The dream is missing so many small details that someone in a hurry wouldn’t think to put together.

He glances at the mistform sitting beside him and nods in acknowledgement. “Dr. Claymore.”

“Howard,” the mistform responds. “I find that Dr. Claymore is too recognizable these days. I only use that name when I’m performing research for Alabaster.”

Buck shrugs. “Sure thing, but I’m not calling you Howard, either. Too weird. I’ll just call you Doc.” He leans against the countertop. “So, what’d you bring me here for?” he asks, refusing to beat around the bush.

Alabaster, predictably, smirks and rolls his eyes. “Of course, you’d figure it out without me telling you,” he says. “Never could get one passed you, could I?”

“You’ve gotten me more than once, if I remember right,” Buck replies. “But you have to admit, this isn’t your best work.” He nods to one of the tables at the back of the shop with his head. “Really? A table stuck in the wall?”

Alabaster chuckles. “You’re not entirely wrong,” he says, glancing to the side at his partner. “I was in a hurry. The spell was taking too long. I’ve been trying for days, but you’ve got a weird schedule these days.” He sends Buck a curious glance. “You’re not on the run again, are you? I thought your situation was fixed after the earth bitch croaked?”

“That ‘earth bitch’ isn’t dead, Baster. She’s just asleep,” Buck says bitterly. “And no, I’m not on the run anymore. The gods lifted my exile after Gaia.” He pulls himself off the countertop and sighs. “You could have had yours lifted, too, if you’d joined us.”

“And fight for the immortal mafia? You’re crazy,” Alabaster retorts. “Still doesn’t explain your weird schedule. I used to be able to get ahold of you much more easily, even when you were globetrotting.” He crosses his arms over his chest. “You’re good with words, Ev, but you can’t dance around me. You know it.”

Buck bites back a groan and waves his hand. “I’m working a job with a weird shift schedule. Trying to live a normal life away from gods and monsters, y’know?” He’s not sure why, but he feels oddly protective of his whereabouts, even with Alabaster. He likes his little life. It’s exciting, and he feels like he makes a difference without having to rely on the Olympians and all the problems that come with them.

Bringing Alabaster into that feels… wrong.

“Well, that ‘normal life’ has managed to catch someone’s attention,” Alabaster warns him. He motions to Dr. Claymore, and the man pulls a piece of paper from his body. He lays it out on the table, waves his hand over it, and suddenly, a map of the West Coast appears above the paper. Alabaster waves his hand, and a series of red, pink, and purple dots appear on the surfaces of Nevada, Oregon, and California.

“That’s a new one,” Buck comments idly, watching some of the dots slowly move across the map. One dot jumps directly from Oregon into northern California, which earns Alabaster a raised eyebrow. “Wanna explain?”

“It’s a map of the West Coast,” Alabaster explains helpfully.

Buck gasps in mock surprise, “Really? I thought it was the Midwest.” He really lets his dry sarcasm soak into the words and rolls his eyes when Alabaster scowls at him.

“Shut up,” he snaps. “I was getting there.” He coughs into his hand pointedly. “Anyway, the dots are different concentrations of Mist that I’m picking up in different areas – I tweaked Lamia’s tracking spell a little. Not as effective, but it works.”

“Wow,” Buck says softly. He's not a magician, but he knows how difficult it is to alter an already incredibly powerful and well-established spell like that one. Alabaster's gotten stronger in the last couple of years. “Could I get one of these?”

“I wish, but it requires a powerful source of mist to get it to work,” Alabaster explains. “I’d give you one if I could, believe me.” He shakes his head. “Back to the map. Red is enough Mist for a monster or two. Pink is for a large group – monsters that move in packs. Purple is for Labyrinth entrances and monster dens.”

Buck startles from his examination from the map. “Whoa, wait. The Labyrinth?” he asks incredulously. “I thought that collapsed with when Daedalus died?”

“Someone on Gaea’s side brought it back,” Alabaster says, his eyes narrowed in thought. “I thought you knew about it?”

Buck scoffs. “I wish I had – I traveled across the US by bus to get to Camp Half-Blood with the others.”

Alabaster smirks. “It’s not the same Labyrinth we entered way back then. That one at least made it clear it was trying to kill you at every turn.”

Dr. Claymore huffs. “No, it’s more subtle than that. It pretends like it’s guiding you, taking you where you want to go, and then it leads you right to where you least want to be.” He groans. “It sent us straight to Lamia once. Not my favorite adventure.”

“So it’s nice about killing you?” Buck asks.

Alabaster looks at the map thoughtfully. “No, I wouldn’t say that much,” he replies. “I would say it’s more like the Labyrinth doesn’t try to kill you itself and lets everything else try to kill you instead.” He shrugs. “It probably gets a kick out of luring unsuspecting demigods and monsters to their deaths under the pretense of being helpful.”

“I uh… hm.” Buck points to the map with a finger in an attempt to get back on track. “So, the teleporting red dot is…?”

“A monster that went through the labyrinth, most likely,” Dr. Claymore says. “And more of them are coming.”

Alabaster nods. “That’s why you’re here. Monsters seem to be coming to LA, or at least, they’re headed that way.” He levels Buck a shrewd look. “You may be avoiding the topic of your current whereabouts, but I do know that you’re in LA. I still keep tabs on those of us who’ve survived since Manhattan – I know what city you’re in, even if I don’t know what you’re doing.”

Buck swallows thickly. That knowledge makes him more than a little uncomfortable. “Great,” he says quietly. “And I suppose the others know too?”

Alabaster waves his hand. “No. I wouldn’t do that, Ev. You’re off living your sweet little mortal life. I’m not going to ruin it by sending our old teammates to your front door.” He leans onto the counter and smirks. “Though, Sonia has been asking about you recently. She’s as curious about what you’re up to as I am.”

The thought of Sonia, loud, brash, destructive Sonia, crashing into his station on a whim sends a wave of anxiety through him. “Di immortals, Alabaster, I swear –“

“Oh, don’t worry about it,” Alabaster says with a chuckle. “Howard would never let me do that. He always squawks something about ‘consent’ and ‘stalking’ when I bring it up.”

“Because tracking people without their consent is considered wrong and stalking behavior,” Dr. Claymore says with exasperation that sounds like he’s rehashing an old argument. “In the US –“

“The US government doesn’t really have jurisdiction over myths and magic,” Buck interrupts. “But I have to ask, do the others know?”

“Most of them. The one’s I’ve been able to get ahold of, anyway,” Alabaster replies easily. “Sonia, Lou, Tanner, Kellyn, most of my siblings – but Hecate kids are easier to contact than most. We’re all so connected to the mist, it’s as simple as stepping into a dream rather than crafting a whole reality. Sonia’s on the easier side for the same reason.”

“I thought Sonia –“

Alabaster’s eyes crinkle at the corners with silent amusement. “I can summon the projection when it’s active. No dreaming required.” He shrugs. “When you’re practicing your abilities all the time, they grow. You know that as well as I do – if you practiced…” He trails off, letting buck fill in the rest.

Buck’s stomach twists. “If I practiced, I’d never forgive myself,” he says dryly. “I don’t use it anymore. You know that.”

Dr. Claymore nods, conjuring a notebook from his body the same way he had the map. “I see, so you choose, as a moral point, not to use your gifts from your mother?”

Buck’s mouth curls down at the edges without his input. “I don’t like the idea of controlling people to get what I want,” he mutters. “People don’t deserve that.”

“That’s not what you said during the war,” Alabaster points out without any heat. His voice oozes practicality and careful logic rather than judgement – classic ‘Baster’.

“The war ended thirteen years ago,” Buck snaps more out of frustration than anything else. “People change in thirteen years.” He points at the map and levels Alabaster a heated glare. “So, are you going to tell me what’s going on or not? If not, I’d like you to send me back, please.”

Dr. Claymore snorts. “He does have a point, Alabaster,” he chides. “Maybe we should get to the point?”

Alabaster sighs heavily. “Fine, fine.” He looks Buck squarely in the eye. “Something’s happened in LA, something big.” He points at the map, and suddenly it shifts to a larger image of the entire continental United States. I’ve been tracking this big Mist surge to the past three or four years. It’s traveled from Texas to the Middle East, then back to Texas. My guess is mortal military. That’s the only organization I can think of that’s active in that region from the US that could potentially have demigods in it. The Legion still hasn’t made many expeditions to Europe, Africa, and beyond out of fear, and gods know the Greeks aren’t organized enough to do anything either.”

He rocks his stool onto its back legs and lets the front ones fall with a loud thump onto the floor. “Then the surge in the Middle East exploded, dimmed, and moved from there back to Texas. It was like a star going supernova or something. A few months later it was back and just as strong. Then it moved to LA.”

Eddie, Buck thinks darkly, rubbing his wrist without realizing he’s doing it.

Alabaster’s eyes narrow. “You know about it,” he says matter-of-factly.

“Let me guess, the surge exploded again before going out completely?” Buck asks. At Dr. Claymore’s silent nod, he sighs. “Yeah, that’s my fledgling,” he says quietly.

“Fledgling what, demigod?” Alabaster asks. “No demigod has that level of protection.”

“And yet, this one did.” Buck rubs his face tiredly with his hand. “So you’ve been tracking a fledgling.”

“Apparently.” Alabaster looks at the map and frowns deeply. “If your fledgling’s managed to catch my attention from the other side of the country, you they’ve probably caught the attention of things a lot worse than a curious Hecate kid.” He points at the general area of LA and throws Buck a look of concern. “Whatever kind of demigod they are – I’m assuming you don’t know that yet – their awakening was powerful enough to trigger something. Every monster and pack on the West Coast is making their way to California. I wouldn’t be surprised if they ended up in LA.”

Buck grimaces. “Di immortals,” he curses angrily. He’s really fucked up – more than he’d thought.

“Evan, your boss is calling you,” Dr. Claymore says urgently.

Both Buck and Alabaster look at the mistform in surprise, but the mistform himself looks just as shocked as they are.

Alabaster turns back to Buck, his previously green eyes a glassy grey. “Evan, you have to wake up,” he says in a voice that’s too feminine to be Alabaster’s.

But the coffee shop’s already fading into streaks of brown, green, and grey.

When he comes back to himself, he returns to the sensation of someone shaking his shoulder none-too-gently. “Damnit Evan,” the owner of the hand curses with frustration, “wake up.”

Evan’s eyes snap open, his hand coming up to grab the person’s wrist instinctively. He quickly releases it when he comes eye to eye with Maddie.

Maddie in rumpled PJs. Maddie with a seriously bad case of bedhead. Maddie, who’s shaking. Maddie, who has his phone clutched tightly in her hand.

She looks at him with wide, worried eyes. “Ev, it’s your boss. He says there’s something wrong with Eddie.”