Chapter Text
i. The Double Life of Véronique (1991), dir. Kryzysztof Kieślowiski / ii. Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid's Tale / iii. The Perks of Being a Wallflower (2012), dir. Stephen Chbosky / iv. Scrapper (2023), dir. Charlotte Regan / v. Sappho, Come Close / vi. Anna de Noailles, Dazzled, Precise / vii. Blueming (2022), dir. Hwang Da-Seul
PURE CHROMATICITY!
( ❝ ever think you could change 'em? ❞ )
AN ARTISTIC TRIUMPH!
( ❝ no, luke. i've never thought that. ❞ )
━━━━━ ART CREATES MADNESS; or madness creates art; or maybe art and madness have always existed as one, and they've only become separate entities because the mad never admit they're insane. That is how it typically goes — if you tell yourself something enough times, you start to believe the lie yourself. You become deluded by your own lie; the lie becomes your reality.
Besides, it wasn't like Frankie would ever find out the correlation between madness and art. Mr. D hates it when she asks, threatening to turn her mad so "she could figure out herself." But the thing is, if the makers of art are mad, then Frankie is already insane. But she didn't want to admit that there was a possibility — the mad never want to admit they are mad, you know.
However, Frankie did often wonder if she was doomed by her artistry. There are many tales of the artist becoming the art; Prometheus Bound, written by Aeschylus hundreds — thousands — of years ago. Prometheus created humans, in a way — he gave them fire, and that fire led to every artist in today's world. Isn't that what artists want most? To create something so great it can live beyond its creator? And Prometheus did that. He created humanity by giving them fire. He created artists.
He also suffered creating the art, as did many artists. By Zeus, Prometheus suffered eternal imprisonment — the Titan was chained to a mountain in the Caucasus, and he was forced to endure daily the suffering of having his liver pecked out by this huge, ferocious vulture. What artist doesn't want to create something so — thought-provoking that they are to suffer from its creation?
Prometheus wasn't the only tragic Greek tale — no, there are many tragic Greek tales, and many of them are tragic because they create — and isn't that all of what art is? Creating? Innovating? There was Medea and the slippery, slippery slope of her path of cultivating revenge — cultivating; creating; revenge is an art, even if it is a dangerous one. Medea created — cultivated — her future; her vision of what she wanted to see. In a sick way, Medea was a writer — only of a horrible story. A story where she killed her husband and her own kids.
Art is to tell a story. And every artist wants their story to last for the ages.
But maybe all of this was Frankie's justification. A way to justify the tragic ending she knew she would have. She thought her death — one she was sure would happen sooner rather than later, especially as a demigod — would make her worthwhile — and not only herself, but her art; her paintings; Frankie's way of cultivating. However, she didn't want her art to end with the quest to retrieve a golden apple from the Garden of the Hesperides. One; where's the glory in repeating what others have done? Hercules had done it thousands of years before, and his story hadn't been forgotten over the thousands of years. It was the hero's eleventh labor, and even then, it wasn't his most memorable one; why would it be any different for Frankie to do it? (It wouldn't be any different, that's the thing.) Two; it wasn't even Frankie's quest — it was Luke Castellan's quest, given to him by his father, Hermes.
Where was the glory in being told to go on this quest that wasn't even her own? There was no glory. Frankie didn't even need glory. She was fine being another "child of some unimportant god." She was fine having people assume she had nothing to offer Camp Half-Blood besides to occasional free Iris Message (a curiosity of being Iris's daughter) — but she would like people to acknowledge her for her talent with painting. Not even just paints or paintings — colors. She saw everything as colors, beyond the obvious, surface-level hues. She saw the grass as more than just green. Green grass wasn't just green grass — it was the color of life, it was the proof that things could grow, and it was the color to assured people that the ground would always be beneath their feet.
It was like the colors danced on her skin. The way water laid on something that it was repellent to — there was this thin layer between her skin and any color she drew out. She saw — and sometimes felt — the chromaticity; the intensity; of these colors. Reds burned; blues cooled; greens enveloped; yellows glittered; purples radiated.
Maybe Luke saw that, too. He was her head counselor, after all. Or maybe it was the Fates. They had pity Frankie would never be anything more than some failed, wannabe artist they would take her string of ife and twirl it with this quest. She didn't want pity; she didn't want a quest either. She also didn't want — or need — to be admired for her art.
Good art took on a life of its' own, only Frankie worried art would consume her.
TO SEE COLOR, I SEE LIFE ...
FRANCES ❛FRANKIE❜ WARD
━━━━━━━━━ emilia jones!
🎨 daughter of iris, goddess of the rainbow!
LUKE CASTELLAN
━━ charlie bushnell!
🪽 son of hermes, god of travelers and thieves!
BUT YOU? IT'S BLACK AND WHITE.
as described! . . . katsuo yamamoto!
as described! . . . grover underwood!
as described! . . . annabeth chase!
as described! . . . clarisse la rue!
finn wolfhard! . . . connor stoll!
wyatt oleff! . . . travis stoll!
as described! . . . sherman yang!
max barczak! . . . lee fletcher!
as described! . . . michael yew!
malina weissman! . . . silena beauregard!
kiko mizuhara! . . . drew tanaka!
ryan potter! . . . ethan nakamura!
jonathan daviss! . . . charles beckendorf!
akira akbar! . . . beatriz díaz!
i. disclaimers! i own nothing in the percy jackson and the olympians universe besides frances ward, her story, and any other characters i have made, such as katsuo yamamoto or beatriz díaz. everything else you see in this book that is not original to this fanfiction belongs to rick riordan. all rights go to him besides frances ward and any other character i have made.
any gifs used in the book do not belong to me, they belong to the original creators. i have simply edited the size of them to fit what i want. the graphics, although, do belong to me. but the pictures in each graphic were sourced on pinterest and such — those individual pictures do not belong to me.
last thing, i swear — there will be main characters who die, non-canon character(s) specifically. you've been warned, and i put in bold so hopefully, this will be the thing that grabs your attention if not anything else. do not act blindsided when there are characters that die! i warned you!
ii. trigger warnings! this book will talk about and/or include cussing, the neglection of a child, mental illness (depression, anxiety, ptsd, etc.), death, gore, luke castellan (i know it's a fic for him leave me alone), daddy issues (kind of a joke, but hermes does suck ass in this), just a lot of family trauma in general (it is greek mythology, after all), and the regular percy jackson and the olympians themes that are present in the books.
do not read this book if any of that is triggering to you. reading this is not — and never will be — more important than you and your mental health!
iii. other things! if i get anything incorrect or come off as insensitive, please tell me and i'll absolutely fix my mistake!
also, don't steal! that's not cool. i'll find out and i'll make you ... take it down or something.
iv. other notes! i'm being irresponsible, you guys. i swore to myself i wasn't going to post anymore fics - let alone pjo fics - until i at least finished kingdom come ... but here we are!
i also swore i would never make a like fic. an angel has lost its wings today 😔 (it's me, i'm the angel.) in my defense, this doesn't end well for him!! (or frankie, or katsuo, or beatriz ...) and it also is a character study(?) in a way - "in a way" being frankie (and katsuo) watching and witnessing luke's "beginning of the end," his fall from grace essentially, his final push into his descent into villain-eryness (go with me on that one).
when i say i'm being irresponsible, i also mean it because I Haven't Planned :) vibes and vibes only (i'm going to be ripping my hair out and drowning in my own tears btw)