Archive of Our Own

Look, I didn't want to be half-blood.

It's complicated. Let me start over.

Hello, my name is Percy Jackson, son of Poseidon and Saviour of Olympus.

I'm sure you've heard of me. You must have had, if you're here, today, with me.

I'm confident in the fact that you see me as something somewhat close to a god, I bet you've heard the legends, the myths, the stories.

The reality is much different, you'll come to learn. Like I have, many times.

The truth, as they say, is not a very pretty thing at all.

"You are a half-blood."

"You are a demigod."

"You are a son of Poseidon."

Are they scared to tell me that I am also fated to a life that will only end in dark loneliness and crippling isolation, too?

"The Greek Gods are real."

"Mythical creatures are real."

"Olympus is real."

Is that their way of sugar coating the truth?

By blinding me with what is ‘real’ to distract me from what isn't? Because my life isn't real, my reality isn’t real.

Nothing is real.

I remember the first time all of it was revealed to me. When I faced the Minotaur, and when he took my mother's life. She was driving me to what I thought was an innocent summer camp when it happened.

It was just the two of us, until it wasn't.

He surged out of nowhere, and for that moment, we were three, and I watched, paralyzed, as he killed Sally Jackson, the only person who had been there for me my whole life. I saw his claw rip through her stomach, I felt the pounding of rain drum on my cheeks as it masked my streaming tears, I heard her agonized scream ring in my ears, I tasted blood fill my mouth as I bit my tongue to refrain from falling apart.

We were back to two. And once again, until we weren't.

I took one terrified look at my mother's mangled, twisted body and the red trails her blood left on the wet ground, and I felt rage like never before.

The Minotaur was dead before I could even properly register that she was gone.

And so now we were down to one.

Me.

All alone.

There was no clock to rewind, no hands to tick back, and no timeline to rewrite. Nothing to reverse.

There is nothing that will bring her back.

No tears will heal the wound spreading red on her abdomen or tend to the matching chasm that has cracked its way through what is now my heart of stone. No amount of regret will change what is now set in the stars and etched in my soul.

Everything after that is fuzzy. There was the camp, and I woke up in an infirmary bed. Someone took care of me, although who it was exactly is blurry, and all I can recall is their kindness towards me, their short dark hair and how they told me that I drooled in my sleep

But after that, I don't remember much other than insufferable pain. I vowed to never feel pain like that ever again. Pain is suffering, and I will not suffer. Pain is emotion, and so I will not feel.

I will be numb.

So they told me the truth, stories, how I was special. So they also told lies, did they not? Do they really think I am special, or is that what they are trying to believe? That I will come save them, that I will be the heroic saviour they have so long awaited?

So be it.

What else do I have to do anyway?

My fingers grip on the ledge of the cliff is slipping, and Tartarus’s endless abyss stretched out below me. My palms are clammy, sweaty and slippery, and I know I will not make it.

I will fall.

Maybe I could try, maybe I could try to haul myself up, pull with all the little strength I have left to hoist my body up onto safe ground. Maybe. But I am exhausted. I am tired of saving myself, I am tired of trying.

I know I could make it.

But I don’t.

I let go.

The fall is peaceful.

It’s long, and I pass out somewhere in the middle, welcoming the dark. Any kind of rest is a treasure made of gold for now. I don’t care how, as long as I cannot feel. But eventually, I will wake.

I wonder when will come the time in which I will not.

I drift off again, ignoring the constant trembling of my body, but I am used to the absence of warmth and comfort. The tremors and shaking are just causes of my lack of sleep, or maybe it’s Tartarus.

Either way, I don’t care, not really.

When I hit the ground, I almost scream out in pain as my shoulder collides harshly against rough, jagged rocks, but the shock is somehow familiar, so I just bite my lip and push myself up, wincing. I walk for what seems to me as a long time, possibly days or maybe even weeks, as down in the dark depths of the world time is impossible to keep track of.

There is only night, after all. Day has long only been something of the above.

My skin is split open with blisters and my tongue is parched from dehydration, but I forge on. I am not reluctant to die, but I will not do so here.

I will not suffer and fall in the hell of the real world, only to reach the afterlife and join the same place once again.

I am a monster, after all. There is no denying it.

I know that I am no hero.

Elysium is a faraway dream I will never attain, but I am okay with that. I deserve it, so it is only right.

That is the one truth I will agree with, the one truth concerning which my opinion will never change.

When I cross the paths with the goddess Akhylys, I react instinctively. I do not think.

I do not regret either.

Her wispy hands of smoke immediately fly to her throat, choking on her own misery and tears. I can see her blood bulge and shift through her translucent skin, and I long to make her veins pop.

She is reduced to her weakest form within minutes, almost gone, and I only stop as she pleads to me for mercy with the promise of opening the Doors of Death for me, if only I let her go.

So I do.

I will not die in this hell.

Shame, her blood and tears felt good under my grip.

Maybe now, I will be the puppeteer instead of the puppet.

Gaia stares down at me. “What?”

My gaze pierces hers defiantly, and the two of us are alone on this stretch of land, her humanoid figure of clumped earth towering above mine. “I said, you need a sacrifice.”

She blinks.

I elaborate. “I will be your sacrifice.”

Her lips of soil shift into a demonic grin, and I extend my hand to hers.

“Swear on the River Styx.”

Even if it will not affect the outcome either way, she still scowls at the demand, like the extra precaution is a nuisance and a waste of time. “Fine. I swear on the River Styx, to accept Percy Jackson as sacrifice, leaving the world in peace, and return to my slumber.” Her voice seems to shimmer, and the oath between us has formed.

I nod.

She unfolds her curled fingers towards mine, but then hesitates, her black pupils scrutinising me closely. “Don’t you want to live? Loyalty or noble acts have never been your strong point. Aren’t you even a bit scared of dying?” She smiles wide again, like her jab is a triumph— a win against me.

But I smirk back, tilting my head as the last piece of my heart drowns along with the rest of me in the River Styx. “On the contrary, I’ve been waiting for it ever since I turned thirteen years old.”

And then, I take her hand, and everything seems to snap together.

I sink through the ground, and I drown right there, in Gaia’s soil.

It’s like back then, with me and the Minotaur, when we were just two— except this time, between me and Gaia, it’s hard to tell who is the true monster.

And once again, we are two, until we are not.

Because here I am.

The Great Percy Jackson, dead.

“Percy Jackson… Hmm.”

I — or is it my ghost? — stands lazily in front of the judges of the Underworld as they peer down at me, reading my files and information on what are —for some reason— 10th Generation Apple iPads.

Finally, the one in the middle pushes his glasses higher up his nose and leans forward. “Well, you’ve done a plenty load of bad things, have you not?”

I hang my head, agreeing, but my face is still blank, numb and void of the emotions I long ago threw away along with my heart of gold.

It is stone now.

“However, you have given up your life for the well-being of the world, and you have been through a lot, as I can see. You are a genuine person, Percy Jackson.”

My head snaps up.

“Fields of Asphodel.”

I gape at him, and he just offers me a small smile. “Ah, so you can have actual facial expressions. Now shoo.”

And then, I’m in the Fields, and I know what will happen.

I fade away.

I blink.

I fade away, I think firmly this time.

I blink once again.

I fade away.

Why am I not fading away?

I look around. Everyone is blurry, faceless. Roaming, never to find a destination and never to live again.

But I’m still me.

My orange t-shirt has lost its orange hue but it is still there, my features are prominent and I can think. I am feeling.

The crowd moves around me, while I freeze in shock.

It’s been what feels like an eternity of wandering, trying to find the exit. I am still the only one like this, and I still have not figured out why.

But even if I am different, I am still dead.

(Or at least— I was, until I crashed into you. I remember…)

I sigh, looking around once again to find the robotic movements of the mass of ghosts dispersing, before turning—only to smash into something. Hard.

That can’t be right.

I can't touch anymore. Nothing in the Fields is solid except for the ground, all the ghosts are just wisps of smoke I pass through easily. So what is this?

It’s a human.

Black tousled hair, chocolate brown eyes, long lashes, the thin frame of someone who hasn’t eaten in days, eyebags of one that hasn’t slept much either, and sharp, pale features.

Familiar, but the memory slips from my grasp just as Tartarus’s ledge once did.

His shocked expression matches mine perfectly, and so do his next words, because we say them at the same time. “You’re real?”

We both stare at each other for a moment, but I collect myself faster and clear my throat. “Well, technically, I’m dead.” I look him up and down. “But you’re not.”

“You’re Percy Jackson?”

My expression flickers in surprise, and he notices without fail. “You are.”

I do not reply, but he is smart to take it as a confirmation. However, I almost yank away when he grabs my wrist, the warmth of his touch shocking me like nothing before.

If I think about it too hard, I haven’t had physical touch in a long, long time.

His name is Nico Di Angelo, I came to learn.

And as he drags me out of Apsodel and into the open, I come to find that I am not dead after all.

I ask him why, but he just looks at me, smiles and says, “Because you deserve to live.”

It is not an answer, but he has a nice smile, and he tells me I do so too.

I realise that I must have just had, and that shocks me too.

Because I haven’t smiled in a long, long time either.

One day, long after I left the Fields of Asphodel, Nico Di Angelo told me that it was he who nursed me back to health during that long week spent in the infirmary after my mother’s death.

He’s the only person in my life now, but I’m okay with that.

Step by step, and I’ll start with him.

Truth was hard.

Hell was hard.

Death was hard.

But he is easy. Easy to be with, easy to laugh with, easy to love.

So I guess that we are back to two now.

But this time, there is no “until we aren’t”.

This time, it is just us two.

That, I know, will not change.