Chapter Text
The first thing I learned about being Percy Jackson was that his neck hurt on school buses. The second was that he was considerably shorter than I remembered.
I woke with my forehead pressed against cold glass while the floor vibrated beneath my feet. For several seconds I remained perfectly still, mostly because waking up somewhere unexpected was not entirely unusual for me. Death had a habit of depositing me back in the House in less-than-dignified positions, and I had long ago learned that it was sensible to establish which parts of me still worked before attempting anything ambitious.
This, however, was not the House. There were too many voices around me, for one thing, and none belonged to shades. Sunlight moved rhythmically across my closed eyelids while something large growled beneath the floor. Someone several seats away was laughing, another person was complaining about homework, and whatever I was sitting inside lurched violently enough to send my shoulder against the window.
I opened my eyes. Trees and buildings rushed past outside. For one brief and ridiculous moment, relief came first. I recognized the roads, the strange metal vehicles and the general architecture well enough to know where I was. Percy's world.
Then memory returned. The junction. Gold spreading through everything. Melinoë holding onto me as though physical strength alone could keep history from taking me away. Nico's shadows stretching backward instead of outward. Annabeth clinging to Percy while the Remnant calmly explained that it intended to use us as variables in some cosmic experiment.
Melinoë shouting across the divide at Percy.
Find Hecate! She'll kno—
And Percy, just before everything disappeared, giving me that tiny nod across the divide.
I sat upright much too quickly and immediately struck both knees against the seat in front of me. That was when I noticed my legs. They were much too short.
I stared down at faded blue trousers I had never owned, then turned my hands over and examined them. The fingers were smaller, the palms narrower, and none of the familiar marks from centuries of carrying Stygius remained. When I reached automatically toward my hip, my hand found nothing except clothing.
No sword. I was wearing shoes, with no heat around my feet. I flexed one ankle experimentally. Nothing happened.
"Percy?"
I froze. That voice I knew. I turned and found Grover sitting beside me, and for perhaps half a second, seeing him was the best thing that had happened since the Remnant began tearing history apart. He looked younger than I remembered, although that was difficult to judge with satyrs, and wore a knitted cap pulled low over where his horns should be. The anxious eyes, curly hair and general air of someone anticipating an environmental disaster were exactly right. “Grover,” I said.
His eyebrows pulled together. “Yeah?”
I exhaled, relieved despite myself. Someone familiar. Someone who knew Percy, who knew Camp, who had stood beside us only days ago—
“Are you okay, Percy?”
The relief vanished. I slowly turned toward the window. My reflection stared back from the glass: black hair, green eyes, Percy's face—only much younger. I had seen Percy Jackson exhausted, furious, soaked in two different versions of the Styx and laughing while explaining that a rubber ball constituted a perfectly acceptable method of bypassing Cerberus. This boy had years to go before any of that. "Oh," I said.
Grover leaned closer. “Oh what?”
I touched my cheek and watched the boy in the window do the same. “That's inconvenient.”
"What is?"
I looked around the vehicle properly for the first time. Children filled the seats around us, most dressed in similar uniforms. There were bags, notebooks and enough food wrappers to suggest we had been traveling for some time. Nobody carried weapons. Nobody was screaming. The Remnant was nowhere in sight.
A perfectly ordinary day, apparently, except for the fact that I had woken up inside my friend's childhood.
"How old am I?" I asked.
Grover stared at me. "Percy, did you hit your head?"
"Possibly. I experienced several things before waking that make a concussion seem comparatively pleasant, but I would still appreciate an answer."
His expression suggested this was not how Percy normally spoke. "You’re twelve."
I looked down at my hands again. Percy had not merely been moved somewhere else while I occupied his body. The Remnant had placed me years before the version of him I knew.
"How long have we known each other?"
Grover’s eyes widened. "Percy."
"Please answer."
"Since September."
I closed my eyes briefly. This body already had months of history with these people, and I remembered none of it.
"Where are we going?"
"The museum."
"Which museum?"
"The Metropolitan."
I waited for that to mean something. Grover watched me, his hands tightening around the straps of his bag.
"Okay. You're messing with me."
"I currently lack enough information to make a convincing joke." I pointed at a sign on the bus. "What is a Yancy?"
"Your school."
I looked around at my classmates again. At least I knew what we were doing here.
Grover leaned closer and lowered his voice. "What happened to you?"
"That is an extremely complicated question."
"Try."
Hello, Grover. We met in your future after I accidentally walked out of my Underworld and into yours. A damaged cosmic correction mechanism subsequently decided that Percy and I were similar enough to exchange places in history.
Somehow, I doubted that would improve matters. "I woke up a few minutes ago," I said instead.
"On the bus?"
"Yes."
"You were awake before that."
"That was not me."
Grover's eyes moved over my face as though he expected it to change. Then he leaned toward me and sniffed.
"You're doing that thing again," I said.
His expression went still. "What thing?"
"The smelling."
"Again?" he whispered.
I had said too much. "You have done it around me before."
"No, I haven't."
"Not yet."
The sound Grover made attracted two students' attention. He waved them away, then leaned so close his cap nearly brushed my forehead. "What do you mean, not yet?"
"I believe I mean exactly what I said."
"Percy."
"That's another problem."
"What is?"
"My name."
Before I could elaborate, a girl with red hair and freckles leaned over the seat in front of us.
"Jackson, are you practicing for the mental hospital?"
Grover sank beside me. I looked at her. "Excuse me?"
"Talking like a robot isn't going to make you smarter."
She waited. When I offered nothing, she rolled her eyes and turned back around.
"Friend?" I asked Grover.
"No. That's Nancy Bobofit."
"Excellent."
He studied me. "You really don't remember her?"
"No."
"Yesterday?"
"No."
"Mr. Brunner?"
I followed Grover's gaze toward the front of the bus and found a brown-bearded man sitting several rows ahead in a wheelchair, a bow case beside him. I recognized him immediately.
"Chiron?"
Grover went very still. "Who?"
I considered pretending I had misspoken, but I doubted either of us possessed the necessary acting ability.
"Never mind."
"No. Definitely not never mind. How do you know that name?"
I glanced toward the front again. Chiron looked younger only in the sense that the rest of the world around him did. The wheelchair disguise was surprisingly convincing, although knowing there should be half a horse attached somewhere made the illusion considerably stranger.
"I've met him," I said.
"You've been in his class all year."
"Not like that."
Grover stared at me. Then I made the mistake that ended any possibility of pretending this was ordinary memory loss.
"You're a satyr."
All the color disappeared from his face. "Don't say that."
"Why?"
"Because you're not supposed to know!"
Percy didn't know Grover was a satyr or Mr. Brunner was Chiron. Presumably he had never heard of Camp Half-Blood either. I leaned back into the seat and looked at my reflection.
Historical role origins have been located.
I had expected a significant battlefield, perhaps one of Percy's quests. Instead, the Remnant had sent me to the beginning of Percy becoming the person I knew.
Which meant that if the Remnant had done the same thing to Percy— I stopped. Melinoë. Mother. Father. The House. Was Percy standing somewhere in my body while everyone I loved looked at him and called him Zagreus? Did any of them remember me?
For the first time since waking, panic pushed hard enough against my chest that I had to deliberately slow my breathing. There was nothing I could do about Percy from a school bus. Think about the immediate problem. Mel would have told me to assess the situation before running headfirst into anything. Annabeth would have wanted evidence. Nico would have found some way to make the entire situation sound even more depressing.
Percy would probably have hit something. For now, I had Grover. He was still staring at me.
"You're really a satyr," I said more quietly.
His eyes closed. "Please stop saying that."
"And Chiron is pretending to be human."
"Stop knowing things."
"I would be delighted."
The Metropolitan Museum of Art was enormous, and I approved of it almost immediately. Percy's world had an interesting habit of constructing enormous buildings, filling them with objects from dead civilizations, then assigning people to explain why those objects mattered.
Compared with several modern customs Percy had explained to me, this seemed remarkably sensible. The school portion made less sense. Students moved in groups while adults repeatedly told them not to touch anything, which naturally caused several students to immediately attempt touching things.
Grover remained close enough that I suspected he had decided I was either ill, possessed or about to explode. Possibly all three. I was distracted by the labels. The letters shifted unpleasantly if I stared too long, as though they disliked remaining in the order somebody had assigned them. The Greek beneath one display remained perfectly stable. I read that without difficulty.
"Percy."
I looked up. Chiron—Mr. Brunner, apparently—was watching me from his wheelchair. He gestured toward a painted vase. “Would you care to tell the group what this scene depicts?”
Several students turned as I studied it. That, at least, was easy. “Kronos.”
Chiron's eyebrows rose. A few students laughed, but he did not. “Go on.”
I pointed toward the figures. “The overthrow of Ouranos. Kronos later becomes ruler, receives a prophecy that his own children will overthrow him, consumes most of them, fails to consume one, and eventually discovers that eating your heirs is not an effective long-term succession strategy.”
More laughter. Chiron's expression changed by only the smallest amount, but I noticed. “And how did Zeus ultimately defeat Kronos?”
That question was less amusing. The junction flashed through my memory: Kronos and Chronos tearing through one another, Percy recognizing one of them, a young man's face appearing beneath the Titan's, and Gigaros destroying them both. Percy had survived a war involving Kronos only weeks before we met. I knew the ending in fragments, not the history that led to it. “With help,” I said.
“From?”
“His siblings. The Cyclopes. The Hundred-Handed Ones. Allies he could not have won without.”
Chiron studied me for another moment before nodding. “Very good.”
As the group moved on, Grover leaned close. “You hate Greek mythology.”
“I assure you I do not.”
“Yesterday you called the homework 'a bunch of dead guys ruining everybody's lives.'”
“That remains a reasonably accurate summary.”
Grover stared at me. I smiled, and then Nancy Bobofit threw part of her sandwich into his hair. He flinched and quietly pulled the bread from his curls. "It's fine," he muttered.
"That did not appear accidental."
Nancy turned around. "What?"
I looked at the bread in Grover's hand. She followed my gaze.
She raised her eyebrows. “Wow, Jackson. Big words today.”
“I have been informed that I apparently attend this institution. I assume vocabulary is involved.”
Grover whispered my borrowed name in warning, but Nancy stepped closer. “What are you gonna do?”
"I haven't decided." She looked disappointed. I knew the type; some shades behaved similarly during security exercises. Throwing them into walls usually helped, although applying that solution to a schoolchild might create complications.
Nancy reached for another piece of food. Behind her, a ripple crossed the fountain despite the still air. I frowned, but before I could examine it, Nancy threw the food and the fountain exploded sideways.
Several gallons of water struck Nancy squarely in the back and soaked her from head to toe. She screamed, students scattered, and Grover jumped beside me. I was still staring at the fountain when she spun around. “JACKSON!”
I pointed at myself. “I did not touch you.”
“You did that!”
“I am several feet away.”
“You freak!”
A woman appeared behind her, thin, severe and dressed in black. She had the expression of someone who regarded the invention of children as a regrettable development.
"Mr. Jackson."
Something about her voice bothered me. Grover went rigid while Nancy attempted to look innocent.
"With me."
I glanced at Grover. He looked terrified.
"Who is she?"
Grover's mouth opened, but the woman answered before he could.
"Mrs. Dodds."
I frowned. "Do I know you?"
Several students laughed. Apparently that sounded like insolence. Mrs. Dodds did not appreciate it.
"You know me very well, Mr. Jackson."
I doubted that. Yet something beneath her face felt familiar. Not the features themselves, nor the voice. Something older, hidden beneath both.
"Now."
I glanced toward Chiron. He was speaking with another student, but his eyes flicked toward us for a fraction of a second. He had noticed. I followed Mrs. Dodds through one gallery, then another, until the sounds of the other students faded behind us. With every step I became increasingly aware that I was unarmed.
Mrs. Dodds finally stopped near a collection of ancient grave markers.
"Do you understand how much trouble you've caused?"
"No."
"You think this is a game?"
"I don't actually know what this is."
Her mouth tightened. "Your grades. Your behavior. Your disrespect. And now attacking another student."
"I did not attack Nancy."
"You expect me to believe the fountain moved on its own?"
"At present, yes."
Mrs. Dodds stepped closer. "And your pre-algebra?"
I paused. I had faced Hydras, Theseus, my father, Chronos and a cosmic mechanism attempting to rebuild history around me. Nobody had threatened me with pre-algebra before.
"I don't know what that is."
Mrs. Dodds stared. "What did you say?"
"I don't know what pre-algebra is."
Her expression became almost satisfied. "Oh, I think you've made that very clear all year."
Some form of school subject, then. Percy had neglected to mention it.
"I suspect we have more important problems."
"You have no idea."
The human performance disappeared from her eyes. I recognized the look of someone who had already decided violence was inevitable.
"Where is it?"
I went still. "Where is what?"
"You know perfectly well."
"I don't."
She stepped closer. "Do not play games with me, boy."
The air tightened. Her coat stretched into leathery wings, fingers lengthening into claws. Her face twisted into something older and crueler, so familiar that I forgot Percy, the Remnant and the absurdity of algebra.
I stared. She hissed. "Where is it?"
I barely heard the question. "Alecto?"
Her wings stilled. She kept her claws raised, but uncertainty crossed her face.
"How do you know that name?"
I nearly laughed. Alecto. One of the Furies. I had fought her more times than I could reasonably count. She had insulted me, threatened me, attempted to dismember me and once spent most of a battle complaining that her work would be considerably easier if I stopped returning from the dead. For one absurd second, seeing her felt like seeing home. "Alecto," I repeated.
Her claws lowered slightly. “Who told you?”
The relief disappeared. I studied her properly: the same mythological shape, a similar presence, but no recognition. My Alecto would already have insulted Father, questioned my intelligence and complained about whatever weapon I happened to be carrying. This one was looking at Percy's face. At a stranger. “Don't you know me?” I asked.
Her expression hardened. “I know exactly what you are.”
"No," I said quietly. Melinoë flashed through my mind. Mother. Father. The House. If Percy had awakened in my body, was Mel staring into my face while knowing immediately that her brother wasn’t behind it?
Alecto lunged. I moved automatically—or tried to. My mind ordered a dash. Percy's body took one ordinary step.
Her claws opened my shoulder. I hit the stone floor hard enough to lose my breath and stared at the blood running down my arm.
I had bled often enough before, but this was Percy's body, in Percy's world. I had no reason to believe my Styx could reach me here. If Alecto killed me, there might be no Pool waiting at the end of it. No second attempt.
Alecto smiled.
"Now. Where is it?"
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"Liar."
She came at me again.
This time I did not attempt to dash. I rolled aside instead, discovering immediately that Percy's body was lighter and faster in some ways while being much weaker in others. My shoulder screamed as I pushed myself upright beside a stone bench.
I had no Stygius. No Varatha. No Aegis. No Coronacht. Not even something blunt enough to be respectable. Alecto spread her wings.
"Your father should have taught you better."
That got my attention. "What about my father?"
She meant Percy's father. Something flew through the doorway.
"Percy!"
Chiron. A small object spun through the air. A pen. I caught it and stared. For roughly half a second, I was offended. Then recognition arrived.
"Oh."
Riptide. Percy had shown me the disguise at Camp. Apparently my objections to carrying a legendary sword as stationery had not changed history. Alecto dove, and I uncapped it.
Celestial bronze expanded into my hand. The blade felt wrong. At first I thought it was heavier than Stygius; then Alecto's claws struck Riptide hard enough to nearly tear it from my grip, and I realized the problem wasn't the sword. My arm was weaker. I staggered backward. She smiled. I did not. This was humiliating.
I knew how to use a sword. Knowing where a blade should go and convincing a twelve-year-old shoulder to put it there were very different problems. I parried her next strike too late. My wrist buckled, and another attack drove me backward. My instincts kept demanding strength, reach and reflexes I no longer possessed.
Alecto preferred the left claw first when closing distance, used her wings to assist the following step, and expected a smaller opponent to retreat. When she lunged, I stepped inside her reach instead. My shorter stride nearly ruined the timing, but I corrected and brought Riptide upward beneath her guard. She twisted quickly enough that the blade only opened her side. She screamed. I turned with the motion, but Percy's body moved too slowly.
Her wing caught me across the chest. The room flipped. I struck a display case hard enough to crack the glass behind me and slid down onto one knee, my ribs protesting.
Alecto stalked toward me. “You fight strangely.”
“So I'm discovering.”
“You are not trained.”
She hesitated. I stood, keeping Riptide raised. I could learn to use it, just as I was learning to use this body. I had fought injured, poisoned, exhausted, burned and cursed. I could adapt.
As Alecto attacked again, I shortened my steps and lowered my center of balance. If Percy's shoulder couldn't drive the sword the way mine once had, I would let the movement do the work instead. Her claws came down, and I caught the strike with Riptide, redirecting it rather than trying to stop it outright. As her second claw swept toward my head, I turned with the motion and let it pass beside me. That left an opening, and I brought Riptide around.
Alecto saw it too late. Celestial bronze passed cleanly through her, and her eyes widened. For one instant we stood almost face-to-face, both equally surprised by the result. Then she dissolved. There was no corpse and no blood. A burst of gold dust filled the gallery and slowly drifted onto the stone floor.
I remained where I was with Riptide extended while my heart attempted to escape through my ribs. My shoulder hurt. My hand trembled. I was apparently twelve years old. Percy's mother was somewhere I had never been. Grover knew me as somebody else.
I looked toward the doorway. Chiron was gone. I replaced Riptide's cap and stared at the pen for several seconds. Percy's weapon. Percy's hand. Percy's history. I closed my fingers around it and headed back toward the others.
If the Remnant intended to discover whether Zagreus could live Percy Jackson's life, it had chosen a remarkably aggressive first day. I had intentionally vaporized my teacher. Considering she had transformed into Alecto and tried to kill me, I felt justified.
Judging by Grover's expression when I returned,