Fandom: Trials of Apollo
Rating: Gen
Genre: Family, Angst
Characters: Apollo, Zeus, Cabin Seven
Apollo loves his children. He also loves his father.
@toapril-official is back for another year! My life is pretty busy this year but I'm still going to try and get all 30 days done - I've gone into it with a plan this year, so maybe that'll help... Anyway, here's TOApril day 1 - Tumbling Love. Zeus' parenting is its own warning, I think.
The first thing Apollo noticed as he approached Camp Half Blood was the shrieking. High pitched shrieks, ones that could only come from children, and if he hurried his pace a little – he had chosen to arrive quietly this time, no sun chariot landing by the lake, no flash of light as a god materialised, just a good, mortal-fashioned stroll through the surrounding woods towards the archway proclaiming the name of the camp for all those who could see it – then that was no-one’s business but his own.
Shrieks, like all noises, came in a variety of fashions, and while Apollo had seen mortals and immortals alike react in panic at all types, it was easy for him to identify these shrieks as shrieks of laughter. Demigods shrieking in laughter, mostly the younger ones with their higher pitched voices but there were some deeper, older voices tangled in as well.
And they were close.
He crested Half-Blood Hill, brushing past Peleus and not sparing the golden fleece a single glance, nor Thalia’s old pine tree, to see what, exactly, the demigods were up to that made them so raucous – not that Apollo minded the noise. The opposite, in fact – he loved hearing the demigods so carefree.
He loved seeing it, too.
The harpies were no doubt watching on somewhere in resignation as their charges added more work to their already never-ending list of cleaning chores to keep the camp safe and hygienic, but to Apollo the sight of green-stained t-shirts, and pants, and even skin, was a beautiful sight.
Demigods were still children, not magically older or more mature than their mortal peers even if their parentage and the world it brought them into forced them into something more aware aged them before their time because if it didn’t it would kill them, and seeing them act like it always settled something in Apollo’s essence. He wasn’t the god of children, or youth – Hebe would have several unpleasant things to say if he so much as suggested he was - but he was their protector, the protector of not just the young but of their youth.
It was a role he kept failing at, with demigods, as the world kept pushing and pushing. This camp was the closest he could come to succeeding at it and its success was intermittent at best.
Right now, it seemed like it was succeeding.
Merida giggled as she pushed her twin, who yelped as he overbalanced and grabbed at her in turn as he fell, dragging her down with her. They rolled down the hill in a mess of limbs and squawking, yelling at each other and humour surrounding them as they went. A little further along the hill, Kayla threw herself down with abandon, closely followed by Jerry, while Yan took the more sensible approach of laying down before starting to roll. Gracie was talking quietly with Austin, but both of them were also grass-stained, so they just seemed to be taking a break from the time honoured tradition of children rolling down hills for no reason other than because they could, and because it was fun.
Apollo loved the sight.
More heads came back into view, Will with his arm around Raphael and blond hair threaded through with glimpses of green, the two boys laughing. Behind them, Alice’s make-up was smeared but she didn’t seem to notice as she goaded Sam into pulling her up the hill, while Emma hung onto her own waist to get dragged up.
None of them noticed him, but that was by design as he faded into the background, content for the moment to watch them play, tumbling down the hill again and again and feeling his essence thrum with pure love.
There was nothing quite like loving his children. Nothing like being a father to these innocent, battered but not broken demigods. Apollo loved being a father, always had done even if he usually looked too young to be one, by mortal standards.
He didn’t understand the people who didn’t.
Apollo watched his children play, unaware of their audience, and considered joining them, letting his presence be known. It had been a little while since he’d last dropped by in person, even if he’d spoken with most of them in their dreams the past couple of evenings.
The scent of ozone, sprites of static brushing against his essence, stopped him before he could make a move.
“You should not be here,” his own father said, sparking into existence. For Zeus, it was an unusually subtle display of his presence, but Apollo supposed he didn’t want the demigods to notice he’d deigned to make his way into their camp, even if it was only the very fringes of it, standing underneath the boughs of the tree he had once created to prevent his daughter dying entirely. Apollo was glad of that, too - he didn’t want his children, or any other demigods, realising Zeus was there, either.
It was bad enough that they were in Zeus’ presence, catching his attention, in the first place. Apollo supposed he hadn’t been subtle enough in his own approach, not if his father had noticed.
Zeus wasn’t looking at his children, though. Not yet, at least. Instead, his piercing blue eyes were focused on Apollo himself, which was never a comfortable position to find himself in, but it was better than it being his children. He wasn’t foolish or naive enough to think that his father wasn’t fully aware of the demigods, and whose children they were, though.
His father didn’t look as stern as Apollo expected him to be, when he met the older god’s gaze with his own, trying to minimise Zeus’ reasons to look to his children.
It was to no avail. He’d barely made eye contact when Zeus looked away, looking instead at the children who continued to play, oblivious to their grandfather’s presence. Apollo stifled Lester’s instinct to swallow, to show nervousness.
“Although,” Zeus continued, as though there had been no pause, not giving Apollo time to scramble to come up with an answer that would both appease his father and not put his children in more danger than they already were, “it is a father’s prerogative to watch over his children.”
There had never really been a hope that Zeus wouldn’t know exactly who he was looking at.
Those bright blue eyes, so much like Jason’s except Jason had been a mortal and his father was the king of the gods with windows to an essence of an eternal storm, whirling and flashing for millennia, much like the storm on the surface of the planet named for his Roman form, glanced back at Apollo again, and he felt seen in a way he didn’t want to be, not by this god, of all beings.
“In that, we are not so different, you and I,” his father commented, and Apollo had to fight to supress the unease that rippled through his essence. “Watching over our children, guiding them… making sure they take the right path, against all other temptations. Those are a father’s duty.”
“I agree.” It wasn’t something Apollo could deny, wasn’t something he’d argue with his father about, not when his children were right there.
Zeus smiled, and it made him look benevolent. Kind. The way Apollo remembered him from his youth, before he learnt that storms were unpredictable and it didn’t matter how pretty the sky was when the lightning struck. He didn’t know why Zeus was showing him those same pretty skies now.
It felt like a warning.
“I cannot stop you from being a father,” the older god told him, “but you must remember, Apollo, that demigods are mortal. They are not gods. Their lives flicker for less than a century before they disappear forever.”
That, felt like a threat.
“I know, Father,” he said, not even risking a glance towards the slope of the hill, although it didn’t stop him being aware of Kayla throwing herself back down again, and the shrieks of laughter that accompanied it.
“A father guides, but he knows when to step back,” Zeus said, as though he hadn’t said anything at all. “Remember that, too, my son. Do not linger - and I am sure I do not have to remind you of the Laws.”
He disappeared in another crackle of ozone, before Apollo could even digest the words, but Apollo was under no illusions that he was still being watched. There could be no visiting his children today, not now.
Not while Zeus was watching… and Zeus was always watching.
Watching, and judging, ready to correct his children’s paths if they strayed. Apollo watched Gracie push Austin down the hill and surprised a wince as he recalled falling himself, no doubt pushed by his father for all he still didn’t remember it.
He tried to imagine doing that to his own children, remembered Hal and the way he’d had to give him a gentle push before Zeus interceded and pushed harder, tried to imagine pushing any of them hard of his own volition. He failed.
Guiding his children? Yes. But he couldn’t conceive of doing to his children what his father had done to him. Not even his immortal ones, the ones that wouldn’t flicker and fade within a century. He couldn’t imagine how Zeus had done it.
Sometimes, it made him want to hate his father. Olympus knew Zeus’ treatment of him wasn’t right, that the Apollo of old, before the Ancient Laws and his own father’s threats of punishment, would’ve punished parents for if they’d done it to their children. Apollo didn’t know if Zeus loved him, any more. He thought he had done, once upon a time, but now? Now, it was difficult to tell.
Now, it didn’t matter. Zeus could love him with the strength of a thousand suns and it wouldn’t change anything, because his actions and words were angled to control, to punish, to hurt, regardless of the intent behind them.
The same way, it didn’t matter that Apollo still loved Zeus, that even now, standing in the shelter of Thalia’s tree and watching the children that his father may or may not have just subtly threatened, he couldn’t take back the centuries of love that he’d poured into his father. He feared him, distrusted him, at times resented him… but he still loved him.
He always would, he knew, and it felt like a betrayal to his own children that he could love the god that would snuff their lives out with a single thunderbolt if the mood struck him – the god that had done that exact same thing before. It felt like he shouldn’t love them both, but he did.
It didn’t matter, though. It didn’t change anything. Apollo had loved Commodus – still, deep inside his essence, loved him despite everything he’d done. That hadn’t stopped him from killing him twice; if anything, it had spurred him on to end him with his own hands, rather than let anyone else take his life.
Loving his father wouldn’t stop him from doing what he needed to do. Maybe he couldn’t stop loving him, but he could still choose his children over him.
There are supposed to be endorphins or whatever that make you feel great when you exercise. I don't think I have any because I only feel great when I'm lying on the sofa reading a book, possibly while simultaneously eating biscuits.
Morbid question, but have you said how the Apollo kids (other than Michael & Nathan) died in the Battle of Manhattan?
Hi anon, sorry for the delay in getting back to you, I was super busy last night and work is exhausting right now...
I have mentioned somewhere in the depths of one blog or other the fate of the other Apollo kids who don't survive Manhattan. None of these are (yet/currently) written out as a story but I am more than happy to summarise here, and expand with relevant stories if people are interested!
So, going in chronological order of death:
Death 1: Nathan Lister
This one is definitely the most well-documented after Michael's canonical fate, because I reference it in several fics and also because it's a canon death:
Hellhounds leaped ahead of the line from time to time. Most were destroyed with arrows, but one got hold of an Apollo camper and dragged him away. I didn't see what happened to him next. I didn't want to know.
In my setting, this camper is Nathan! All we get is Percy saying he doesn't see what happens to him and doesn't want to know, but that feels like a pretty nasty torn apart or eaten sort of fate. Poor Nathan.
Deaths 2 and 3: Elias Robinson and Sally Farmer
These two are more or less simultaneous, hence listing them together. I haven't decided which one happens first, but it's the same cause of death, and is again a canonical event:
He struck the bridge with the butt of his scythe, and a wave of pure force blasted me backward. Cars went careening. Demigods—even Luke's own men—were blown off the edge of the bridge. Suspension cords whipped around, and I skidded halfway back to Manhattan.
I got unsteadily to my feet. The remaining Apollo campers had almost made it to the end of the bridge[...].
I also have Alice and Kayla falling from the bridge due to this, but they're much closer to the shore and survive the fall, but for Elias and Sally this fall from the bridge sadly ends fatally.
Death 4: Michael Yew
I don't think I really need to elaborate on this one. It's the final canon description of an Apollo kid death (even though there's no body and I do like playing around with various ways he might survive).
I turned to thank Michael Yew, but the words died in my throat. Twenty feet away, a bow lay in the street. Its owner was nowhere to be seen.
"No!" I searched the wreckage on my side of the bridge. I stared down at the river. Nothing.
It is interesting that son of Poseidon, Perseus Jackson, can't spot or otherwise find him in the river, though...
Now, the final two deaths I haven't pinned down the exact order of yet, but both happen the following night, while Percy's doing fun things like fighting the flying pig and Clarisse is doing fun things like fighting the drakon and then being generally badass etc. Unlike the first four, there's no real canon to draw from here, it's just vibes that there were deaths on the second night of fighting, too. For ease I've still kept these two separate because unlike Elias and Sally they're separate causes, but this might not be the order they actually died in.
Death 5: Joy Norris
Joy is killed by dracaenae sometime during the second clash in the blocks around Olympus. With Michael dead and Will heading up the healing efforts in the hotel/Olympus etc., she's the most senior Apollo camper and is therefore on the front line of archers/healers trying to help the wounded and keep her siblings safe while they help the wounded. Unfortunately, this doesn't end well for her.
Death 6: Robyn Archer
Robyn is the main battle medic in the cabin during Manhattan, because Will's been holed up and isn't a great archer anyway. She's also two years older than Will, and wasn't going to let her younger brother take the front line when she's both a better archer and older. I've tentatively put her as the final death because she was killed by a Hyperborean Giant and these don't join the battle until a little later, or so it seems from Thalia's comment. One of them is also responsible for Clarisse's freezing incident and I haven't yet decided if that's related at all to Robyn's death. Maybe it is..?
(The survivors, in age order:
Will Solace, who had to take up the mantle of cabin leader and battle medic after Michael, Joy and Robyn all died - he was technically next in line for leadership after Michael anyway, on camp seniority rules, but Joy and Robin and Nathan who was already out of contention were older and weren't going to let that responsibility fall on him mid-battle if they could at all help it... oops.
Alice Tuner, who fell from Williamsburg Bridge and was out for the rest of the battle with a head injury and hypothermia, although had to help treat the other injured up on Olympus because the Apollo kids were low on healing manpower by the end.
Sam Clair, who isn't the best at healing but is good with a bow and also very, very lucky, apparently, and made it through all the way to the last stand against Kronos as a warrior defending the healers.
Austin Lake, who was well-protected by his older siblings and mostly stayed at the back out of as much harm's way as possible, using his combat saxophone to great effect when he was involved in the fighting rather than up on Olympus treating the injured.
Kayla Knowles, who also fell from Williamsburg Bridge but landed close enough to the shore she was able to scramble onto it and away from the chaos - dragging Alice with her - before proving her new position of best archer in the cabin until she was pulled up to guard the injured in Olympus, before the final stand against Kronos.)
So there you have it! The fates of all the Apollo kids that fought at Manhattan - more than half of which didn't survive. Oof.
Fandom: Percy Jackson and the Olympians
Rating: Teen
Genre: Hurt/Comfort/Family
Characters: Lee Fletcher, Kronos, Apollo, Apollo Cabin (and many more)
As always, @stereden is responsible for the accompanying podfic! Previous chapters are being filled in slowly; I’ll make a note when the gap is gone!
This chapter comes with a warning for a brief scene featuring suicide ideation by a depressed character.
<< Chapter 30
Listen to chapter 31 on AO3
Lee discovered the problem with borrowing Michael’s bow as soon as he and Tris returned to the foyer of the Empire State Building and he saw the grip Kayla had on it. He didn’t even have to ask to know that there was no way the girl was going to give him her favourite brother’s prized bow just because he said Michael had said he could use it.
The only person that was going to convince her would be Michael himself.
“Kayla,” he called, walking over to her. She turned sharply, eyeing him suspiciously. “Michael’s awake.”
Immediately, her eyes went large and hopeful, and Lee directed her to the elevator so she could see him for herself. Michael could take care of the rest – he’d see her still holding his bow and make sure it ended up in Lee’s hands before the battle started.
Then, he went to seek Joy and Robyn out, because they had to divide their cabin in two and he had some ideas, but he didn’t know where all of the younger ones would be best suited. His sisters would know that better.
“We need Kayla down here,” Robyn said when he got the three of them into a huddle, leaving Tris and the others to keep an eye on the injured. She didn’t seem at all happy about it, though. “I know she’s only eleven, but with Michael and Nathan down, she is our best archer. She’ll give Michael a run for his money in a few years without a doubt.”
Joy nodded, although she was clearly equally unhappy about it. Lee had been hoping otherwise, but if he was honest, he’d already known Kayla was good – she even had Clarisse’s praise, as veiled as it was, and that wasn’t easy to get.
“Sally needs to go up,” he said, and neither of them protested that. Sally wasn’t the best healer either – her skills were firmly in poetry with not much branching out into either healing or combat – but she could keep Will company and fetch and carry for him if nothing else. “How about Austin?”
“Also a better fighter than a healer,” Robyn said. “I’d like to put him out of the way with Will and Sally but I don’t think we can justify it.” She eyed him. “Honestly, you should be up there, Lee.”
Lee shook his head. “I’m fighting,” he said. “Michael’s lending me his bow.”
“That’s why you sent her to see him,” Joy noted, the smile on her face shining in amusement as she signed. Lee shrugged. He was not above using siblings against each other to manipulate them, and both sisters had been campers long enough to know that. Kayla would no doubt figure it out quickly, too.
“Anyone else we can spare?” he asked hopefully, and tried not to be too dejected when they both shook their heads in tandem. He’d expected that answer, having gone through the youngest two individually.
“Not injured enough to excuse it, and we do need healers down here in the first instance,” Robyn grumbled. “I want Elias on healing before fighting where possible, though.”
Joy nodded, and Lee wasn’t going to argue.
“So – primary fighters,” he said. “Me, Kayla, you-” he gestured to Joy. “Who else?”
“Sam,” Joy signed, a sign he didn’t recognise before finger-spelling their brother’s name out. She hadn’t known Sam long enough to determine a name sign for him the last time they’d spoken about him, last year – before the battle in camp. Lee quickly added the sign to his mental bank of name signs.
“And Austin,” Robyn finished. “He’s not picking up healing very quickly. Why aren’t you putting yourself as a healer, Lee?”
He grimaced. “I’m still running on empty on that front,” he admitted. “Turns out we’re solar powered enough that being cut off from the sun for a year did a number on my healing. I can do something in a pinch, but that’s going to have to be assumed a last resort that might not work properly.”
Both of them looked furious. Robyn was almost spitting as she forced out her next words.
“So. Healers.” She gestured to herself. “I’m in charge. Alice and Elias will be able to keep up with battle triage and healing, too. How’s Tris right now?”
“Stronger than me but weaker than he could be,” Lee admitted. “But keep him in your team. He can still triage no problem, at least.”
“So could you,” Robyn noted. “You don’t need energy for that, and you’re the most experienced of all of us.”
She had a point but Lee still shook his head. “We need two leaders down here,” he said, with an apologetic look at Joy, who would be leading the archers, if Lee wasn’t barging in. She waved him off – they both knew that she’d have to keep using her voice in battle, especially with her hands full of bow, and it would be difficult for her.
“The Ares kids had better be bringing you some spare armour,” she signed, though, and the thought hadn’t occurred to Lee. Neither he nor Clarisse had mentioned armour or weapons to Ellis when he’d called. He shrugged and she frowned.
“You need something,” she insisted, tapping at his chest, which also drew his attention to the fact that he was still in a purple t-shirt, unlike everyone else’s orange, beneath their armour.
“I’ll figure something out before the fighting starts,” he said. “Also – where’s Michael’s quiver? I know he’s out of arrows but I’ll need something.”
Both girls hesitated and glanced at each other, before Robyn groaned. “Back at the hotel,” she said. “We took his and Nathan’s off of them and didn’t bother to bring them with us, given they’re not going to be fighting.”
“Okay,” Lee sighed. “I’ll go-”
Two hands latched onto his arms firmly, and both his sisters glared at him.
“You will not,” Joy signed one handed, the negative a harsh movement.
“Sam!” Robyn yelled, and their younger brother hurried over to them. “Go back to the hotel, we need all the discarded quivers. Take someone with you.”
Lee did not want his younger siblings going out in such a small group, but Sam nodded and disappeared, snagging Alice and Elias in the process. Austin tried to follow, but Sally held him back and he huffed, sitting down on the floor and fiddling with his saxophone instead.
“You need to rest, if you’re insisting on fighting tonight,” Robyn told Lee firmly. “And let me see those wrists of yours. Michael’s bow is no joke and you haven’t drawn a bow in too long.” He didn’t fight her as she unravelled Chris’ neat bandaging and sang a healing song over each wrist. Her healing was far more powerful than Lee remembered it being, but it did what it needed to. The bruising and welts barely changed, but he could feel the bones and muscles strengthening.
It was almost more than he knew Will could do, and Robyn wasn’t that good. From the glance she sent the sun, she knew it, too.
Well, neither of them were going to complain if Apollo decided to bolster their healing for the war. Nor would anyone else. Lee sent their father a silent prayer of thanks.
They separated. Robyn sought out Sally and sent her up to Olympus, complete with instructions to get Kayla to come back before dark, before snagging Tris and taking him over to the area of the foyer she had commandeered as the triage centre. Lee and Joy only had Austin to round up for the moment, but that was okay, because Lee needed to know what his little brother could do.
Austin didn’t have a bow, just the saxophone. But he did also have a quiver of darts tucked away, and at some coaxing revealed a blowpipe hiding inside the saxophone.
“Dad gave it to me!” he proclaimed, gesturing at the saxophone as a whole. “I have another one for playing, but this one…” He proceeded to explain all of the weird and wonderful features the dubbed combat saxophone had hidden inside it. A lot of them weren’t actually the most useful for head on fighting, but between the blowpipe and the saxophone, Austin had enough that Lee was at least as confident as he could be that the younger boy would be able to keep himself alive whilst taking down a couple of monsters, and that was by far the most important thing.
Lee was not planning on losing any siblings today. If possible, he didn’t want to lose anyone at all, but he was uncomfortably aware that it was war, and war didn’t tend to end without casualties.
They were trying not to kill the opposing demigods, he’d discovered, and while he didn’t want them dead, he was uncomfortably aware that at least some of Kronos’ demigods had no such qualms, which put them at an automatic disadvantage. It was much, much harder to put someone down and keep them there without killing them.
Over the afternoon, more and more demigods trickled in. The trio that had gone out to retrieve the abandoned quivers were quick to return, and Joy had snagged Sam while the other two were directed towards Robyn and Tris. Lee had to loosen the straps on Michael’s quiver before it would fit around his waist snugly; Nathan’s quiver would have fit him better without the adjustments, but it was also bloody, and given his brother’s reaction when he’d seen him earlier, he didn’t think it was right to use his.
Michael, at least, had given permission to use his bow, and Lee could extrapolate that out to his quiver without feeling guilty about it.
Kayla finally came back down from Olympus a couple of hours later, when most of the demigods had arrived and were starting to trap the area. The Hephaestus campers were working closely with the Hermes kids to make some of the roads in the vicinity all but impassable, so they could focus their forces on the section that was easier to hold.
“Michael said to give you this,” she said, and she clearly didn’t like it, but she did hold out Michael’s bow to Lee, who accepted it gratefully. “Don’t damage it. He got it from Dad.”
Lee knew that. It had caused a bit of a stir in the cabin at the time, when Michael had woken up one morning with a bow in his arms and no inclination to let anyone else near it. It had taken them several weeks to get him to actually keep it in the armoury where it was supposed to be – Lee was certain that Chiron had known about the bow being kept in the cabin despite the no bows in cabins rule, but the centaur had never confronted them about it. Lee wasn’t actually sure if anyone outside of the cabin knew it was a godly gift – Michael didn’t advertise it.
Even now, years later and far less prickly towards his siblings than he’d been when he was eleven, Michael was still protective of his bow. There were very few people allowed to hold it, and even less allowed to shoot it. Lee hadn’t been in the latter category before, and appreciated his brother extending it to include him for the war.
“I know,” he said. “I’ll take care of it.”
There was always a risk of weapons breaking, even ones gifted by gods – Lee remembered when Clarisse’s first spear had broken, the combination of her shock that it could, and her fear that Ares would be angry about it. She’d become a lot more protective of the next one she’d received. But as a general rule, weapons from the gods tended to be hardier, and more difficult to break.
Lee had no intention of testing just how much Michael’s bow could take.
He tested the weight of it, even though there wasn’t really any need. The bow had been Michael’s from eleven to sixteen, and hopefully for many more years to come, and had adapted to what Michael could comfortably draw over the years. Lee wasn’t Michael, but it still drew back smoothly, feeling the same weight as his own bow. He held it at full draw long enough for his arms to start to shake, mostly to test his own endurance as well as the bow’s settled weight, before releasing the tension slowly, very aware of Kayla’s judgemental look.
She was testing him, making sure she could trust him with Michael’s bow, and that wasn’t really her call to make but Lee wasn’t going to call her out on it. He was curious about her own background, though, because she was clearly an experienced archer. She also used a modern recurve, rather than any of the more traditional unsighted bows favoured by most of the cabin, and that implied formal training before camp, in a mortal setting.
“When did you start shooting?” he asked her as he settled Michael’s bow on his back, secure and out of the way for the moment.
She shrugged at him. “Don’t remember,” she said. “Da’s an archery coach.”
It took Lee a moment to parse the words and realise that she had to be one of the demigods with two parents of the same gender. They weren’t common, but they weren’t unheard of, either. He’d had a few siblings with two dads before, although Kayla was the only one in camp right then.
“That explains a lot,” he said. “You’re good.”
“I know,” she said, puffing her chest out with no sense of modesty at all. “I’m going to be better than Michael one day.”
Lee didn’t think Michael was planning on letting his superiority be stripped away quite that easily, but he also thought that Michael recognised that she might – otherwise he’d be treating her more like Nathan, who’d always said that and been laughed off because he was good but Michael was better. If Michael had laughed Kayla off, he didn’t think she’d be so attached to him.
“Michael’s the best archer I know,” he said neutrally, instead of taking sides. “Did you know he can even outshoot some of Lady Artemis’ Hunters?” Not all of them, of course – the blessing of a goddess and centuries of archery experience did put several of them in a different league entirely – but the younger ones he had definitely outshot before. Lee remembered the last time it happened.
He also remembered the resulting carnage, because Michael had not been a graceful victor and the Hunters hadn’t taken kindly to it. Never let it be said that Michael couldn’t cause a lot of chaos with his attitude sometimes, and it wasn’t always with Clarisse.
“Are they that good?” Kayla sniffed, and Lee was glad that none of the girls in question were in earshot right then, because that would’ve sparked its own fight if they had been.
“They’re very good,” Lee said firmly. “They all have Lady Artemis’ direct blessing.”
He recognised that look on Kayla’s face. It was the same one that Michael pulled when he sensed a challenge.
“Why don’t we arrange another competition after the war?” he said pointedly, knowing that Kayla wasn’t going to settle until she’d tried to outshoot the Hunters, but also that trying to outshoot them in a war would be a very, very bad idea. “Michael would love another go at them, too.”
That got her to pause, although she squinted at him suspiciously. “Fine,” she said mulishly. “After the war.”
Hopefully he could sort something light-hearted out with Thalia before Kayla tried to issue any challenges herself. Not all of the Hunters were automatically anti-campers, it would just be a case of working with Thalia on the topic.
While the Hunters hadn’t made an appearance, the rest of the campers seemed to have arrived, and Lee left Kayla under Joy’s watch, asking both of them to divvy up whatever arrows they had left that were useable between those of them that weren’t in Olympus. The fighters would need more than the healers, but all of them needed at least some.
Clarisse was prowling around just outside the door, glowering up at the sky as the sun got lower, past the tops of the highest buildings. It wouldn’t be long before sundown, and Kronos’ attack, and the Ares cabin hadn’t arrived yet. Chris was leaning against the doorway, watching her but not intercepting her movement.
Maybe Lee should do the same, but he moved to join her instead.
“You need some fucking armour,” Clarisse greeted him as he fell into step next to her. “And some arrows.” Her eyes flickered to the quiver on his hip, one that Lee knew she recognised. Michael had used the same one for years.
“The cabin are redistributing what we’ve got left at the moment,” Lee told her. “I’ll have arrows soon.”
She huffed. “That’s the problem with you archers,” she muttered, not for the first time and no doubt not for the last, either. It never failed to wind Michael up, but Lee could see her point – it was frustrating when they ran out of ammunition, but until the war, it had never been a problem. Not in the safety of camp. “The bastard really isn’t fighting?”
Her eyes were on Michael’s bow now, and she didn’t look comfortable about it.
“Not tonight,” Lee said. “I don’t think we’ll be able to keep him back longer than that, though. Broken ribs or no.”
“Bastard heals fast,” Clarisse acknowledged. She looked away from Lee and his borrowed weapons, scanning the streets instead – searching for her siblings.
Lee understood. He was searching, too. If Silena had found a way to get rid of them, despite them being on guard, then they were in trouble. It was no exaggeration to say that they needed the Ares cabin to bolster their front line if they were going to hold the block overnight – or even just the building itself.
Silver flickered in the corner of his eye, and a familiar face appeared in front of them, just out of range of Clarisse’s spear.
With the recent revelation that some of the Hunters were his sisters, Phoebe was pretty much at the top of Lee’s suspect list. The red-haired Hunter had been a Hunter for as long as he’d been a camper, and he was certain that she’d seen hundreds, if not thousands, of years. She was high enough up the hierarchy without being openly special that it would make sense.
She also was particularly dismissive of camp, and the Apollo cabin in particular. She and Michael got into howling arguments that turned into fights, and separating them was hard.
Her eyes lingered on Lee for a moment, before she focused on Clarisse.
“Thalia sent me to alert you,” she said. “Your cabin reached the Plaza Hotel and are now on the way here. Silena is leading them.”
Clarisse’s prowling came to a halt, and a satisfied glint lit up in her eye. “Good,” she said, and Lee was very glad he wasn’t her enemy right then. She turned her head back to Chris, who was in sight and just about earshot. “Warn Drew!”
That was going to get messy, quickly.
Phoebe disappeared again, blending into the cityscape unfairly well for someone wearing silver, as Clarisse then turned to Lee.
“Do you want to still be here when they get here?” she asked him, and that was the question. Silena didn’t know that she’d been exposed, and if she didn’t see him or Tris, she wouldn’t have any reason to – until Drew lashed out, which wouldn’t take any time at all.
He didn’t really want to see that fight, and he didn’t really want to see Silena ever again.
There would be no way to avoid her, though. It would be better, in the long run, to get the confrontation over with now, before the fighting. Before a distraction got someone killed.
He and Silena had already caused one death between them, and that was one death too many. Lee wouldn’t let there be another.
“No,” he admitted. “But I’m staying anyway.”
She clasped his shoulder firmly. “I’m with you,” she said.
Fandom: Percy Jackson and the Olympians
Rating: Teen
Genre: Hurt/Comfort/Family
Characters: Lee Fletcher, Kronos, Apollo, Apollo Cabin (and many more)
RL has delayed this week’s podfic as well, unfortunately. I’ll update this and chapter 21 when they're out!
<< Chapter 21
The sun was higher in the sky when the first of his siblings pulled back, far enough across that Lee could estimate with a certainty he'd missed that it had been somewhere between half an hour and an hour since they'd all dogpiled him.
Well, that wasn't strictly true. Kayla had floated between the hug and poking at Michael with muted desperation, and Robyn had kept peeling off to check on both their unconscious siblings, but barring those, no-one had released him for a long, long time. Long enough for his latest bout of tears to expire and the evidence dry from his face. Tris' hair was still damp, as was Lee's own, but they were both drying off at a fair speed now that the sun was in the sky and shining down on them.
Sally was the one to brandish a hair tie in his face. "Your hair's long," she said, and always had a supply wrapped around her wrist, so it was with no effort on her part, and no resistance on Lee's, that she tied his long and messy hair back into something that doubtless wasn't neat, but at least stopped hair falling in his eyes inconveniently. With everything else going on, Lee had hardly noticed it, but he certainly noticed the lack when the hair was pulled back, out of the way.
"Thanks," he said warmly, and she stole another hug, worming her way between him and a vaguely disgruntled Tris to get it. Tris seemed determined to stay glued to Lee's side, and while Lee was glad for the constant reminder that his little brother was with him, the fact that he knew it was mostly triggered by trauma hurt.
"I missed you," Sally told him, and Lee gave her an honest smile.
"I missed you, too," he said.
"So what's the plan now?" Robyn asked, squatting down next to Michael with a hand over his broken ribs. Next to her, Kayla once again had one of Michael's hands in a white-knuckled grip, and unlike Lee, she didn't seem to be completely out of tears yet, although they were far less prevalent than they had been earlier. The red rimming her eyes was just as stark, though. "Percy said something about a ceasefire until tonight, but what are we doing in the meantime?"
Lee had missed the ceasefire thing – either Percy hadn't mentioned it, or he hadn't been listening when the son of Poseidon had said it. If it had come out of Kronos' mouth, he'd certainly missed it, far more interested in saving his brother's life instead.
Still, a daytime ceasefire would help them. All of them needed rest – they'd been up all night and had to be exhausted. Will was hopefully already asleep, as long as the rest of the campers weren't overworking him.
If they were, Lee would take great delight in siccing Michael on them the moment his brother was conscious again. Michael didn't need to be uninjured to verbally tear someone apart, and wouldn't wait to be, either.
"Does anyone know where the current headquarters is?" Lee asked, and all eyes went to Joy. After Michael and Will, she held the most seniority, after all.
She shook her head. "There isn't one," she signed, the jerk of her thumb from beneath her chin harsh. "Percy spread us out across Manhattan."
So they had no idea where Will was. Great.
That hadn't been something Lee had considered when he'd let Percy take his younger brother away. They also didn't have transport to go anywhere, not that would take the thirteen of them, including two unconscious bodies that had to be transported with care. All they could do was walk, but without a target to aim for, that wouldn't do them any good.
"Someone call Annabeth," Robyn ordered. "Either she'll know, or whoever's got her phone will know. There's got to be a phone around here somewhere."
They were using cell phones to communicate? Lee had seen Percy with one, but Percy tended to be a law unto himself and could also take care of himself when monsters tracked him down. Then again, he supposed that monsters finding them was probably the least of their worries, especially with Kronos already knowing their movements – oh gods, he hadn't mentioned Silena yet.
He didn't know how.
"I'm on it!" Alice called, scrambling to her feet and running over to the nearest mortal, ransacking their pockets until she pulled out a flip phone. "What's the number, again?"
Robyn rattled it off, and with more ease than Lee usually saw with demigods, Alice punched them in, not even hesitating before finding the call button and holding it up to her ear.
Alice did live in the mortal world for most of the year. Lee supposed she'd had to learn to blend in, even if she didn't own one herself – unless she did, and just didn't bring it to camp. Lee wouldn't be overly surprised, even if the idea of his younger sister carrying around a personal monster beacon terrified him.
The conversation was quick.
"Plaza Hotel," she reported, snapping it shut and stuffing it back in its owner's pocket. "I don't know where that is."
"I do," Sam said, their resident New Yorker. Lee didn't remember whereabouts, exactly, in New York his mom lived, but the paleness of his brother's face probably had something to do with the battle being far too close to her for his comfort. "It's on the south east corner of Central Park."
Ordinarily, that wouldn't be too far to walk, but with Michael and Nathan unconscious, that became a tall order – and with the streets jammed with cars, Lee couldn't conveniently borrow one to transport them.
Maybe Clarisse would have a solution, when she arrived.
"Some of you need to head over there and keep Will company," he said. "Make sure he's not being overworked."
"I have patients here," Robyn said immediately, and Lee nodded at her, expecting nothing else. Joy raised a hand, volunteering herself, and Alice followed suit, quickly followed by Elias and Sally.
Lee turned to Sam. "Can you lead the way?" he asked, and his brother nodded. A glance at Austin and Kayla made it abundantly clear that Kayla was going nowhere without Michael, and Austin was sticking closely to her, so Lee didn't bother trying to persuade them.
"What about the rest of you?" Alice asked.
"Clarisse should be on her way here," Lee said, and immediately the cabin erupted into multiple tirades, none of them complimentary. He raised a hand for silence, and after a few moments, they unwillingly gave it to him, still simmering. "I don't know what, exactly, went down between her and Michael, but Kronos knows the Ares cabin isn't here and they're our best melee fighters. We need them."
"Tell that to Clarisse," Alice muttered darkly. "Stupid bitch."
"I intend to," Lee said. He gave the rest of his siblings a look. "Anyone who thinks they can't be civil when she turns up, go with Sam and the others to the Plaza Hotel. I need a civil conversation with her."
"I'm staying," Tris piped up stubbornly. He still hadn't completely let go of Lee, still clinging to his arm, and Lee hadn't expected anything else. Tris clearly didn't know any more about the latest, massive, Clarisse and Michael argument – one that seemed to have spread to at least most of their cabin, this time – than he did and Lee rather thought it might take a crowbar to separate his littlest brother from his side any time soon.
"I'm not leaving Michael," Kayla said stubbornly, and Robyn repeated the sentiments with both their unconscious brothers. Austin hesitated, looking at Kayla but then at Lee, and clearly he didn't think he could be civil with Clarisse. Lee made a simple gesture for him to join Sam, and with dragging feet, he did.
In the end, most of the cabin went, leaving Lee with his unconscious brothers, Tris, Robyn and Kayla. That lifted a weight off of Lee's shoulders; he loved his siblings, but all of them together was a lot after a year of isolation, and being put back in charge because their new head counsellor was down for the count was a familiar feeling, but also somewhat overwhelming.
Kayla and Robyn mostly kept to their self-appointed charges; Kayla clearly hadn't been at camp long enough to be trained, and wasn't a natural healer, but she was trying her best, checking Michael's pulse and talking to him, while Robyn mostly fussed over Nathan's ragged stump, with occasional visits to Michael's side instead to make sure his healing was going in the right direction.
Lee had tried to flit between the two as well, only for Robyn to tell him if he tried she would sit on him, then moments later change her mind and ordered Tris to sit on him anyway. Tris had, of course, been more than willing, and Lee once again had a lap full of little brother.
"Are you okay?" Tris asked him quietly, resting his head on Lee's shoulder.
Lee hummed lightly, considering his answer. No, he wasn't, not really, but he had several of his siblings back, they were all still alive – even if two of them had been scarily close calls – and they still loved him, despite the secret he'd kept from them for as long as they'd known him.
"It's the right direction," he eventually replied, which probably wasn't the answer Tris was hoping for, but it was an honest answer, and Lee was done lying to his siblings. He was done with lies in general, if he thought about it, and part of him wondered if his siblings were going to start getting more creative with the truth rather than outright lying, now they knew he could catch the latter.
He thought he'd prefer it if they did; he didn't mind teenage white lies, and if they could tell him those without actually lying, that would be much, much better. But that was a problem for later, once the war was over and Kronos back in Tartarus where he certainly deserved to be.
For now, Lee's biggest concern was getting Clarisse on side, and movement in the sky indicated something drawing close.
"Stupid chariot," Robyn muttered under her breath, and Lee remembered reports of a flying chariot being stolen, remembered Michael's indignancy that he'd given Clarisse 'the chariot' – sans expletives – and put the pieces of the puzzle together just in time for the pegasi to glide to a stop in front of him.
Clarisse hadn't brought any of her siblings with her, but despite that she wasn't alone, either. A tall guy, easily Lee's height, stepped out, shuffling sideways and out of Clarisse's way as the daughter of Ares dismounted and stalked straight over to Lee.
He stood up, shuffling Tris away because Tris didn't need to be involved in this particular conversation, and watched her approach.
Much like Silena had been, in that last call he'd witnessed as Kronos' prisoner, Clarisse was dressed for war. Both wore gleaming armour that was well cared-for and wouldn't fail them in the heat of battle, but that was where the similarities ended. Where Silena had been grace and beauty, Clarisse was strength and brawn. Her spear crackled loudly, electricity coursing through it and promising immediate pain in Lee's future if Clarisse so chose.
She wouldn't hurt him, not once she knew it was him. Lee was sincerely hoping they'd get the identity proving out of the way before the violence started.
The boar's head shaped helmet glared at him menacingly, and from the eye slits Clarisse's own brown eyes duplicated the effect. She didn't look impressed at all, a twisted scowl on her face doing nothing to make her look attractive, but attractiveness had never been part of Clarisse's charm. That was in her strength, her personality, the way she fiercely protected anything that she saw as hers.
"Fletcher!" she barked, back to surnames again, and the sharp point of her spear whistled through the air, coming to a halt just under Lee's chin, far enough from his skin that he wouldn't accidentally cut himself on it if he moved, but close enough that she would have his head in an instant if he put a step wrong. "After the Labyrinth, which wound did you tell me would leave the worst scar?"
Lee remembered that clearly, patching up the girl that was more interested in Chris' welfare than her own, spitting and cursing at him as he patched her up, because someone had to, and Will might have been the better healer, but there were secrets at stake, too, and Lee wasn't letting Will carry so much weight on his shoulders. He'd been twelve.
Clarisse had barely cooperated with him, not even when he'd told her that her wounds would scar, and not nicely, if she didn't behave. He'd worn her down in the end, and while there were several scars hidden beneath her armour that he hadn't been able to completely eliminate, the one that he'd thought at the time would be the worst had actually healed up nicely, once he got hold of it. The scar that had actually ended up the worst had been one across her left hip, deep enough to scour bone but thankfully not break it.
But at the time… "Your lower back," he said. "A telekhine caught you from behind." It had been one of the worst wounds, and certainly one of her biggest blood loss contributors, but once she'd finally let Lee at it, he'd managed to reduce the scarring far more significantly than he'd expected, to his relief.
She eyed him for a few more moments, searching his face for what he could only assume would be some sort of falsehood, before the electricity faded from her spear and she tilted her helmet back.
"You didn't die," she said. "What the fuck happened?"
Lee told her, pausing whenever her eyes drifted over to where Kayla was still kneeling beside an unconscious Michael, and more than once trailing off himself as he looked at the boy behind her, one he'd never dared hope would be safe and sane again. Still, despite the interruptions, he got enough of the story out to give Clarisse the footnotes.
She barely blinked at the revelation of his truth sensing, seemingly more incensed with Luke for spilling the knowledge than Lee for hiding it in the first place. Then again, Clarisse had always been a straight-forward girl, with no time for falsehoods. Lee had only very rarely heard her tell a lie.
There was a moment of silence once Lee finished his recap, and at some point Tris' fingers had found Lee's, twisting between them and gripping them tightly. Clarisse studied him intently, her brain clearly digesting the new information and compartmentalising it, before she asked the question his siblings had all missed, either because they hadn't known or because they'd been too scared to ask.
"Kronos had a spy in camp," she said bluntly. "The idiots didn't tell me directly-" she glared at Michael again, and Lee knew it would be a long time before he got this particular feud of theirs detangled, if he ever managed it "-but too many of our plans kept going wrong. Kronos was using you to check their reports."
Behind him, he heard Robyn take a sharp intake of breath, although he didn't dare turn away from Clarisse to check on her.
"He was," Lee admitted, and the weight of it almost forced him to sit, because Kronos had been using him for that, and at some point or other he'd actually got Lee to work for him, in a strained capacity. Silena might have given the information, but Lee was the reason Kronos had been able to retaliate so hard whenever she tried to keep something from him.
"So who was it?" Clarisse demanded, still as blunt as ever. Who do I need to kill echoed into Lee's mind, even though she hadn't said it in so many words.
Lee didn't want to tell her. Saying it out loud felt like a finality, even though he'd been watching Silena betray camp for over a year. He didn't know where she was now, whether she'd finally joined Kronos' forces properly, or was still pretending to fight for the gods, alongside the Aphrodite cabin.
But he couldn't keep it to himself, and Clarisse wouldn't thank him for trying to protect her from the truth, so he met her eyes squarely and cursed his eyes for somehow finding more tears to fall from somewhere.
Fandom: Percy Jackson and the Olympians
Rating: Teen
Genre: Hurt/Comfort/Family
Characters: Lee Fletcher, Kronos, Apollo, Apollo Cabin (and many more)
As always @stereden is responsible for the accompanying podfic!
<< Chapter 20
Listen to chapter 21 on AO3
It didn’t take long for Joy to return with their siblings, sans Will. Lee ached at the absence, but he didn’t even know where Percy and Will had gone, so until they got news on that, they didn’t know where to go – but once they did know, Lee was going to work out how to transport all of them wherever there was, as long as it was away from the front line.
If it wasn’t away from the front line, he was going to have words with Percy about dragging Will into more danger.
It was a subdued procession of siblings that approached him. They’d rigged up some sort of stretcher out of a blanket or two – no doubt requisitioned from some unguarded cars – and between them, Joy, Robyn, Sally and Elias were carefully bearing a still-unconscious Nathan. He’d been patched up more since Lee had left him with Tris, clean bandages wrapping the worst of the exposed wounds. It didn’t do anything to hide the missing arm – if anything, the sudden mass of bandaging around the mauled shoulder highlighted it, instead.
Alice had Kayla under one arm, the youngest’s eyes rimmed red with tears still spilling down her cheek. Sam was similarly holding onto Austin, and Tris alternated between hovering next to Nathan and darting forwards, leading the way instead.
And that was all of them. Ten siblings, not including Michael or Will, for a total of twelve. Thirteen, including Lee.
Lee had never seen the Apollo cabin number so few in all his years at camp, and feared the reason why.
“Lee!” Tris was the first one to reach him, darting forwards ahead of the rest and slamming straight into Lee’s chest, wrapping his arms around him tightly. Lee gripped him back, burying his face in his brother’s dark, damp hair, and taking a moment to breathe before he had to face everyone else, and the realities that went along with them.
A young voice shrieked “Michael!” and frantic feet started to run, before stopping sharply.
“He’s hurt,” Alice said, almost a snap but gentle enough that it wasn’t, quite. “Be careful, Kayla.” Lee raised his head from Tris’ hair to see the young girl tugging away from Alice’s restraining hand and racing towards him, skidding to a stop on her knees next to Michael in a move that made Lee wince slightly.
“Michael?” she tried, her fingers lacing between Michael’s cautiously. “Michael, wake up.” He didn’t stir and she dissolved into tears, gripping his arm more firmly and starting to shake it, only for Alice to swoop in and grab her.
The older girl didn’t look much better. She’d forgone the make-up she’d refused to leave the cabin without for the whole of the previous summer, but Lee thought that if she hadn’t, the mascara would’ve long since smudged, so it was probably a good thing, even if it made her look younger, more like the barely-teenager that she was than the older teenager she’d been trying to emulate back when she’d only been twelve.
But Alice was sending him looks, like she couldn’t believe he was real, and while he knew she liked Michael, he also knew that for most of their siblings, he had been their first head counsellor, and their longest head counsellor. Alice wasn’t the only one looking at him like he was a minor miracle.
Lee didn’t feel like a miracle of any degree.
“Is this everyone?” he asked, belatedly tacking on, “aside from Will.”
“Yeah,” Robyn threw over her shoulder, one of the few not looking at him. She was kneeling beside Nathan, still fussing over his bandages. The pair of them had been thick as thieves ever since Nathan’s arrival, two years ago, and Lee wasn’t surprised at all to find her sticking to his side like glue now. “Everyone else left.”
“They didn’t come back,” Elias corrected, sitting himself down on Nathan’s other side, cross-legged on the asphalt and hands flopping lazily in his lap. However he’d tied his long locs up before the battle had started to fail, and some of them were escaping confines to pool on the ground next to him. “After… you… Phoebe and Morton decided that was it. They didn’t want to spend their last summer fighting again, so they said goodbye last summer.”
Joy gestured sharply, catching Lee’s attention before her hands started to flicker. “Nye and Xavier got pulled out by their moms,” she signed. “Last we heard they were all still alive. I think Xavier went back to Spain.”
It was those two signs, the hands with three fingers curled and thumb and little finger extended, pulsing and rotating into mirrored thumbs’ ups that settled Lee’s heart.
Still alive.
The absences weren’t because they were dead, it was because they had fled the war while they could, and Lee could never be upset about that. He’d have loved it if all his siblings had been able to flee and get away from it, but that wasn’t really an option for those of them with nowhere else to go, and some of them were too loyal to stay away even if they did have the choice.
It was a choice that had almost killed Tris. Robyn making the same choice would probably save lives even though it risked hers. Alice was young but too stubborn not to come back, and Sally was quieter but still got her own way most of the time.
He didn’t even know if Sam had gone home at the end of last summer. He’d barely known the younger boy at all; he hadn’t even arrived at camp a whole month before the battle that tore Lee away for so long.
The rest of them, the year rounders like Michael, Will and Joy, the new kids Austin and Kayla – none of them had really had a choice. Lee wouldn’t have done, either – but he knew he would’ve chosen to fight even if he had. Michael and Will would have been the same, and so would Nathan. But the others, Joy and Elias… Given the choice, they might have preferred to stay away – they were musicians, and not fighters.
They were fighting anyway.
Lee hated it.
“So what happened to you?” Alice asked, and she was trying to sound sharper, like Robyn would have done if she had been the one to ask the question, but it came out as less a demand and more a plea. “Who did we burn, if it wasn’t you?”
It didn’t feel like the right time for a story, but they were stuck waiting, anyway – even if most of his siblings didn’t know that – and with so many pairs of eyes on him, Lee knew he couldn’t just brush them off. His siblings, at least, he owed the truth to.
He’d tell Michael and Nathan later, and hope that the two of them could stop sniping at each other long enough to listen, because they weren’t anywhere near as bad as Michael with Clarisse, but Nathan loved to push Michael’s buttons and Michael never failed to push right back. Lee was pretty sure he was at least partially doing it on purpose, because he knew Michael did actually like Nathan, or at least accepted him as family – and for Michael, that was a big thing. He still needed to tell Will, too, and maybe Will would be enough of a buffer to stop the sniping.
He tapped Tris on the shoulder, asking him to let go long enough so that he could sit down. He wasn’t telling the story on his feet, with his siblings gathered around on the asphalt like it was story time in elementary school.
Tris grumbled but obliged, giving Lee just enough range of movement to sit himself down, next to Michael, before curling back up in his lap again, the same way he had done back in Kronos’ stone cavern, except this time Lee had the use of his arms and legs, and used the former liberally to pin his little brother in place, almost like an oversized plush. He rested his head on Tris’ shoulder, trying not to feel like Tris was a human shield against the judgement of his siblings and hating himself for the idea even worming itself into his head, because they were his siblings.
The few that hadn’t yet sat followed suit, settling into a loose and sloppy horseshoe that somehow also encompassed the unconscious Michael and Nathan.
“I was told the guy’s name was Marcus,” he started, latching onto Alice’s question as a way to start because it was as good as anywhere else, he supposed. “I don’t know anything else about him. He was never a camper.”
No-one looked particularly surprised at that – if he had been a camper, he’d have been recognised, and not mistaken for Lee. At least, Lee liked to think that his siblings would’ve recognised it wasn’t him if it had been someone else they knew.
“Why go through that effort?” Robyn asked. “Don’t get me wrong, Lee, you’re awesome and I know it, but why did Kronos go that far?”
Lee felt Tris burrow deeper against his chest, a silent support that Lee appreciated more than he could ever say, even though the movement caught the attention of most of his siblings, whose eyes sharpened, clearly knowing they were about to hear something different. Interesting, perhaps, if it was in another context and didn’t directly involve Lee. Apollo kids generally liked interesting – they weren’t often as obvious as Athena kids, but most of them were veritable sponges for new information, too.
He really, really didn’t want to tell them. Didn’t want them to start looking at him differently, using him as a lie detector even if it wasn’t malicious, or even on purpose. Didn’t want to have to deal with the guilt of knowing their lies, of them knowing he knew when they’d lied, and feeling bad for it, or conflicted, or even betrayed. Because he’d never told them, let them lie to his face when he asked them if they’d cleaned their bunk properly or just shoved everything haphazardly under the bed (it was almost, almost always the latter) and smiled and pretended to believe them.
But they deserved to know, and they deserved to know first, before he had to repeat it to Clarisse, and probably most of the rest of camp, too, before they even started to consider believing he hadn’t gone of his own free will – because Lee wasn’t a fool. He could see where some of the other campers, the ones that didn’t understand cabin seven’s mutual adoration for their father, might draw those conclusions.
That didn’t make it easy.
“I…” he started, but a lump formed in his throat and forced him to stop, trying to swallow it back down again.
“I can tell them,” Tris volunteered, his too kind little brother, and Lee choked up again.
“No, no,” he said weakly, clearing his throat a little and swallowing painfully. “No, it’s okay, Tris. I can do it.”
“If you’re sure,” Tris assured him, and Lee hated that his little brother felt the need to try and reassure him, to try and help him with this. It wasn’t on Tris, it should never be on Tris. Tris should never have been involved in this at all.
“I’m sure,” he said, and his voice was thin but it was still true. Still, he kept his eyes on the top of Tris’ head, where his hair was plastered to his scalp and still dripping wet – if Tris had his way, that would be his natural state. Looking at Tris’ parting was much easier than facing his siblings, right then. He wished Michael was still conscious, the one that had known for years and never judged him for it.
None of his siblings pushed him, not even Robyn, who alongside Nathan and Michael could be the pushiest of the lot. Lee appreciated that.
“Not many people know… knew,” he corrected, because thanks to Kronos the number of people that knew was far, far too high, much more so than Lee would ever be comfortable with. “But I inherited… something rare from Dad.” He took a deep breath, then faltered and dived down a sideways tangent. “Luke knew. He was… when I was younger, when Luke was nice and didn’t show any signs of wanting to raise Kronos and kill us all… I told him about it.”
“And he told Kronos,” Alice guessed, but from her tone it was less a guess and more a foregone conclusion.
Strictly speaking, Kronos had somehow dragged it out of Luke’s brain after taking over his body, rather than Luke telling him of his own accord, but it was close enough that the difference didn’t really matter. It mattered a little bit, that Luke hadn’t thrown Lee’s secret straight to the titan as an offering, but also if Luke hadn’t raised Kronos in the first place, it would never have been an issue at all.
“Yeah,” Lee confirmed, figuring the simple answer was best. They didn’t need to hear about the rest of it. That bit wasn’t important. “Kronos decided it was useful.”
“But Lee wouldn’t use it for him,” Tris piped up, and he sounded so proud that it almost broke Lee’s heart. “He held out, even when Kronos hurt him.” Then his voice faltered, and Lee had the horrific feeling that his little brother was crying. “That’s why Kronos grabbed me,” he sobbed, and the entire gathering of their siblings took a single, indignant intake of breath.
Clearly, neither Lee nor Tris needed to say anything more on that subject. Lee glanced up at them to see a ring of furious faces. Even Austin and Kayla seemed to understand enough, and they’d never met Lee before now.
“That bastard,” Robyn growled, one hand balling into a fist. “I’m going to punch that bastard in his smug face.” There were various murmurs of agreement from the rest of Lee’s siblings, and Lee couldn’t take that, couldn’t have any more of his siblings in Kronos’ vicinity.
“Stay away from him,” he begged, and it felt like a low blow to gesture at Michael in a reminder of how easily Kronos could take any of them out, but he did it anyway, because he needed them to stay safe.
The silence that followed was a heavy, awkward one, until Sally broke it, her voice small but steady, asking the one question Lee had been dancing around answering even though he knew he had to.
“What is it you can do?” she asked. “It must be powerful, if Kronos wanted it.”
Lee made a disagreeing sound, one hand letting go of Tris to see-saw.
Tris, his amazing little traitor of a brother, nodded vigorously. “It is,” he said, and he didn’t sound like he’d stopped crying, but he did sound proud of Lee, like he didn’t find it somewhat unsettling and potentially terrifying.
There was no way he was going to escape answering now. He also knew that if he didn’t answer it now, he wasn’t going to at all.
“I’m a truth sensor,” he said, tempted to murmur it into Tris’ hair but forcing himself to say it clearly, just so he didn’t have to repeat himself. “Or more accurately, I can tell whenever anyone says a lie.”
The silence that fell felt damning. Lee didn’t risk looking at them, burying his face back into Tris’ hair, aware he was definitely using his youngest brother as a human shield and hating himself for it but unable to pull away. Tris gripped hold of his arms, not letting him move even if he tried.
It was Austin that eventually broke that silence, the little brother that Lee didn’t know, had no idea what to expect from.
Also the only little brother that had never lied to him, if only because he’d never had the chance.
“That sounds pretty cool,” he said. “No-one gets to lie to you and get away with it, right?”
Lee winced, but before he could say anything, Alice let out a horrified gasp.
“That means you knew I was lying that time you asked me what I’d been doing with Tiana behind the Hephaestus cabin that one time!” she exclaimed, sounding almost mortified, and Lee winced again.
“I try not to call out lies,” he admitted. “Lying is normal, it’s natural. I don’t police them. And just because I know you lied doesn’t mean I know what the truth is, either,” he added, glancing at Alice with her horrified face. Given Tiana was an unclaimed kid with a fondness for making things out of metal, he imagined it was probably something innocent enough – he seemed to recall there had been some incident or other shortly afterwards with fire and mechanical creatures whirring around.
“So why did Kronos want a human lie detector?” Robyn asked. “Did he not trust his own followers?”
“No,” Lee said bluntly. “He didn’t.”
“Was he right not to?” Austin leaned in, looking eager. Lee comforted himself with the knowledge that Austin was too young to put things together, and that he didn’t know Lee. Some of the older ones, the ones that had known him longer, were starting to give him considering looks that he didn’t think he liked.
“Michael knows,” Joy said, her quiet, rasping voice cutting across the silence before Lee had to answer. “Doesn’t he?”
Lee glanced at their brother and nodded. “He figured me out a few years ago,” he admitted.
Robyn snorted. “Of course he did.”
He risked looking back at his siblings again. None of them seemed to be looking at him like they suddenly hated him, so that was a good start.
Then Tris twisted in his arms, and gave Lee a tight, tight hug. “He hurt him,” he said, turning his head back to everyone else, and there was intent in the movement. An expectation, and Lee wasn’t sure what for, but then there was a sea of movement and he once again found himself in the middle of a pile of Apollo kids, all of them clinging to him somehow.
It was acceptance, sincere and warm, and Lee didn’t mean to break down, had hoped that his siblings wouldn’t hate him, but with the proof and the love and everything…
Tris’ hair was already wet with saltwater. It wouldn’t notice if it got any wetter.
From discord:
"Ooooh! P and S with either claiming or dream time with dad"
OC Ficlet Ask
I thought I had more than one Apollo kid whose name begins with P but apparently I don't... that's okay, though - I only needed one! Had a bit more choice for S though :D
The newest camper was gangly, only eleven but already showing signs that he was going to grow up to be pretty tall, if he grew up at all.
Phoebe knew she was being fatalistic, when she looked at the kid with scratches and a torn sleeve where something had slashed at him as he'd made the last, desperate sprint to camp, but she'd been having bad feelings about the way the war is going. A quest of four left camp only yesterday, Annabeth Chase of all people breaking the rules (then again, the younger girl tended to do that if it suited her, more than she would admit to), and if that wasn't a bad omen, Phoebe didn't know what was.
Being a daughter of Apollo, she liked to think she knew at least something of bad omens, even if she didn't have any more prophetic powers than the nearest rock - just dreams, but everyone in cabin seven knew where those dreams came from, and it wasn't them. She knew words, though, and the connotation between four and death, and she didn't have to be a prophet to know that the war was getting more intense.
Everyone knew that the prophecy said something about a big three kid turning sixteen, and maybe Thalia had dodged that by joining the Hunters, but Percy didn't have that out and he'd survived two summers already. Next summer would hold his sixteenth birthday, if he held out that long. This summer involved the Labyrinth springing up in the middle of camp, or close enough to it, and that was its own disaster.
Rumour had it that even Clarisse refused to go in there, and the daughter of Ares could be called many things, but a coward had never been one of them.
Phoebe eyed the newest camper, all gangly and slightly bloodied, and worst of all untrained, and hated herself for thinking that he'd joined camp at the worst time if he'd wanted to live. She knew he hadn't known that, that something had driven him to come to camp now, but that didn't make it any better. If anything, it made it worse.
Then the universe, the gods, whatever, decided to make it even worse, as the boy stumbled and golden light lit up the air above his head, solidifying into the all-too familiar golden lyre, and Phoebe's stomach dropped like a stone, far faster than the rest of her body as she fell into the automatic kneel, because that meant that this new kid that was probably going to die was her little brother.
His satyr guide stumbled away from him a step or few, always nervous about being the protector when the lyre appeared, but did their duty with a thin and reedy bleat. "Hail Sam Clair, son of Apollo."
The boy - Sam - had the same confused face all new campers got when they were claimed (the lucky ones who were claimed, and Phoebe knew she only needed to look in the direction of cabin eleven and she'd see multiple disgruntled and jealous faces), but he was injured and also her new sibling, and she was closest.
With a sigh, she dragged her feet forwards as the satyr fled. "Sam, was it?" she asked, and he nodded, looking up at her with wide, brown eyes. "Phoebe, daughter of Apollo, which makes me your sister." She put her hand on his shoulder and started to push him forwards. "Infirmary first," where Lee would be, so she could palm off their new youngest on the head counsellor and walk away before she got attached.
She wasn't getting attached to anyone new until the war was over.
"...or I'll start correcting the apostrophes on their blackboard menu." It's my version of community service, providing a good spelling environment for all, but some people just don't appreciate it.
Sam Clair, A Cast of Vultures by Judith Flanders, page 197
