129I've been sitting on this story for quite a while. I know I have other stories on the works as well, but I was a bit too excited for this one and really wanted to write it. There are some similarities but also a lot of differences from the main book. It may seem certain things seem repeated, but just read along, you'll see a lot of major changes. Especially about Percy's personality and his general smartness/academics. Enjoy
AU at the end
Kronos needed a weapon. A weapon he didn't have the last time he fought the gods. During the first Titanomachy, his traitorous children barely managed to prevail and win the war because of multiple events lining in their favour. His wife hid the birth of the youngest son, Zeus, who managed to trick him into gorging out his other children and freeing the Hekatonkheires to build them weapons and defeat his brethren. And himself, Lord Kronos, King of all Titans, had been chopped up by his own scythe and dispersed to the pits of Tartarus.
Oh, was he going to get his revenge.
During his slumber, he silently watched his children and the other Olympians. Their main reason for surviving this long was due to their own children. They produced demigods that could bypass the Ancient Laws, complete tasks for them and provided them with the numbers needed to continue through the Western Civilisation.
Well, two could play that game. That was just what Kronos needed to get the edge over his children. A half-blood who wasn't restricted by the Ancient Laws could use his powers to bring those fools down from their thrones.
He had been watching the recent events occurring on the surface world. Zeus's daughter had been hunted by his eldest son and was no longer available after turning into a tree. But Poseidon had fallen for a mortal woman, despite his oath. Yes, that would be the perfect cover. He could use the woman and give birth to a child, a perfect weapon for his cause.
He concentrated, gathering whatever strength he had left to send bits of his essence to the mortal world.
Three identical women sat together on a long wooden bench. On the very left sat Clotho, the spinner; in the middle was Lachesis, the measurer; on the right was Atropos, the cutter. Three powerful deities, known as the Moirai, that had the ability to determine the lives of all beings, mortals and immortals. They were currently debating on the premonitions they had foreseen for the upcoming divine war.
"Kronos is sending parts of himself onto the mortal plane," Atropos noted. "He's targeting Poseidon."
"It appears so, sister self," Clotho agreed. "Lachesis, you may want to deal with that. We can't let the crooked one interfere with the birth of Perseus. The demigod will be the one we choose for this war."
Lachesis didn't respond, which drew the attention of her two sisters.
"Lachesis, you are going to stop Kronos, right?" Atropos prodded, raising an eyebrow. Both sisters recoiled with surprise as she shook her head.
"Have you gone mad, sister self?" Clotho asked. "Should the consummation of Poseidon and his lover, Sally, be interfered with, the consequences won't be good. The Titan King will gain an edge, and it'll be the end of Olympus."
"Or, it could be what saves it," said Lachesis.
"It's official. After countless eons of this, she's finally lost her mind," Atropos said, shaking her head.
"Listen to me, Atropos. The Olympians are fighting a war on two fronts. A son of Poseidon may be powerful. But a son of Kronon? Need I remind you of such capabilities for a half-blood without any bindings that an immortal has?"
"Ah, yes. The same bindings that could be leveraged against the people we aim to protect," Clotho said mockingly.
"I think you underestimate the mother," replied Lachesis, her voice and tone carefully neutral. "You spun her thread Clotho. You know what Sally Jackson is capable of. Her past and future. She will go to the lengths needed to keep the child against his father until he reaches his haven."
"You place a lot of faith in the one mortal Lachesis," Atropos said, scepticism filling her voice. "Are you truly willing to take such a risk just to give the Olympians an advantage?"
"Kronos aims to do this, one way or another. If he's denied now, he'll succeed elsewhere. This way, we still retain control in our hands," said Lachesis with finality in her voice. "Clotho, change the thread. We're doing this."
Being a half-blood sounds cool and amazing. But there's a lot that comes with having a god as a parent. But having a titan as a parent? That made things ten times worse.
Percy Jackson learnt that the hard way.
Until a few months ago, he was a boarding student at Yancy Academy, a private school for troubled kids in New York.
A troubled kid? That mildly described Percy. He was known for his recklessness, incredible strength, quick temper, and occasional violent threats. In his defence, the worst threat he had given out was a painful promise to chop off his algebra teacher's private parts and crush his windpipe so thin that he could turn it into a flute. And well, it was an algebra teacher. Who likes algebra right?
Anyways, he was determined to be good for this trip. His class was on their way to the Metropolitan Mueseum to look at some Greek and Roman stuff.
A note to keep in mind. Percy's mother was obsessed with Greek things. Throughout childhood, he had heard stories from her about Greek heroes such as Theseus, Belleraphoon and his namesake Perseus. She had taught him a lot about the gods as well, such as Zeus, Hera, Poseidon and the other Olympians and how they fought against Kronos. She read that story to him a lot, instilling in him the morals of how there was an endless cycle of violence and to never fall into it. Percy hadn't done a great job of following that, considering he was already on probation from the headmaster for his anger issues.
"Mr Jackson, are you paying attention?" Mr Brunner's voice drew him out of his musings. Percy cursed himself silently. His mind had drifted off in his thoughts and had forgotten what his teacher was talking about. He glanced at where Chiron was facing. It was a statue of a large man, holding a baby is his arms, his mouth unhinged almost like a snake. He put two and two together and realised what Chiron had been talking about.
"Yes sir. You were talking about Kronos right? About him eating his children."
"Correct Mr. Jackson. And why did he do this?"
"Because of his father, the sky god, Ouranos." Percy remembered from the stories his mother had read to him. "When Kronos overthrew his father for his mother, he had cursed him to be overthrown by his own children. So, when his wife, Rhea gave birth to the gods, he didn't trust them and ate them to keep them contained. But when Rhea gave birth to Zeus, she hid the baby and gave Kronos a rock to swallow instead. And so when Zeus grew up, he tricked his father into barfing up his brothers and sisters–"
"Ewww!" said one of the girls behind him.
"-and that resulted in a decade long war between the gods and the titans. From which the gods won."
Behind him, Nancy Bobofit mumbled to a friend, "Like we're going to use this in real life. Like it's going to say on our job applications, 'Please explain why Kronos ate his kids.'"
"And why, Mr. Jackson," Brunner said, "to paraphrase Miss Bobofit's excellent question, does this matter in real life?"
"Busted," Grover muttered.
"Shut up," Nancy hissed, her face even brighter red than her hair.
"Because the stories of the Greek myths reflect modern moral dilemma. Kronos overthrew his father violently and in his paranoia, he didn't trust his kids. And because of that paranoia, his own children overthrew him. Similarly with the other myths. Perseus, the son of Zeus. His grandfather, Acrisius, was given a prophecy that his daughter would give birth to a child that would overthrow him. In his paranoia, he locked her up in a prison cell to ensure she'd never give birth. But Zeus visited her and gave birth to Perseus. And in turn he wanted to avenge his mother for being imprisoned in the first place. Had Acrisius acted differently, things may not have gone so disastrous for him."
Mr Brunner nodded, a smile spreading across his face.
"Well done Mr Jackson. Full credit. The stories of Greek Mythology are indeed a reflection of many problems that we face in current times and they serve as a reminder of how we must approach a problem. And yes you were right on the history. Zeus did indeed feed Kronos a mixture of mustard and nectar, which made him disgorge his other five children, who, of course, being immortal gods, had been living and growing up completely undigested in the Titan's stomach. The gods defeated their father, sliced him to pieces with his own scythe, and scattered his remains in Tartarus, the darkest part of the Underworld. On that happy note, it's time for lunch. Mrs. Dodds, would you lead us back outside?"
Grover and Percy followed the rest of the class when Mr Brunner called his name.
"Sir?" Percy asked, frowning. He hadn't done anything wrong this time. He couldn't help but feel a bit uncomfortable under Mr Brunner's stare. Something about those eyes didn't sit right with him. They seemed far far too old. Almost like they had seen years of time flow by him. Almost as old as the myths themselves.
"I'm pleased to see you're learning the things I teach you. You must continue to work like this. About how your studies apply to the real life."
"Yes sir," Percy answered. Out of all the teachers he had, he liked Mr Brunner the most. He had recognised Percy's talent and eagerness to learn despite his constant problems with dyslexia and ADHD which caused his grades to never go above a C. And Mr Brunner was entertaining as well, making fun lessons about Greek tournaments. He wanted to do his best to impress Mr Brunner.
"What you learn from me is vitally important. I expect only the best from you Percy Jackson."
He told him to go outside, turning towards the stele with a mournful expression, almost as if he had been at the girl's funeral.
Overhead, a huge storm was brewing, with clouds blacker than anything ever seen over the city. Percy thought it was global warming or something, because the weather all across New York state had been weird since Christmas. We'd had massive snow storms, flooding, wildfires from lightning strikes. It wouldn't have been surprised if this was a hurricane blowing in.
"Detention?" Grover asked
"Nah, not from Brunner. He just told me the usual of expecting the best from me," Percy said, grabbing his lunch.
"To be fair, you seem to do quite well in his lessons. And well, it's the first class your grades went up in. He probably wants you to succeed, you know," Grover said, eyeing the apple in his hand.
"You can have it," Percy grinned, handing the apple to him.
Percy looked out towards the streets, the stream of cabs going down Fifth Avenue. His mom's apartment was only a few ways down from where he was. He missed her a lot. He didn't care about what others would think or say, calling him a mama's boy. He loved his mother more than anyone else in this world. He wasn't an easy kid, he was more than aware of that. He had anger problems, a rebellious streak and the occasional tendency to want to maim someone violently. Despite that, his mother never shouted or raised her voice at him. He wanted to go into one of those cabs and go right back to her apartment. She'd be happy to see him, but disappointed that he hadn't tried. And he couldn't stand to disappoint her. She'd give him the sad and pleading look to go back and try again. She was the one person above all he didn't want to fail.
His train of thought was interrupted as a piece of bread slammed across his face. He whirled to see Nancy Bobofit grinning at him.
"Oops," she smiled with her crooked teeth. Percy tried to maintain his cool and didn't respond, though his face contorted into a glare.
"What's wrong Jackson, miss your parents? Sorry, I meant parent. Your father never loved you, that's why he left right?" Nancy's smirk widened.
"Hey Nancy, at least I got a parent who still loves me. Your parents sent you here because they couldn't deal with your bitchy attitude. Must be sad to know that even though you have both your parents, neither of them love you," Percy shot back. One of Percy's talents was digging up blackmail on other people. It was his biggest tool in a fight.
As expected Nancy's face went bright red and a snarl escaped her mouth. She went barrelling forwards, aiming to hit Percy. He sidestepped and she completely missed her face. Unfortunately, she barged straight into Grover's face. He yelped as he dodged backwards, but his face was still backhanded from Nancy.
"Ouch," Grover groaned, as he held his cheek with his arms.
That's when Percy saw red. He didn't mind being hit, but when his only friend was attacked, that was crossing a line.
He didn't even remember laying a finger on Nancy but as he advanced on her, her body shot up a few feet in the air and flew across the road, crashing past the water fountain and straight into the rubbish bin. A piece of litter hit her forehead as she glanced upwards, unsure of what had just happened.
"How did you…?" Nancy's eyes widened as she realised how far she had been flung back. Behind them, a lot of kids were whispering.
"Did you see–"
"–she shot across–"
"Almost like she was flying"
Percy had no idea what they were even talking about. Even Grover stared at him wide eyed, like he didn't understand what had happened. In all fairness, neither did Percy. All he knew was from the look in Mrs Dodds eyes, he was screwed.
As soon as she was sure that poor little Nancy was fine, and promised her with a bunch of new stuff from the joke shot, blah blah blah, she turned towards Percy, a glint of triumph flaring across her eyes.
"I know," Percy grumbled. "A month erasing workbooks."
That wasn't the right thing to say.
"Come with me," Mrs. Dodds said.
"Wait!" Grover yelped. "It was me. I pushed her."
Percy stared at him, stunned. He couldn't believe he was trying to cover for me. Mrs. Dodds scared Grover to death.
She glared at him so hard his whiskery chin trembled.
"I don't think so, Mr. Underwood," she said.
"But—"
"You—will—stay—here."
Grover looked at him desperately.
"It's okay, man," Percy told him. "Thanks for trying."
"Honey," Mrs. Dodds barked at Percy. "Now."
Nancy Bobofit smirked.
Percy glared at her with such ferocity, he could see her shiver. A small feeling of triumph settled through him, looking at her dishevelled face, as he followed Mrs Dodds.
They followed past the museum, past the gift shop and back into the Greek and Roman section. This time, it was completely empty.
Mrs Dodds stood in front of him, her arms crossed. She was making a low growling noise from her throat, which erected the hairs on his neck in alarm. Something was seriously wrong.
"You've been giving us problems, honey," she said.
He did the safe thing. He said, "Yes, ma'am."
She tugged on the cuffs of her leather jacket. "Did you really think you would get away with it?"
The look in her eyes was beyond mad. It was evil. Percy could tell from that look alone that she wasn't human. No human could look that menacing. Whatever she was, it was something out of this world.
I said, "I'll—I'll try harder, ma'am."
Thunder shook the building.
"We are not fools, Percy Jackson," Mrs. Dodds said. "It was only a matter of time before we found you out. Hades already suspects your parentage. Your aura gives you away child. Confess, and you will suffer less pain."
Percy narrowed his eyes in confusion. Hades? Who was Hades? They couldn't be talking about a greek god. And his parentage?
It wasn't like he had kept a secret about his parents. He didn't know who his father was. And his mother was Sally Jackson, a candy shop worker in upstate New York. There was nothing to suspect about him.
"Well?" she demanded, looking at him with rage.
"I have no idea what you're talking about," Percy said, clenching his hands into fists incase a fight erupted. He had been in enough conflicts to know when he was in danger.
"Your time is up," she hissed.
Then the weirdest thing happened. Her eyes began to glow like barbecue coals. Her fingers stretched, turning into talons. Her jacket melted into large, leathery wings. She wasn't human. She was a shriveled hag with bat wings and claws and a mouth full of yellow fangs, and she was about to slice me to ribbons.
"Die honey," she roared. She lunged straight towards Percy, with full intent of killing him.
Percy's life flashed before his eyes. He remembered random incidents about his life, the time he strangled a snake in his own crib, the time he could've sworn the man stalking him had one eye in the middle of his forehead. Adrenaline rushed into him as he dodged out of the way narrowly, his body thinking for his mind. He ran for the statue behind whatever-the-hell-that-was and leapt upwards to gain some height. He couldn't quite comprehend whatever Mrs Dodds had become, but he knew if he could gain some height advantage, he had a chance of taking her down.
He had overestimated his own skill. As soon as he had gained some form of leverage, Mrs Dodds shot right below his feet and he was sent tumbling down, his face being introduced to the marble floor. He could feel the tip of his nose flattening against the cold floor and his vision disorienting slightly. He turned his body, only to see Mrs Dodds hovering over him. She let out a snarl and darted right for his body, her talons outstretched.
Terror flooded Percy as braced himself for the sharp pain as he shielded his face against the inevitable impact.
A few seconds passed…
Percy dared to look upwards to see the strangest thing. Mrs Dodds was still there, flying towards him but at an extremely slow pace. Almost like a dramatic scene from a movie where the character was moving in slow motion. He witnessed her claws unfold from her hands one scene after another, almost as if he was watching it on YouTube as 0.25x speed. With great difficulty, he pushed himself up and found that he was walking at normal pace.
He jumped up, grabbing Mrs Dodds neck, and using all his strength, threw her body against the nearest statue. The moment he let go of her body, whatever slow motion spell had occured seemed to disappear and with a shrill shriek, Mrs Dodds hit the statue and her body disintegrated.
Percy looked around. He was completely alone. There was no evidence of whatever had happened.
Percy's hands were still trembling from what had happened. Had he been injected with some drugs? His mind couldn't wrap around what had happened.
He went back outside. The pattering sounds of rain echoed in his ears.
Grover was still stood outside, where Percy had left him. Nancy was stood by her friends. When she saw Percy, she said, "I hope Mrs Kerr whipped your butt."
Percy stared at her with confusion. "Who?"
"Our teacher smart boy. Who else?"
Percy blinked, not following what she had said. He went to Grover and asked him where Mrs Dodds was.
Grover paused before looking at Percy. "Who?"
Percy thought Grover was messing with him.
"Dude, I'm being serious."
Above Percy, thunder boomed.
Percy caught Mr Brunner's eye and walked towards him.
"Are you alright, Mr Jackson?"
"Sir, where's Mrs Dodds?"
He stared at me blankly. "Who?"
"The other chaperone. Mrs Dodds. The pre-algebra teacher."
He frowned and sat forward, looking mildly concerned. "Percy, there is no Mrs Dodds on this trip. As far as I know, there has never been a Mrs Dodds at Yancy Academy. Are you feeling all right?"
Author's Note:
Like I said I've been sitting on this story, along with another one for quite a while. The other story is only partially written whereas I've gotten this story to about 15 chapters so I wanted to post this. I will be clear, my biggest priority is Assassin of Olympus, but I was feeling a bit creative so I put some extra attention to this one at the moment. Anyways, let me know what you think. There will be similarities to the main book, but also a lot of differences. Like, a lot of differences. His powers are a lot more intricate. The gods will play a huge role in Percy's life. Anyways no more spoilers.
Let me know what you lot think. I will take constructive criticism as always.
Also this will still be Percabeth, I'm sorry to those who aren't for that. But I'm already writing a Perzoe (Assassin of Olympus) and in the middle of writing a Perlia (Book not released yet as I'm not happy with it at the moment), and I need some of my OTP. :)
But their relationship will build a lot more differently than it does in cannon. Percy has some... weird things about him, you'll learn later.
Discord Server: VUMM3Sb
Enjoy
SpiritsOfTheWorld