Coming of Age (Percy Jackson)

 

After retrieving a breastplate and a sword, Percy heads straight for the creek to wait for Clarisse and the rest of Ares Cabin to come running. For a moment, he had considered doing a little proactive hunting of his own first before making his way for the natural boundary… but best not to chance it. Annabeth’s plan, now that he’d been fully read into it, was a good one Percy had to admit. And with his little bout of pre-battle banter delivered to the enemy, he didn’t think for a second that the sons and daughters of Ares wouldn’t come straight for him as soon as they had the chance.

 

Setting up on his team’s side of the river, Percy gives his sword a few test swings, tilting his head to the side as he swishes it back and forth. Truth be told, he hadn’t wielded a sword much before now, but apparently he was a natural if Luke was to be believed. The man had roped him into a couple of swordplay lessons once it was confirmed that Percy would be joining their side even though he was no longer part of Hermes Cabin.

 

From what Luke had declared after those lessons, Percy was born to wield the blade. Which was… nice. Really it was. But ultimately, his heart just hadn’t fully been in the lessons if he was being honest. He’d been too busy contemplating his parentage and everything that it meant to worry about being a prodigy with the sword on top of everything else.

 

Thinking about his father being Poseidon tended to lead to him thinking about his mom, which in turn sent Percy into a spiral of depression and anxiety. Was she even still alive? They’d said that she was, but at the same time… Percy didn’t know what to believe. All he knew was that he couldn’t very well save her by standing around here. But he also couldn’t go running off to find her without any information on where the hell she could have been taken to in the first place.

 

And setting that aside… how had his parents even gotten together? How had his mortal mother ended up seduced by his divine father? Percy knew from the stories that Poseidon could be quite the ladies’ man, and the only reason he wasn’t known more for it was because his brother Zeus tended to overshadow him in that regard. But still, it was a little hard to wrap his head around the fact that his mother and the Sea God Poseidon had ended up doing the horizontal tango and producing him. Though really, the proof was-

 

Before Percy can think on his mind-boggling parentage any longer, he starts to hear the sound of people rushing towards him and knows that not only has the Capture the Flag Game began in earnest, but he’s already been discovered by the enemy team’s scouts. Not that he was trying to be particularly sneaky or anything like that in the first place.

 

Swinging his sword in his hand, Percy watches across the creek as Ares Cabin comes rushing out of the trees. ALL of Ares Cabin from the look of things, a good dozen demigods all running out, eyes locking on him, and then charging forward to run him down.

 

Clarisse is at the head of the pack of course, that wicked spear of hers still sparking with red lightning as she gives him a vicious, sadistic grin, leading the rush across the creek. She doesn’t say anything, but there are hoots and hollers from her siblings, and the hunger for violence in their eyes makes it clear that they expect him to turn and run.

 

However… Percy doesn’t do that. And as more and more of them enter the creek, he can see some of the slower ones at the back starting to falter. In fact, one of them, the dark-skinned one from the bathroom who wore her hair in a tight ponytail, actually proves to have some modicum of intelligence, because she slows to a halt right at the edge of the creek on their team’s side and looks at the water.

 

The epiphany she’s clearly having is quite amusing, even as Percy finally moves. However, rather than stepping away from the creek and leading them back into the woods on his team’s side of things, Percy steps forward… meeting their charge with a nonchalant walk of his own as he smiles thinly.

 

Seeing the confidence etched in every line of his being, the Daughter of Ares with half a brain squawks and then cries out in warning.

 

“WAIT! He’s the Son of Poseidon! He can-!”

 

But Percy just chuckles and shakes his head, cutting her off with two crisp words. He doesn’t raise his voice, and yet… they resound throughout the clearing all the same.

 

“Too late.”

 

Sure, he might not have been overly focused on Luke’s sword fighting lessons, but Percy had two very good reasons for that. One, there was the aforementioned parentage weighing rather heavily on his mind. Coming to terms with his father’s true nature and his mother’s kidnapping was enough to distract anyone. But two… there was the one good thing that had come out of being Poseidon’s son.

 

In an instant, the water of the creek rises at Percy’s command, capturing those from Ares Cabin foolish enough to go running into the body of water in its clutches. Clarisse and the others shriek and howl in anger, even as tendrils of liquid scoop them up and hold them aloft, disabling them effectively in an instant.

 

Percy can’t help but smirk as he does this. His and Annabeth’s experimentation in this very same creek a few days back had wielded… exceptional results. As such, he was coming into this battle with a pretty clear understanding of his powers over water. Honestly, he didn’t know if it had something to do with him hitting eighteen, or coming to Camp Half-Blood, or possibly the fact that he’d been claimed by Poseidon.

 

He was a literally an athletic school swimmer, and yet… not until coming to this place had he ever felt like this in water before. The control he had over water hadn’t come easily, but he’d managed to work it out with Annabeth’s help swiftly enough. However, the other part… that HAD come easily.

 

Even as those who haven’t entered the creek just yet skid to a halt, Percy is already dashing forward, moving through the water like it’s nothing. No, more than that… he moves through the water faster than he did on dry land. Bursting out the other side, he swings the flat of his blade at the mocha-skinned Daughter of Ares first, smacking the side of her helmet hard enough to send her flying to the ground, unconscious in an instant.

 

He took half a second to send a silent apology her way… truth be told, it was more of a compliment than anything else. She was the smartest opponent here as far as he could tell, so of course he would deal with her first. After she went down… the others still on dry land didn’t last much longer either.

 

None of them run to their credit. But then again, facing down an empowered juggernaut like Percy has become, maybe they SHOULD have turned and ran. After all, he wasn’t their objective. Or rather, he wasn’t supposed to be.

 

But these aren’t children of Athena. They aren’t sons and daughters of the Goddess of Wisdom and Strategy. No, they’re demigods because Ares, God of War and Spirit of Battle, had to go and get his dick wet. And as children of Ares, they exemplify his traits… both the best and worst of them.

 

They stand their ground and fight him, and Percy lays them all out one by one, carefully taking them each down. He’s careful because he truly doesn’t want to hurt any of them, but he’s also mindful of Hestia’s words before the match started. To put it bluntly, his power after entering water is so insane that it’s a very real concern that he might kill someone with his newfound strength.

 

Luckily, they’re all wearing armor, so he’s able to knock them all out without having to stab a single one of them with his blade. Only once he does so, does Percy turn back to the creek where the other half of Ares Cabin’s fighting force remains raised up in the air, the water holding them aloft with his mental focus.

 

Their restraints are liquid, so they can’t cut themselves down or break free. And because they’re dangling in midair, they can’t even get the leverage they need to try to escape either. Cursing and shouting and snarling have filled the background of Percy’s fighting with their siblings, and now that he’s actually facing them all, their volume only increases. Above all of them, Clarisse’s voice is still the clearest, however.

 

“DAMN YOU JACKSON! LET ME DOWN, BASTARD! FIGHT ME LIKE A MAN!”

 

It would have been child’s play to disarm Clarisse and her siblings and then knock them all out with a little bit of drowning to really bring this to a close. And maybe that’s even what Percy should have done. After all, the faster he cleaned up here, the sooner he could go and see if Annabeth and her team needed his help in securing the actual objective.

 

… However, with the entirety of Ares Cabin having come over here to fight him, Percy didn’t think that Team Athena and friends really needed any more of his assistance. If they couldn’t win a simple game of Capture the Flag with this sort of advantage… well, he’d be the one who would pay for it in the end, but even still… he doesn’t end it like he could.

 

Instead, he steps into the water again, walking back across the creek as he sets Clarisse down on Blue Team’s side of the small river. As her feet find solid ground, the statuesque blonde lets out a huff of relief, though she tries to mask it as a huff of anger instead. Then, seeing him approaching, she grits her teeth and sets her stance, glaring daggers at him as she points the tip of her electric spear in his direction.

 

It's a dangerous weapon for sure. If it was just Clarisse and her spear against him and his borrowed sword, with all of Clarisse’s years of experience in fighting versus his two measly sword fighting lessons… sure, Percy would put money on Clarisse coming out the victor of that fight.

 

But that’s simply not the case right now. Moving through water, Percy feels almost too powerful as he speeds forward to meet Clarisse’s opening thrust. The blonde Daughter of Ares might as well have been moving in slow motion. He bats her spear aside with his blade, being sure to hit it with the flat so that he doesn’t sheer right through it with his current strength. They might be enemies, but Percy at least doesn’t hate Clarisse enough to destroy what looks like a prized weapon just like that.

 

Still, the sheer strength of his swing is enough to tear the spear right out of Clarisse’s hands. She gasps in shock as it’s wrenched from her grasp, before her features twist up in raw fury. However, she doesn’t get a chance to act on that anger, because Percy has already glided right into her personal space… and landed a nose-crunching elbow right to her face.

 

Clarisse’s head snaps back, blood spurting out as she lands on the riverbank right next to the creek and lands hard. She flops down, still conscious, but holding a hand to her nose to try and contain the bleeding. And yet, those her eyes water from the pain, he can see she’s still pissed as all hell and that anger will probably act as the quintessential painkiller, keeping her in the fight.

 

Percy just shakes his head as he watches Clarisse’s other hand dig into the moist dirt under her, the statuesque blonde preparing to push herself to her feet and keep fighting. He didn’t want to hurt her any further, but it looked like she might not actually give him much of a-

 

“VICTORY! BLUE TEAM VICTORY! TEAM ATHENA WINS!”

 

Luke’s voice, carefree and cheerful as it resounds throughout the forest, draws both Percy and Clarisse’s attention down the length of the creek. There, off in the distance, they can both see the Hermes Cabin Leader standing on Blue Team’s side of the creek, waving Red Team’s flag in the air as his teammates surround him, cheering and clapping him on the back.

 

Capture the Flag was over. Percy’s team had won. Of course, no one from his side of things was close enough to see the battle that Percy had successfully waged against the entirety of Ares Cabin… but Percy didn’t care about that, truth be told. He wasn’t out for glory or anything like that. Rather… he’d won his wager with Clarisse. That was all that really mattered at this point.

 

Grinning as Clarisse slumps back in defeat, scowling but no longer looking like she was planning on trying to take his head off right that moment, Percy moves over and picks up her spear, before going and offering her his hand.

 

The blonde looks surprised for a moment, but ultimately she lets him help her to her feet, while at the same time behind Percy, the rest of Ares Cabin who had still been held aloft by the water, falls into the creek with much cursing and splashing.

 

Clarisse, far from looking upset on their behalf, glances past him and lets out an amused snort, even as he hands her back her spear and gives her a nod… a nod that Clarisse begrudgingly returns.

 

“Looks like it’s my win, Clarisse.”

 

She scowls and blushes furiously at that, before opening her mouth. However, whatever she might have said… he never gets to hear it. Just before the Daughter of Ares can speak, a loud, rumbling growl catches their attention. Percy and Clarisse both swing around… to find themselves facing down a massive, hulking, dog-like monster with red eyes and pitch-black fur.

 

Beside him, Clarisse’s sharp intake of breath is enough to tell Percy that this is most definitely not part of the game.

 

“Hellhound… that shouldn’t be possible. We’re still within the Camp’s borders.”

 

Percy frowns at that, before flexing his fingers and shaking his head. The power he gained from stepping into a body of moving water was only temporary unless he fully submerged himself. Already, he could feel himself being drained of the enhanced strength and speed that he’d used to so readily defeat the whole of Ares Cabin. But at the same time… it didn’t look like this hellhound was going to let them go easily.

 

No… they would have to fight.