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Of Demigods and Wrackspurts (PJO/HP - Luna Lovegood)
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Chapter 16: The Titan Of Foresight - Part 1
Surprise POV
Hero.
Has their ever ever been a more complicated word?
One definition refers to figures idolized by others for their courage and nobility of character.
But it had an older meaning too.
One used by the ancient Greeks to describe a warrior with special strength and abilities - often of divine heritage, but not always.
Hercules, the first Perseus and Hector.
Atalanta and Hippolyta.
A thousand, thousand, thousand more, rising and waning over the millennia like an inexorable tide.
As a general rule, Quintus - or Daedalus, as he always was behind his myriad faces no matter how much he could come to loathe that simple truth at times - despised both kinds equally and avoided them all like a plague.
Why ever would he not?
The former were a subjective ideal, and the latter often were, despite the fairytales, mortal men and women who had been no more noble than he ever was.
Bravery in the face of beasts and gods, but arrogance and hubris and fate returning them to earth and crushing anyone unfortunate enough to be in their vicinity beneath the weight of their mistakes, regrets, and failures.
Heroes of any variety meant trouble, and staying far removed from them and their affairs was simply good sense.
That, he's known for millennia.
So it was darkly ironic that the one time he decides to ignore his own good sense - the one time he chooses to linger behind to satiate his own damned curiosity for the first time in centuries and inadvertently involves himself in the affairs of heroes - a quest, no less - matters spiral out of control so thoroughly that he came face to face with a god, a titan, and no less than seven heroes in quick succession.
How wonderful.
"Ah, Daedalus." Prometheus smiled in greeting as he caught sight of him, unbothered by his visible dislike. "What an unexpected pleasure."
He wasn't surprised that the titan of Foresight could see him for who he was behind this relatively recent automaton body, but he was far from pleased.
He especially disliked the way the blonde-haired and familiarly gray-eyed Annabeth Chase snapped her gaze to him, stunned disbelief and blossoming recognition grew on her face.
And there went that ruse, over before it even began.
He resisted the urge to scowl - His siblings were always so irritatingly quick-witted.
"Though perhaps I really shouldn't have been surprised. From what I've heard, you do so rarely leave your Labyrinth these days. Quite a shame, that."
"I prefer not to be hounded by the divine." Daedalus smiled unpleasantly - a feat he'd perfected into an art form. "Titans and gods alike, and your faction has been gratingly insistent these last few years."
To that, Prometheus actually shrugged.
"Guilty."
"What exactly is this?" Percy Jackson whispered to Annabeth, his sword drawn at the ready. The effort to be subtle was a waste - his words carried over in the tense silence just fine.
"You're guess is as good as mine." Thalia Grace answered, white-knuckling the shaft of her spear and keeping her eyes fixed unerringly on Prometheus.
The victory of the demigods had been strangled in its infancy. They'd barely had a minute to celebrate their reunion - and he knew finding one another in the Labyrinth warranted nothing less - before the titan had shown his face and doused their growing joy with a wave of cold dread.
He could sympathize, truly - immortals seldom had any understanding of tact - though he'd have much preferred to be able to do that from a distance.
"He's here for us, I imagine."
It didn't surprise him to see Luna Lovegood stepping up forward, deliberately placing herself between Prometheus and the carefully retreating demigods.
The titan didn't miss the movement for what it was, and he chuckled lowly.
"You make my intentions sound so sinister, daughter of Thanatos."
He didn't deny it, though.
"But have I mistaken them?"
"Technically, no."
All the demigods tensed.
"However," Prometheus raised his hands up in what was likely intended to be a pacifying gesture. "I truly do believe that listening to what I have to say is in all of our best interests. More so yours than mine, even."
"And that is all this is? A conversation."
"To begin with, yes."
Left unsaid was what would happen should the conversation not go Prometheus's way - given that the demigods were exhausted and nothing was stopping the titan from rounding them all up, Daedalus himself included...
"Wonderful."
Prometheus blinked in surprise when Luna smiled, the abrupt response and the sudden gesture bewildering.
"Then we should do this the right way, should we not?
And before anyone could ask what that was supposed to mean, Luna had already turned to Daedulus next, and spoken in perfect Attic Greek.
"Lord of the Labyrinth, I request hospitality within your domain on behalf of myself and my companions."
Ah.
Daedalus couldn't help it. He snorted at the look of stunned surprise on Prometheus's face.
He knew what her game was.
Xenia.
The ritualized right of hospitality - an olden practice where travelers could call upon the hospitality of a host and receive protection by their hearth and shelter within their home for as long as they showed proper respect and decorum.
It was a practice that traced its descent from the earlier days of Titan rule - a more civilized bastardization of their diplomatic practices, coined when they rose to rule the earth as the primordials withdrew from this plane long enough that their lesser children dared to make something of the world beneath them.
His lips curled up into a smile.
"Granted."
In truth, it was just a formality. It wasn't binding, and there was no true power behind it. Daedalus himself was not defenseless, certainly not within the walls of the Labyrinth - the maze was often one with his very soul - but he could not best a titan who knew what to expect of him.
However...
If Prometheus wanted to speak to the demigods as he so claimed without ruining the pleasant facade he was trying to lull them over with, then he'd have to play along.
And since one could not rightly speak to a guest without acknowledging the presence of their host-
Daedalus's smile grew more pronounced.
Prometheus would have to request the same right from him to put him on equal footing with Luna and the rest of her quest mates.
The notion of this irritating titan bowing to him, no matter how ultimately meaningless the gesture in the end, was something he found satisfying in a vindictively petty way.
The armies of Kronos had been after him for nearly as long as the Titan King had begun to stir in force, and here was one of their greatest commanders humbling himself before him - he'd take whatever victory he could, and the time to think while this little charade played out didn't hurt at all.
"I see..." Prometheus sighed - likely recognising exactly why Daedalus had played along - but he nodded all the same. "I too, request hospitality from the lord of the Labyrinth."
The words rang out in the same nigh-extinct dialect that Luna had used.
"Granted."
Daedalus answered with relish - and then the daughter of Thanatos flipped the script again.
"In order to uphold the sanctity of this communion, I exercise my right as the humblest party and request the invocation of a patron," Luna said, and Prometheus stilled. "Unless the lord of the Labyrinth denies me his blessing?"
Said lord of the Labyrinth - and wasn't that an ill-fitting title in truth - resisted the urge to stare in wary surprise.
To invoke a patron was to alter the rules of the game - inviting a third party who would oversee this ritual would also introduce real, substantial stakes.
The presence of a chosen patron was intended to ensure that each member of this agreement played their role and did not overstep their bounds - the host could not infringe or coerce his guests beyond their due, and the guests could not abuse their privileges under the host's protection.
If Daedalus - as the host - agreed to allow the girl to invoke a patron, neither he nor Prometheus could act against her and hers without insulting the sanctity of ritual and insulting the patron in turn.
The duty of punishment would then fall to the patron, for both the violation of the rules and the offence done to them in consequence.
Clever.
Very clever, in fact, because there was little doubt on who exactly Luna Lovegood would call down to
Her father.
The threat of Thanatos's mere presence was an effective one, Daedalus could see that much in Prometheus's narrowed eyes.
He wasn't unaffected by it, either, but the odds were stacked on his end.
Daedalus was protected both as host, and by the laws preventing Thanatos from reaping the living.
He lost nothing here, not even the scraps of his anonymity given that Luna's father was apparently already well aware of him.
While he disliked the notion that death was constantly aware of him regardless of the body he took - to say the least - he didn't dare risk turning that apparent ambivalence to Daedalus's constant evasion of him into active malice by denying his daughter a protection so easily given.
Not when he'd proven just how much she was worth to him than the average demigod was to their divine parent - he had taken a corporeal form for the first time in millennia to protect once already, and against the Olympians at that.
No, he would not be inviting that wrath onto himself.
There was stupid, there was suicidal, and then there was unnecessary suicidal stupidity, and this was very much that.
"I have no objection."
At his nod, Luna smiled.
Something in him tensed at that smile - there was something about it that was off, a kind of muted, grim satisfaction that he could immediately tell was uncharacteristic of the girl.
He watched as she raised her arm up, pointing the tip of her stygian spear heavenward.
"Permission has been granted." She announced with finality, and inhaled "I now invoke my patron."
Daedalus suddenly felt a terrible flash of foreboding, but those silvery eyes snapped open and it was already too late to do anything.
"I call upon my Grandfather, Erebus, the all-consuming Darkness!"
No.
The situation wasn't what he'd feared.
It was so much worse.
Accursed moirai was it worse!
Across from him, Prometheus became stone. The demigods froze on instinct. The mortal Apollo - and what did it say of all of this, that he'd forgotten the fallen god in their midst? - nearly collapsed to his knees in horror.
Daedalus's body was still in a way flesh and blood could never be. Every gear and mechanism locked into place from the sheer force of his dread. Even the oil in his false veins seemed to harden into sludge.
A beat passed.
And then another.
And another.
The apprehension in the air, thick and clogging, did not abate one bit.
Surely he wouldn't answer.
The thought had scarcely graced his mind before the presence crashed down on them like the wrath of a god-
No.
Not like a god.
This was so much greater than a mere god.
The air grew cold enough for breaths to mist. The light in the room dimmed until it was no greater than the nearest, most pitiful sputtering ember of a dying flame.
Around them, the shadows abruptly become more, lengthening and deepening and opening up to a blackness more complete and all-devouring than anything he could have ever wanted to imagine, and then they grew beyond even that.
Before their very eyes, the abyss awoke... and all of them felt it as something within stared out.
"Woah." Nico Di Angelo whispered, eyes going glassy in awe. "I... I can feel that."
He raised his hand and stumbled towards the umbral inkiness as if to reach out and touch it.
Daedulus closed his eyes to the sight, solely in order to better resist the urge to scream.
Please, for the love of all that is good and sane, someone move the idiotic child far away from the manifestation of the primordial Darkness before he kills them all.
"Nico, love." Luna Lovegood - and curse the day he ever learned that name. He'd rather face that vengeful wraith of a ghost king a hundred times over than be anywhere near this nightmare - "Come here."
The boy hesitated, as if unwilling to pull away. Behind Luna, his sister twitched and made an aborted movement towards him before the dog at her side bit into the hem of her pants and began furiously dragging her back behind the cowering Ophiotaurus.
None of them dared make a noise through any of this - an instinct written into their very souls roaring at them to keep their silence or risk annihilation.
"Nico," Luna repeated, taking a very careful step forward. "Come. Here. Now."
Slowly, with clear reluctance, the boy pulled back and marched over to Luna. He wrapped his arms around her waist and buried his face in her shirt,
"My grandfather has accepted my plea." How the girl spoke so levelly after what she'd just done, he could not fathom. "Now let's all play by the rules, lest we offend him and disturb him from his slumber."
"He's not awake?" Annabeth whispered, voice strangled and on the edge of hysteria. Daedalus didn't blame her for leaning into the son of Poseidon's hold and hanging on with all the strength she could muster.
His body was metal and magic, and yet even he was on the edge of collapse.
In response, Luna smiled.
That expression, too, was a little unhinged.
"He's only partially aware of us. We're too small to take up all his attention, Annabeth. If grandfather was awake in full, you'd know." She exhaled lightly. "Everyone would know."
"Luna Lovegood," Prometheus said, and it was the first time he'd spoken in minutes.
Gone was the carefully genial tenor he'd used before. In its place was only somber wariness and careful calculation.
"What an odd, dangerous creature you are."
Luna tilted her head pensively. "I'll take that as a compliment."
"I certainly wouldn't be insulting you so lightly." The titan chuckled humorlessly. "Well, Daedalus? As the host, you must provide the food and drink to commence this affair."
Yes.
He should, shouldn't he?
With cold numbness still weighing him down - lest the terror overwhelm his mind - he lifted his hands and willed the Labyrinth to respond to his desire.
Before them, the stone floor rumbled, before it bubbled and parted like the surface of a lake. An elaborate dining table rose from beneath the liquid-like stone, laden with plates of assorted sandwiches, fruits, drinks, and a tray of ambrosia along with a decanter of nectar.
"Sit and take part in the blessings of my table."
No one argued - no one dared to.
The demigods - barring the barely conscious huntress who remained with the beasts watching over her - made to take their seats at Luna's firm nod, trusting her not to lead them astray.
Prometheus and Daedalus took theirs at either end of the table, and the abyss around them seeped closer.
Like it was listening in.
"Well, then."
Silver eyes narrowed.
"Let's begin."
Next Chapter: Politics.
As always, leave your comments and ideas and if you don't like it, please be courteous.
Hero.
Has their ever ever been a more complicated word?
One definition refers to figures idolized by others for their courage and nobility of character.
But it had an older meaning too.
One used by the ancient Greeks to describe a warrior with special strength and abilities - often of divine heritage, but not always.
Hercules, the first Perseus and Hector.
Atalanta and Hippolyta.
A thousand, thousand, thousand more, rising and waning over the millennia like an inexorable tide.
As a general rule, Quintus - or Daedalus, as he always was behind his myriad faces no matter how much he could come to loathe that simple truth at times - despised both kinds equally and avoided them all like a plague.
Why ever would he not?
The former were a subjective ideal, and the latter often were, despite the fairytales, mortal men and women who had been no more noble than he ever was.
Bravery in the face of beasts and gods, but arrogance and hubris and fate returning them to earth and crushing anyone unfortunate enough to be in their vicinity beneath the weight of their mistakes, regrets, and failures.
Heroes of any variety meant trouble, and staying far removed from them and their affairs was simply good sense.
That, he's known for millennia.
So it was darkly ironic that the one time he decides to ignore his own good sense - the one time he chooses to linger behind to satiate his own damned curiosity for the first time in centuries and inadvertently involves himself in the affairs of heroes - a quest, no less - matters spiral out of control so thoroughly that he came face to face with a god, a titan, and no less than seven heroes in quick succession.
How wonderful.
"Ah, Daedalus." Prometheus smiled in greeting as he caught sight of him, unbothered by his visible dislike. "What an unexpected pleasure."
He wasn't surprised that the titan of Foresight could see him for who he was behind this relatively recent automaton body, but he was far from pleased.
He especially disliked the way the blonde-haired and familiarly gray-eyed Annabeth Chase snapped her gaze to him, stunned disbelief and blossoming recognition grew on her face.
And there went that ruse, over before it even began.
He resisted the urge to scowl - His siblings were always so irritatingly quick-witted.
"Though perhaps I really shouldn't have been surprised. From what I've heard, you do so rarely leave your Labyrinth these days. Quite a shame, that."
"I prefer not to be hounded by the divine." Daedalus smiled unpleasantly - a feat he'd perfected into an art form. "Titans and gods alike, and your faction has been gratingly insistent these last few years."
To that, Prometheus actually shrugged.
"Guilty."
"What exactly is this?" Percy Jackson whispered to Annabeth, his sword drawn at the ready. The effort to be subtle was a waste - his words carried over in the tense silence just fine.
"You're guess is as good as mine." Thalia Grace answered, white-knuckling the shaft of her spear and keeping her eyes fixed unerringly on Prometheus.
The victory of the demigods had been strangled in its infancy. They'd barely had a minute to celebrate their reunion - and he knew finding one another in the Labyrinth warranted nothing less - before the titan had shown his face and doused their growing joy with a wave of cold dread.
He could sympathize, truly - immortals seldom had any understanding of tact - though he'd have much preferred to be able to do that from a distance.
"He's here for us, I imagine."
It didn't surprise him to see Luna Lovegood stepping up forward, deliberately placing herself between Prometheus and the carefully retreating demigods.
The titan didn't miss the movement for what it was, and he chuckled lowly.
"You make my intentions sound so sinister, daughter of Thanatos."
He didn't deny it, though.
"But have I mistaken them?"
"Technically, no."
All the demigods tensed.
"However," Prometheus raised his hands up in what was likely intended to be a pacifying gesture. "I truly do believe that listening to what I have to say is in all of our best interests. More so yours than mine, even."
"And that is all this is? A conversation."
"To begin with, yes."
Left unsaid was what would happen should the conversation not go Prometheus's way - given that the demigods were exhausted and nothing was stopping the titan from rounding them all up, Daedalus himself included...
"Wonderful."
Prometheus blinked in surprise when Luna smiled, the abrupt response and the sudden gesture bewildering.
"Then we should do this the right way, should we not?
And before anyone could ask what that was supposed to mean, Luna had already turned to Daedulus next, and spoken in perfect Attic Greek.
"Lord of the Labyrinth, I request hospitality within your domain on behalf of myself and my companions."
Ah.
Daedalus couldn't help it. He snorted at the look of stunned surprise on Prometheus's face.
He knew what her game was.
Xenia.
The ritualized right of hospitality - an olden practice where travelers could call upon the hospitality of a host and receive protection by their hearth and shelter within their home for as long as they showed proper respect and decorum.
It was a practice that traced its descent from the earlier days of Titan rule - a more civilized bastardization of their diplomatic practices, coined when they rose to rule the earth as the primordials withdrew from this plane long enough that their lesser children dared to make something of the world beneath them.
His lips curled up into a smile.
"Granted."
In truth, it was just a formality. It wasn't binding, and there was no true power behind it. Daedalus himself was not defenseless, certainly not within the walls of the Labyrinth - the maze was often one with his very soul - but he could not best a titan who knew what to expect of him.
However...
If Prometheus wanted to speak to the demigods as he so claimed without ruining the pleasant facade he was trying to lull them over with, then he'd have to play along.
And since one could not rightly speak to a guest without acknowledging the presence of their host-
Daedalus's smile grew more pronounced.
Prometheus would have to request the same right from him to put him on equal footing with Luna and the rest of her quest mates.
The notion of this irritating titan bowing to him, no matter how ultimately meaningless the gesture in the end, was something he found satisfying in a vindictively petty way.
The armies of Kronos had been after him for nearly as long as the Titan King had begun to stir in force, and here was one of their greatest commanders humbling himself before him - he'd take whatever victory he could, and the time to think while this little charade played out didn't hurt at all.
"I see..." Prometheus sighed - likely recognising exactly why Daedalus had played along - but he nodded all the same. "I too, request hospitality from the lord of the Labyrinth."
The words rang out in the same nigh-extinct dialect that Luna had used.
"Granted."
Daedalus answered with relish - and then the daughter of Thanatos flipped the script again.
"In order to uphold the sanctity of this communion, I exercise my right as the humblest party and request the invocation of a patron," Luna said, and Prometheus stilled. "Unless the lord of the Labyrinth denies me his blessing?"
Said lord of the Labyrinth - and wasn't that an ill-fitting title in truth - resisted the urge to stare in wary surprise.
To invoke a patron was to alter the rules of the game - inviting a third party who would oversee this ritual would also introduce real, substantial stakes.
The presence of a chosen patron was intended to ensure that each member of this agreement played their role and did not overstep their bounds - the host could not infringe or coerce his guests beyond their due, and the guests could not abuse their privileges under the host's protection.
If Daedalus - as the host - agreed to allow the girl to invoke a patron, neither he nor Prometheus could act against her and hers without insulting the sanctity of ritual and insulting the patron in turn.
The duty of punishment would then fall to the patron, for both the violation of the rules and the offence done to them in consequence.
Clever.
Very clever, in fact, because there was little doubt on who exactly Luna Lovegood would call down to
Her father.
The threat of Thanatos's mere presence was an effective one, Daedalus could see that much in Prometheus's narrowed eyes.
He wasn't unaffected by it, either, but the odds were stacked on his end.
Daedalus was protected both as host, and by the laws preventing Thanatos from reaping the living.
He lost nothing here, not even the scraps of his anonymity given that Luna's father was apparently already well aware of him.
While he disliked the notion that death was constantly aware of him regardless of the body he took - to say the least - he didn't dare risk turning that apparent ambivalence to Daedalus's constant evasion of him into active malice by denying his daughter a protection so easily given.
Not when he'd proven just how much she was worth to him than the average demigod was to their divine parent - he had taken a corporeal form for the first time in millennia to protect once already, and against the Olympians at that.
No, he would not be inviting that wrath onto himself.
There was stupid, there was suicidal, and then there was unnecessary suicidal stupidity, and this was very much that.
"I have no objection."
At his nod, Luna smiled.
Something in him tensed at that smile - there was something about it that was off, a kind of muted, grim satisfaction that he could immediately tell was uncharacteristic of the girl.
He watched as she raised her arm up, pointing the tip of her stygian spear heavenward.
"Permission has been granted." She announced with finality, and inhaled "I now invoke my patron."
Daedalus suddenly felt a terrible flash of foreboding, but those silvery eyes snapped open and it was already too late to do anything.
"I call upon my Grandfather, Erebus, the all-consuming Darkness!"
No.
The situation wasn't what he'd feared.
It was so much worse.
Accursed moirai was it worse!
Across from him, Prometheus became stone. The demigods froze on instinct. The mortal Apollo - and what did it say of all of this, that he'd forgotten the fallen god in their midst? - nearly collapsed to his knees in horror.
Daedalus's body was still in a way flesh and blood could never be. Every gear and mechanism locked into place from the sheer force of his dread. Even the oil in his false veins seemed to harden into sludge.
A beat passed.
And then another.
And another.
The apprehension in the air, thick and clogging, did not abate one bit.
Surely he wouldn't answer.
The thought had scarcely graced his mind before the presence crashed down on them like the wrath of a god-
No.
Not like a god.
This was so much greater than a mere god.
The air grew cold enough for breaths to mist. The light in the room dimmed until it was no greater than the nearest, most pitiful sputtering ember of a dying flame.
Around them, the shadows abruptly become more, lengthening and deepening and opening up to a blackness more complete and all-devouring than anything he could have ever wanted to imagine, and then they grew beyond even that.
Before their very eyes, the abyss awoke... and all of them felt it as something within stared out.
"Woah." Nico Di Angelo whispered, eyes going glassy in awe. "I... I can feel that."
He raised his hand and stumbled towards the umbral inkiness as if to reach out and touch it.
Daedulus closed his eyes to the sight, solely in order to better resist the urge to scream.
Please, for the love of all that is good and sane, someone move the idiotic child far away from the manifestation of the primordial Darkness before he kills them all.
"Nico, love." Luna Lovegood - and curse the day he ever learned that name. He'd rather face that vengeful wraith of a ghost king a hundred times over than be anywhere near this nightmare - "Come here."
The boy hesitated, as if unwilling to pull away. Behind Luna, his sister twitched and made an aborted movement towards him before the dog at her side bit into the hem of her pants and began furiously dragging her back behind the cowering Ophiotaurus.
None of them dared make a noise through any of this - an instinct written into their very souls roaring at them to keep their silence or risk annihilation.
"Nico," Luna repeated, taking a very careful step forward. "Come. Here. Now."
Slowly, with clear reluctance, the boy pulled back and marched over to Luna. He wrapped his arms around her waist and buried his face in her shirt,
"My grandfather has accepted my plea." How the girl spoke so levelly after what she'd just done, he could not fathom. "Now let's all play by the rules, lest we offend him and disturb him from his slumber."
"He's not awake?" Annabeth whispered, voice strangled and on the edge of hysteria. Daedalus didn't blame her for leaning into the son of Poseidon's hold and hanging on with all the strength she could muster.
His body was metal and magic, and yet even he was on the edge of collapse.
In response, Luna smiled.
That expression, too, was a little unhinged.
"He's only partially aware of us. We're too small to take up all his attention, Annabeth. If grandfather was awake in full, you'd know." She exhaled lightly. "Everyone would know."
"Luna Lovegood," Prometheus said, and it was the first time he'd spoken in minutes.
Gone was the carefully genial tenor he'd used before. In its place was only somber wariness and careful calculation.
"What an odd, dangerous creature you are."
Luna tilted her head pensively. "I'll take that as a compliment."
"I certainly wouldn't be insulting you so lightly." The titan chuckled humorlessly. "Well, Daedalus? As the host, you must provide the food and drink to commence this affair."
Yes.
He should, shouldn't he?
With cold numbness still weighing him down - lest the terror overwhelm his mind - he lifted his hands and willed the Labyrinth to respond to his desire.
Before them, the stone floor rumbled, before it bubbled and parted like the surface of a lake. An elaborate dining table rose from beneath the liquid-like stone, laden with plates of assorted sandwiches, fruits, drinks, and a tray of ambrosia along with a decanter of nectar.
"Sit and take part in the blessings of my table."
No one argued - no one dared to.
The demigods - barring the barely conscious huntress who remained with the beasts watching over her - made to take their seats at Luna's firm nod, trusting her not to lead them astray.
Prometheus and Daedalus took theirs at either end of the table, and the abyss around them seeped closer.
Like it was listening in.
"Well, then."
Silver eyes narrowed.
"Let's begin."
...
Daedalus's mood this entire chapter:
View: https://imgur.com/wyvxiQq
Prometheus at the beginning, thinking he's got the demigods exactly where he wants them:
View: https://imgur.com/c6Vr1VX
Luna with her finger hovering over the self-destruct button, daring Prometheus to make a move, because fuck today!:
View: https://imgur.com/gFYTNCt
Daedalus's mood this entire chapter:
View: https://imgur.com/wyvxiQq
Prometheus at the beginning, thinking he's got the demigods exactly where he wants them:
View: https://imgur.com/c6Vr1VX
Luna with her finger hovering over the self-destruct button, daring Prometheus to make a move, because fuck today!:
View: https://imgur.com/gFYTNCt
Next Chapter: Politics.
As always, leave your comments and ideas and if you don't like it, please be courteous.
Last edited:
ScissorSlipper
Barber cat
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Ok. That was very, delightfully unexpected! The last (many) chapters were kinda the usual Percy Jackson thing where demigods are just suffering constantly. But this is a new play. Luna is doing 4D chess.
"This has been a very long day," Luna continued. "All of us have either been almost killed, or tried to kill someone at least once. Some of us multiple times."
Thalia remembered the satisfying feeling of almost frying the huntress to a crisp. Then she remembered nearly getting murdered by her own father in much the same way and shrunk in on herself.
"Now, if anyone here wants to keep trying to kill anyone else, that's fine!" Luna said with a chirpy tone. "I'll just have my grandfather eat us all as a midnight snack, and we can just get it over with here and now."
When Luna stopped talking, an eerie silence fell upon them all. They couldn't even hear their own heartbeat or breathing, as if the shadows around them had already swallowed up all sound.
"Or we could talk." When Luna spoke up again, everyone there felt relief at breaking the silence, even if they wouldn't admit it. Some cast an uncomfortable glance at their surroundings. The shadows that encompassed them were darker than all but one of the demigods present had ever seen before, and the immortals ever wanted to see again.
Thalia remembered the satisfying feeling of almost frying the huntress to a crisp. Then she remembered nearly getting murdered by her own father in much the same way and shrunk in on herself.
"Now, if anyone here wants to keep trying to kill anyone else, that's fine!" Luna said with a chirpy tone. "I'll just have my grandfather eat us all as a midnight snack, and we can just get it over with here and now."
When Luna stopped talking, an eerie silence fell upon them all. They couldn't even hear their own heartbeat or breathing, as if the shadows around them had already swallowed up all sound.
"Or we could talk." When Luna spoke up again, everyone there felt relief at breaking the silence, even if they wouldn't admit it. Some cast an uncomfortable glance at their surroundings. The shadows that encompassed them were darker than all but one of the demigods present had ever seen before, and the immortals ever wanted to see again.
Ariesthegolden
He who knows not how to ADHD, but is learning
- Pronouns
- He/Him
There are some people in this world that you just can't let talk. Where your mistake starts the second you let them open their mouths.
I have never before felt that so visceraly then with Luna Lovegood. Bravo good sir or madam bravo!
I just finished binging this and am so excited for what comes next. This is my favorite fanfic of my favorite series and it will be an honor to bare witness to the cluster fuck of the future.
Also, while she definitely knows what she is dealing with. It really does say something about how much suck has been packed into today that she called him up because while she's generally a level headed and well reasoned person her company definitely isn't. But still, it is such a joy to watch someone finally start talking good sense.
I have never before felt that so visceraly then with Luna Lovegood. Bravo good sir or madam bravo!
I just finished binging this and am so excited for what comes next. This is my favorite fanfic of my favorite series and it will be an honor to bare witness to the cluster fuck of the future.
Also, while she definitely knows what she is dealing with. It really does say something about how much suck has been packed into today that she called him up because while she's generally a level headed and well reasoned person her company definitely isn't. But still, it is such a joy to watch someone finally start talking good sense.
Chapter 17: The Titan Of Foresight - Part 2
He had lived for thousands of years - He had risen to the greatest of heights and tumbled to the lowest pits, and faced the wraths of mortal kings and monsters and gods alike.
Yet all the same, Daedalus had never once regretted existing nearly as much as he did right then, sharing a table with a Titan, six would-be heroes, a sundered god, a downed huntress lying to the side, a mythical creature that spelled the end of Olympus itself and... ah, yes.
The looming, boundless presence of the all-consuming Darkness surrounding them and chilling the very air in his crafted lungs with the imminent threat of abyssal oblivion.
However, could he forget?
Oh, how he wished he could forget - or better yet, leave entirely.
Instead, the wayward son of Athena resolutely ignored the looming and utterly unassailable threat poised to plunge him into an unimaginable fate should he so much as twitch the wrong as only one desperately fighting back the breaking of sanity could, and did the only thing he could.
Carefully, very carefully, he took a small bite of the nearest square of ambrosia and washed it down with a measured, minuscule sip of nectar to complete the right of hospitality on his end.
As soon as he did, Prometheus did the same, reaching for the ambrosia first and the nectar second as Daedalus did.
"There is a joke to be made here," Prometheus was the first to speak, something deliberately musing in his tone as he raised his glass and brought it to his lips. "About the dangers of extended family reunions."
Without another word, the Titan took a long, hearty drink.
That was the final cue for the demigods to dig in.
And dig in they did.
Oh, they remained wary, and Daedalus saw full well the way their hackles were raised and the flickering of their eyes from him to the titan and back again, but that didn't stop them from going through the sandwiches on the table like a pack of wolves, scarfing down whatever was closest as quickly and warily as possible, and then going in for seconds.
They couldn't help it, he knew.
Even putting aside their ordeals - and they'd been through enough to fill an old classic myth or three by now - The Labyrinth had a nasty habit of leeching the strength and vitality of its victims on a disproportionate scale. It all but feasted on that and more, in fact, while insidiously twisting their senses, leaving them blind to the fact until it was too late.
But that was a problem for another day - assuming he lived long enough to make it that far, which the chance of was, admittedly, far less likely now than it had been in the least moirai be damned millennium.
Wonderful.
Unaware of his simmering dread, the demigods continued feasting, though their hackles never once dropped, from the visibly livid Thalia Grace to the uncertain Biance D Angelo.
A small part of him took note of the way Percy Jackson's hand stayed clamped onto his half-sister's even as they ate, their knuckles white from the force of the mutual grip despite the fact that neither of them seemed to be consciously aware of it.
There was a story there, he was sure - just as there was a story that led to the pale-faced and entirely too mortal Apollo to be sitting a few seats down, occasionally glancing towards a dangerously contemplative Prometheus before his eyes moved back down to his plate almost entirely of their own accord.
At least the god - if former at that - had the good sense not to glance back or around at the Primordial manifestation of power surrounding them.
That possible consequences of such a bit of stupidity would not have ended well for anyone present, and even the creatures in their presence knew it too if the way the mythical Ophiotarus - and yes, Daedalus had recognized full well what that thing was - had basically crawled halfway under the table and stayed trembling beside the corpse-stiff and equally unnatural dog was any kind of tell.
The huntress of Artemis was a non-factor - Zoë Nightshade had managed to lift herself up and onto a chair, which was very impressive considering the state that she was in, but the glazed and distant look in her eyes was proof enough that she was barely conscious as she was.
In the end, it seemed that the only one of them who wasn't on the verge of crashing hard was... none other than Luna Lovegood, who was cutting very small, carefully measured squares of Ambrosia and depositing them onto Nico Di Angelo's plate with all the patience of a saint, and the patient smile to boot.
Strangely, considering everything, that made sense.
Of the worst kind.
His thoughts were derailed when Prometheus finally lowered his glass with a clink and abruptly broke out into low chuckles.
"Mortals." He said at last when he trailed off and collected himself - a display that was entirely for the benefit of his audience - and his tone took on a lilt that was almost admiring. "I step amongst you, I familiarize myself with your achievement, and I tell myself that I have your measure. And I do, for the most part. And yet..."
The Titan smiled in a way that pulled at his scars.
"Every once in a blue moon, one of you does something - the utterly ludicrous happens-" He gestured, and Daedalus refused to follow his gesture to what lay beyond their table. "And I am once more thrown for a loop. It is both aggravating... and yet entertaining. Novel, even, though perhaps far more dangerous than anything I would have expected even knowing of your lineage. Still-"
He nodded to the girl of the hour.
"Congratulations are in order. I am impressed."
There was a tense beat, and then Lovegood inclined her head.
"High praise, form one whose domain is that of Foresight."
Prometheus smiled.
"Even immortals who dabble in the machinations of fate can be surprised, child. In fact, it happens far more often than most would guess. Wouldn't you agree... Apollo?"
A flurry of rapid-fire emotions flickered over the fallen god's face, no doubt made worse by the manner in which Bianca's eyes widened in disbelief as she spun around to face him.
"Wait, what?"
Apollo did not answer her - his face had already settled on black rage.
He opened his mouth and spewed a tirade of words in multiple olden Greek dialects so scathing that Daedalus immediately tensed.
Not on account of the words themselves, which were amateur at best - but out of fear that this meeting's patron would take offense.
He dared to glance at the darkness -if it could be called that - and nearly shattered his armrests with a terrified grip as the shadows in the very corners of his vision seemed to shift.
But nothing happened.
Luna Lovegood caught his movement and seemed to immediately understand.
She gave him a low, asinine smile that failed to dispel any of his dread.
If anything, it made it worse.
"Don't look." She whispered, almost conspiratorially. "It's easier that way."
As if on cue, the shadows moved again.
That time, he did shatter his armrests, pulverized wood and splinters raining down from between his clenched fingers.
What exactly was this girl, and what forsaken pit of creation did she crawl out of?
Oblivious to their exchange - or more likely deliberately avoiding it, Prometheus kept his focus on Apollo as his rant finally petered out.
"Goodness me, I have upset you."
Apollo glared.
"Fuck you."
Someone choked.
"And that's just rude," Prometheus said dryly, unoffended.
"That's not rude," Apollo growled, fists clenching on the table in full view of them all. "Rude would be me asking you about the state of your liver."
"In far better shape now than it was all those millennia ago when your Father sentenced me to endless torture under the guise of justice, thank you for asking," Prometheus answered without skipping a beat. "Now you tell me - How is your divinity?"
"..."
"..."
"Fuck. You."
The amount of hate put into those two words alone was impressive, even for an Olympian.
Especially for an Olympian.
Or a former one, in the present case.
"I suppose I deserved that one." Prometheus acknowledge amiably, leaning back and panning his gaze across them all. Daedalus met it stonily when it landed on him. "Having Zeus as an enemy king is an ordeal enough. Having him as a father and knowing that you are not safe from his paranoid whims must be a trial all of its own."
Apollo actually flinched.
By Prometheus's pleased smile, he didn't miss it.
"I thought so."
"Back off." Thalia glowered, hands twitching as though reaching for the phantom of her spear. Daedlus's previously non-existent blood pressure spiked at the thought of what would descend on them should she so much as try and reach for it. "Better yet, say whatever stupid shit you've been waiting to spew, and fuck off."
"That was always my intention, Miss Grace." Prometheus chuckled again, still utterly at ease despite the insults. "But these things do take a good bit of build-up... then again, however..."
The titan steepled his fingers together firmly.
"You've all had quite enough build-up, would you agree." He spoke softly, almost gently. "I am inclined to waive the theatrics, just this once, in favor of the direct approach. Very well."
The demigods stiffened as Prometheus straightened, exuding a certain air.
An Authority.
"I am Prometheus, the Foresight of the Titans. And I have come on behalf of my faction and my King, young heroes, to render an invitation." He spread his arms wide. "Join us."
...
"No." "Fuck you." "Go to Tartarus."
Luna, Thalia, and Percy spoke over one another in the very same instant, the former far less forcefully than the latter two but no less firm for it. The other expressed a similar sentiment in the way they huddled closer together and stared mistrustfully.
It was well deserved.
Prometheus didn't look one bit bothered by the rejection. He looked towards Daedalus, who merely glared back.
Really?
"I understand that you have just cause to be wary of me and mine.. Believe me, I do. The tales paint the Titans as the monsters of this conflict - cruel and arrogant, capricious and whimsical, committing atrocities against mortals at the lightest, most exaggerated of provocations-"
"You're not-!" Annabeth Chase finally made her voice known, and it was tinged with incredulity. "You're not actually trying to convince us that the stories are lies, are you?"
"On the contrary, daughter of Athena, I will admit to their truth gladly." The girl almost recoiled in shock at that, and Prometheus smiled. "Not what you expected, was it? But it is the truth, and the truth is what I've come to offer you today. This I vow on my pride as the Creator of all Greek mortals."
Daedalus grimaced.
A clever... if misleading title - in a way.
But that was a matter for another time, because Prometheus was not finished.
"At the height of our power, and at our worst, we Titans were crueler and more petty than even the most insulting of the old myths painted us to be - and our King Kronos-" A shiver went through the air, though it was quickly drowned out beneath the veil of Erebus's nascent attention - the Titan King at the fullness of his power was nothing before even a slumbering elder Primordial. "-Was the greatest offender by far. He earned his title and his reputation as the Crooken One long before he reached his zenith, and his actions in regards to his newborn children were only an ugly culmination thousands of years in the making."
"Wow. Grandpa sounds like a swell guy." Percy smirked weakly. His hand still hadn't left Annabeth's. "Where do I sign up?"
"Idly, it's a matter of when, not where." Prometheus took the jab in stride - no, he did not consider it one to begin with.
"I can't tell if you're joking, or insane."
"Neither, Percy Jackson. I am, however, not finished. It is true that the Titans once lived up to their worst reputations, exceeded them even. But we have not remained so - when you have thousands of years to contemplate your fall from grace, only a fool does not acknowledge the need for a different approach. Even Kronos, reduced as he is in his current state, knows as much."
"Yeah? What, did he watch a 'I shouldn't have eaten my kids, and here's why' Ted Talk and decided to switch things up?' Percy snorted and went right back to glaring fiercely. "The only thing someone like Kronos would change about that would be him not killing them right from the start."
Prometheus raised a brow.
"Even if that were true-"
If?
Daedalus almost laughed himself, there. He would have were he not cold right down to his last component gear.
"-then he is just the same as the Olympians whose banners you currently stand beneath."
Ah.
So that was his angle.
Percy looked startled.
"What?"
"Did Zeus not attempt to have you killed, time and again, simply based on what you could possibly do?" Those green eyes widened. "Did Hades not attempt the same with Thalia Grace? Did not the Olympians as a whole spend uncountable eons doing the same, pruning mortal lives and manipulating the board to their benefit, at their leisure, regardless of the strife and suffering they sowed in pursuit of their own ends?"
The demigods were silent.
Daedalus was silent.
"My dear heroes, you can not claim righteousness while turning a blind eye to the very same evil you pretend to stand against. The very idea that the Gods who rule now are just where the Titans are not is their greatest success - a lie to disguise their own evil. They are not good - the rule of the Olympians was merely better than that of the Titans, and only by degrees at that. To deny this is to deny reality."
"No!" Apollo faltered as he made to speak, then rallied again. "That's-!"
"The truth - an undeniable one at that." Prometheus declared solemnly and did not even deign to turn to the former god as he continued to speak. "Or did you not see as much for yourselves? How quickly they abandoned one of their own-"
The huntress of Artemis twitched.
"-How quickly they turned on themselves, and how unforgiving and unmerciful Zeus is when his own power and authority were at risk."
Apollo and Thalia exchanged a look, almost entirely on reluctant instinct.
"And it does not end there. Do not think for even a second that victory - of any kind at all - on this quest will mean anything to them. The gods will applaud you for settling a quest, and vote on your very lives in the same breath without an ounce of dignity or shame. Ask Apollo there, if you dare. As him what fate Olympus would have in store for you even if you freed Artemis from our grip and returned her to them in time for the winter solstice, on this very night even, and with not a price paid beyond the momentous effort it would take for you to achieve the feat."
Silence.
"Well?" Prometheus looked around once more. "Go on. Ask him."
No one said a word.
No one needed to.
"You see?" The titan's voice softened once more. "There is no sense in refusing to even entertain the validity of our cause when the state of Olympus and the choices it makes speaks for it all on its lonesome. To support the gods-"
"Enough."
Prometheus stilled. Daedalus stiffened, and a round of sharp inhalations came from across the table.
Luna Lovegood, uncaring of any of them, stared down at the titan with not a hint of cheer or good humor on her face.
Silvery blue against grey.
"Pardon the interruption, but your assumption is bold."
"Assumption?"
"The assumption..."
Slowly, the Daughter of Thanatos straightened in her seat.
In response, and to Daedalus's utter horror, the darkness behind her moved in a way that no one could deny, wafting and waving as it seemed to close in on her until nothing but spectral blackness existed in her shadow.
"...That I care one whit for the gods of Olympus in the long run."
...
Well, then.
Prometheus said nothing.
No one did.
And slowly, Luna smiled.
For the first time in quite some time, the gesture was not all that kind.
"Let's get a few things straightened out, shall we?"
Prometheus: Getting all excited dissing the gods:
Luna: Aight I'm done.
The part of the Titan's curse where Percy and co finished their quest, got to Olympus, and the gods almost immediately voted on whether or not to disintegrate them right to their faces was so messed up.
As always, leave your comments and ideas and if you don't like it, please be courteous.
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Yet all the same, Daedalus had never once regretted existing nearly as much as he did right then, sharing a table with a Titan, six would-be heroes, a sundered god, a downed huntress lying to the side, a mythical creature that spelled the end of Olympus itself and... ah, yes.
The looming, boundless presence of the all-consuming Darkness surrounding them and chilling the very air in his crafted lungs with the imminent threat of abyssal oblivion.
However, could he forget?
Oh, how he wished he could forget - or better yet, leave entirely.
Instead, the wayward son of Athena resolutely ignored the looming and utterly unassailable threat poised to plunge him into an unimaginable fate should he so much as twitch the wrong as only one desperately fighting back the breaking of sanity could, and did the only thing he could.
Carefully, very carefully, he took a small bite of the nearest square of ambrosia and washed it down with a measured, minuscule sip of nectar to complete the right of hospitality on his end.
As soon as he did, Prometheus did the same, reaching for the ambrosia first and the nectar second as Daedalus did.
"There is a joke to be made here," Prometheus was the first to speak, something deliberately musing in his tone as he raised his glass and brought it to his lips. "About the dangers of extended family reunions."
Without another word, the Titan took a long, hearty drink.
That was the final cue for the demigods to dig in.
And dig in they did.
Oh, they remained wary, and Daedalus saw full well the way their hackles were raised and the flickering of their eyes from him to the titan and back again, but that didn't stop them from going through the sandwiches on the table like a pack of wolves, scarfing down whatever was closest as quickly and warily as possible, and then going in for seconds.
They couldn't help it, he knew.
Even putting aside their ordeals - and they'd been through enough to fill an old classic myth or three by now - The Labyrinth had a nasty habit of leeching the strength and vitality of its victims on a disproportionate scale. It all but feasted on that and more, in fact, while insidiously twisting their senses, leaving them blind to the fact until it was too late.
But that was a problem for another day - assuming he lived long enough to make it that far, which the chance of was, admittedly, far less likely now than it had been in the least moirai be damned millennium.
Wonderful.
Unaware of his simmering dread, the demigods continued feasting, though their hackles never once dropped, from the visibly livid Thalia Grace to the uncertain Biance D Angelo.
A small part of him took note of the way Percy Jackson's hand stayed clamped onto his half-sister's even as they ate, their knuckles white from the force of the mutual grip despite the fact that neither of them seemed to be consciously aware of it.
There was a story there, he was sure - just as there was a story that led to the pale-faced and entirely too mortal Apollo to be sitting a few seats down, occasionally glancing towards a dangerously contemplative Prometheus before his eyes moved back down to his plate almost entirely of their own accord.
At least the god - if former at that - had the good sense not to glance back or around at the Primordial manifestation of power surrounding them.
That possible consequences of such a bit of stupidity would not have ended well for anyone present, and even the creatures in their presence knew it too if the way the mythical Ophiotarus - and yes, Daedalus had recognized full well what that thing was - had basically crawled halfway under the table and stayed trembling beside the corpse-stiff and equally unnatural dog was any kind of tell.
The huntress of Artemis was a non-factor - Zoë Nightshade had managed to lift herself up and onto a chair, which was very impressive considering the state that she was in, but the glazed and distant look in her eyes was proof enough that she was barely conscious as she was.
In the end, it seemed that the only one of them who wasn't on the verge of crashing hard was... none other than Luna Lovegood, who was cutting very small, carefully measured squares of Ambrosia and depositing them onto Nico Di Angelo's plate with all the patience of a saint, and the patient smile to boot.
Strangely, considering everything, that made sense.
Of the worst kind.
His thoughts were derailed when Prometheus finally lowered his glass with a clink and abruptly broke out into low chuckles.
"Mortals." He said at last when he trailed off and collected himself - a display that was entirely for the benefit of his audience - and his tone took on a lilt that was almost admiring. "I step amongst you, I familiarize myself with your achievement, and I tell myself that I have your measure. And I do, for the most part. And yet..."
The Titan smiled in a way that pulled at his scars.
"Every once in a blue moon, one of you does something - the utterly ludicrous happens-" He gestured, and Daedalus refused to follow his gesture to what lay beyond their table. "And I am once more thrown for a loop. It is both aggravating... and yet entertaining. Novel, even, though perhaps far more dangerous than anything I would have expected even knowing of your lineage. Still-"
He nodded to the girl of the hour.
"Congratulations are in order. I am impressed."
There was a tense beat, and then Lovegood inclined her head.
"High praise, form one whose domain is that of Foresight."
Prometheus smiled.
"Even immortals who dabble in the machinations of fate can be surprised, child. In fact, it happens far more often than most would guess. Wouldn't you agree... Apollo?"
A flurry of rapid-fire emotions flickered over the fallen god's face, no doubt made worse by the manner in which Bianca's eyes widened in disbelief as she spun around to face him.
"Wait, what?"
Apollo did not answer her - his face had already settled on black rage.
He opened his mouth and spewed a tirade of words in multiple olden Greek dialects so scathing that Daedalus immediately tensed.
Not on account of the words themselves, which were amateur at best - but out of fear that this meeting's patron would take offense.
He dared to glance at the darkness -if it could be called that - and nearly shattered his armrests with a terrified grip as the shadows in the very corners of his vision seemed to shift.
But nothing happened.
Luna Lovegood caught his movement and seemed to immediately understand.
She gave him a low, asinine smile that failed to dispel any of his dread.
If anything, it made it worse.
"Don't look." She whispered, almost conspiratorially. "It's easier that way."
As if on cue, the shadows moved again.
That time, he did shatter his armrests, pulverized wood and splinters raining down from between his clenched fingers.
What exactly was this girl, and what forsaken pit of creation did she crawl out of?
Oblivious to their exchange - or more likely deliberately avoiding it, Prometheus kept his focus on Apollo as his rant finally petered out.
"Goodness me, I have upset you."
Apollo glared.
"Fuck you."
Someone choked.
"And that's just rude," Prometheus said dryly, unoffended.
"That's not rude," Apollo growled, fists clenching on the table in full view of them all. "Rude would be me asking you about the state of your liver."
"In far better shape now than it was all those millennia ago when your Father sentenced me to endless torture under the guise of justice, thank you for asking," Prometheus answered without skipping a beat. "Now you tell me - How is your divinity?"
"..."
"..."
"Fuck. You."
The amount of hate put into those two words alone was impressive, even for an Olympian.
Especially for an Olympian.
Or a former one, in the present case.
"I suppose I deserved that one." Prometheus acknowledge amiably, leaning back and panning his gaze across them all. Daedalus met it stonily when it landed on him. "Having Zeus as an enemy king is an ordeal enough. Having him as a father and knowing that you are not safe from his paranoid whims must be a trial all of its own."
Apollo actually flinched.
By Prometheus's pleased smile, he didn't miss it.
"I thought so."
"Back off." Thalia glowered, hands twitching as though reaching for the phantom of her spear. Daedlus's previously non-existent blood pressure spiked at the thought of what would descend on them should she so much as try and reach for it. "Better yet, say whatever stupid shit you've been waiting to spew, and fuck off."
"That was always my intention, Miss Grace." Prometheus chuckled again, still utterly at ease despite the insults. "But these things do take a good bit of build-up... then again, however..."
The titan steepled his fingers together firmly.
"You've all had quite enough build-up, would you agree." He spoke softly, almost gently. "I am inclined to waive the theatrics, just this once, in favor of the direct approach. Very well."
The demigods stiffened as Prometheus straightened, exuding a certain air.
An Authority.
"I am Prometheus, the Foresight of the Titans. And I have come on behalf of my faction and my King, young heroes, to render an invitation." He spread his arms wide. "Join us."
...
"No." "Fuck you." "Go to Tartarus."
Luna, Thalia, and Percy spoke over one another in the very same instant, the former far less forcefully than the latter two but no less firm for it. The other expressed a similar sentiment in the way they huddled closer together and stared mistrustfully.
It was well deserved.
Prometheus didn't look one bit bothered by the rejection. He looked towards Daedalus, who merely glared back.
Really?
"I understand that you have just cause to be wary of me and mine.. Believe me, I do. The tales paint the Titans as the monsters of this conflict - cruel and arrogant, capricious and whimsical, committing atrocities against mortals at the lightest, most exaggerated of provocations-"
"You're not-!" Annabeth Chase finally made her voice known, and it was tinged with incredulity. "You're not actually trying to convince us that the stories are lies, are you?"
"On the contrary, daughter of Athena, I will admit to their truth gladly." The girl almost recoiled in shock at that, and Prometheus smiled. "Not what you expected, was it? But it is the truth, and the truth is what I've come to offer you today. This I vow on my pride as the Creator of all Greek mortals."
Daedalus grimaced.
A clever... if misleading title - in a way.
But that was a matter for another time, because Prometheus was not finished.
"At the height of our power, and at our worst, we Titans were crueler and more petty than even the most insulting of the old myths painted us to be - and our King Kronos-" A shiver went through the air, though it was quickly drowned out beneath the veil of Erebus's nascent attention - the Titan King at the fullness of his power was nothing before even a slumbering elder Primordial. "-Was the greatest offender by far. He earned his title and his reputation as the Crooken One long before he reached his zenith, and his actions in regards to his newborn children were only an ugly culmination thousands of years in the making."
"Wow. Grandpa sounds like a swell guy." Percy smirked weakly. His hand still hadn't left Annabeth's. "Where do I sign up?"
"Idly, it's a matter of when, not where." Prometheus took the jab in stride - no, he did not consider it one to begin with.
"I can't tell if you're joking, or insane."
"Neither, Percy Jackson. I am, however, not finished. It is true that the Titans once lived up to their worst reputations, exceeded them even. But we have not remained so - when you have thousands of years to contemplate your fall from grace, only a fool does not acknowledge the need for a different approach. Even Kronos, reduced as he is in his current state, knows as much."
"Yeah? What, did he watch a 'I shouldn't have eaten my kids, and here's why' Ted Talk and decided to switch things up?' Percy snorted and went right back to glaring fiercely. "The only thing someone like Kronos would change about that would be him not killing them right from the start."
Prometheus raised a brow.
"Even if that were true-"
If?
Daedalus almost laughed himself, there. He would have were he not cold right down to his last component gear.
"-then he is just the same as the Olympians whose banners you currently stand beneath."
Ah.
So that was his angle.
Percy looked startled.
"What?"
"Did Zeus not attempt to have you killed, time and again, simply based on what you could possibly do?" Those green eyes widened. "Did Hades not attempt the same with Thalia Grace? Did not the Olympians as a whole spend uncountable eons doing the same, pruning mortal lives and manipulating the board to their benefit, at their leisure, regardless of the strife and suffering they sowed in pursuit of their own ends?"
The demigods were silent.
Daedalus was silent.
"My dear heroes, you can not claim righteousness while turning a blind eye to the very same evil you pretend to stand against. The very idea that the Gods who rule now are just where the Titans are not is their greatest success - a lie to disguise their own evil. They are not good - the rule of the Olympians was merely better than that of the Titans, and only by degrees at that. To deny this is to deny reality."
"No!" Apollo faltered as he made to speak, then rallied again. "That's-!"
"The truth - an undeniable one at that." Prometheus declared solemnly and did not even deign to turn to the former god as he continued to speak. "Or did you not see as much for yourselves? How quickly they abandoned one of their own-"
The huntress of Artemis twitched.
"-How quickly they turned on themselves, and how unforgiving and unmerciful Zeus is when his own power and authority were at risk."
Apollo and Thalia exchanged a look, almost entirely on reluctant instinct.
"And it does not end there. Do not think for even a second that victory - of any kind at all - on this quest will mean anything to them. The gods will applaud you for settling a quest, and vote on your very lives in the same breath without an ounce of dignity or shame. Ask Apollo there, if you dare. As him what fate Olympus would have in store for you even if you freed Artemis from our grip and returned her to them in time for the winter solstice, on this very night even, and with not a price paid beyond the momentous effort it would take for you to achieve the feat."
Silence.
"Well?" Prometheus looked around once more. "Go on. Ask him."
No one said a word.
No one needed to.
"You see?" The titan's voice softened once more. "There is no sense in refusing to even entertain the validity of our cause when the state of Olympus and the choices it makes speaks for it all on its lonesome. To support the gods-"
"Enough."
Prometheus stilled. Daedalus stiffened, and a round of sharp inhalations came from across the table.
Luna Lovegood, uncaring of any of them, stared down at the titan with not a hint of cheer or good humor on her face.
Silvery blue against grey.
"Pardon the interruption, but your assumption is bold."
"Assumption?"
"The assumption..."
Slowly, the Daughter of Thanatos straightened in her seat.
In response, and to Daedalus's utter horror, the darkness behind her moved in a way that no one could deny, wafting and waving as it seemed to close in on her until nothing but spectral blackness existed in her shadow.
"...That I care one whit for the gods of Olympus in the long run."
...
Well, then.
Prometheus said nothing.
No one did.
And slowly, Luna smiled.
For the first time in quite some time, the gesture was not all that kind.
"Let's get a few things straightened out, shall we?"
...
Prometheus: Getting all excited dissing the gods:
Luna: Aight I'm done.
The part of the Titan's curse where Percy and co finished their quest, got to Olympus, and the gods almost immediately voted on whether or not to disintegrate them right to their faces was so messed up.
As always, leave your comments and ideas and if you don't like it, please be courteous.
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ScissorSlipper
Barber cat
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Yay, Luna shows a different, perhaps more honest side. I liked this chapter. Not much angst, but it did have colorful and dynamic dialogue.
"The assumption that the gods of Olympus are still alive. Last I saw any of them, my father Thanatos was doing his best to kill them."
Prometheus' eyes widened. The idea that one god could kill multiple others was preposterous, and yet...
Luna continued. "You know of Thanatos? God of death? Gods gain strength from their domain. He might have to get lucky to kill the first one, but after that..." She trailed off, smiling placidly, and the demigods present were no longer at all sure what they should be hoping for.
Fabula Amanti
I want a Grimoire, but I got books.
- Location
- Singapore
Hmm, I wonder if in setting there is a possibility to walk away. They keep saying the free demigods are monster magnets that would likely die and the sane choice would be to join up with the camp and be under Olympus' thumb. The alternative would be to side with the Titans to spite Olympus but would be a net loss for everyone in the world. And there is little to no middle ground or third way besides death.
Here Luna is depicted as a wandering demigod. Given freedom and education to pursue her own wants and whims. Even to step over the line into other pantheons. Fate has pulled her into the tale but after the prophecy she can possibly walk away. Though the question is what she can take with here I think.
I hope others pantheons will be mixed into the story too ! And not only what Rick Riordan wrote only !
Thank you for writing !
Thank you for writing !
Chapter 18: The Titan Of Foresight - Part 3
New
"I am not a demigod of Olympus." Luna Lovegood murmured, and the Darkness stretching around her like a cloak seemed to ripple from the off-putting force the calm, measured words sent out. "I have never been concerned with the state of Olympus, and I have never cared for it beyond the minimum effort it took to acknowledge the gods that rule from it in a purely academic sense."
"Oh?"
"That's right - and if this conversation is meant to be an attempt to pull down some over-polished, prettied-up image of the gods you seem to believe I have floating around in my head, I wouldn't waste my breath." The corners of her lips curved up. "I've had a very comprehensive education growing up, and I am under no delusions as to the nature of the Olympians."
To his credit - as much of it as Daedalus would be willing to credit him with. - Prometheus didn't react overmuch to the suddenly looming presence of the primordial besides adjusting his seat and very carefully folding his arms over the table with a slow, almost languid movement.
It was still better than what he and the rest of them had managed - the demigods were stiff, backs ram-rod straight, the Ophiotaurus and the Labrador were prey-still, and a distant, hysterically amused part of him was fairly certain that Apollo had stopped breathing entirely.
"Well, you must forgive my assumption, bold though it may have been." The titan smiled humorlessly, which was par the course for this conversation at oblivion-point by now. "It is simply an ingrained reflex at this point, to assume that demigods who interact with me and mine would immediately expect us to be the monsters at the end of the tale. You would not believe the lengths and leaps in logic some have gone to in the past simply in an attempt to prove that we are the great evil to Olympus's good."
Prometheus's placid smile never wavered, but that last word still rang out between them with an undertone of acrid derision.
If Daedalus hadn't been focused very hard on not moving in any way whatsoever, he might have considered agreeing with the sentiment.
There was a reason that the reign of Olympus was only considered better than that of Othrys, and never good. - And even that was up for debate.
Luna Lovegood's empty smile smoothed out into a neutral look.
"None of us here are blind." For just a moment, she panned her eyes across the table, though no one could quite meet her gaze. "And I certainly don't share that opinion."
Prometheus raised an expectant brow, but he didn't say a word.
She wasn't finished speaking.
"There is no clear-cut good and evil between your factions, that much is true - but I also think that when one is expected to choose between leaping into a frying pan or running into the fire, they're much better off not picking at all." Her eyes narrowed pointedly. "Choosing one over the other on the off chance that you might come out the other side with fewer burns isn't the winning argument you seem to think it is, Lord Prometheus."
"Fair enough... however," Prometheus leaned forward, smile now wry, but undiminished. "It is the only argument I can truly offer you in the spirit of honesty, backed by my assurance that things are not as they once were, and the demigods of Olympus are unfortunately due for an inevitable collision with the precipe of a choice they must make."
"Is that right?"
"Come now, let us not insult one another's intelligence - you know it is."
She pursed her lips tightly - but she didn't refuse the point.
"You might have a remarkably greater degree of... let's call it leeway in how things are set to play out over the course of this inevitable war given your parentage and the sheer means you've demonstrated as of yet, to the extent that even now I find myself carefully choosing my next your words, but your fellow questers aren't quite so fortunate, are they?"
Another pause, heavier than the last.
And then someone else broke it.
"If there's a point to any of this." Every pair of eyes immediately snapped to Percy Jackson. Annabeth's grip on his arm was bone-white. "Get to it, and get this over with already."
The last words were a hiss that would have made a gorgon proud. The demigod was at the very, very end of his tether.
In spite of himself, Daedalus sympathized, he really did.
Anything that ended this debacle and got them all far, far away for him would be a fates-ordained miracle at this point.
"The point, son of Poseidon-"
The boy's face twitched and his free hand jerked like in an aborted movement that was almost certainly a reach for some manner of weapon. Annabeth's steadying grip somehow grew that much stronger.
"-is that you are halfway through a prophesized quest, with the gods at your heels and us titans to your front. You might be trapped in between a rock and a hard place, and you might very well despise it - I would far from bame you after all these ordeals - but come the end of this quest, you will have to decide on which side your loyalties would be better placed."
Jackson actually cracked a grin that was more teeth than smile.
"With you, right?"
"That, or the gods that even now forsake you."
The way that truth rang out between them, cold and impersonal and free of inflection made it hit that much harder, Daedalus could see it in their eyes.
Prometheus only watched as Jackson pretended to consider that.
"...Are you done?
"..."
Then, eerily enough, he leaned back.
"I suppose I am."
Daedalus almost jolted in shock.
What?
"Great. Good to know. We'll probably get back to you sometime in the next three to five business days." Jackson's eyes lit up with flat hostility. "Now leave."
If the vitriol in that world alone were made into poison, they would all be dead from proximity alone.
"There's no need for worry. I've made my offer, and accomplished everything I've set out here to do."
Prometheus spoke softly, acquiescing - and that was enough to set Daedalus's teeth on edge, how easily he seemed to be taking all of this.
Even with The Darkness's overbearing clawing grating at their souls, it still felt as if the words were coming from a coiled serpent.
And he would know about serpents - he was the son of Athena, cursed or not.
But he had no control or even the wish for here, and he said nothing as Prometheus shifted his focus back to Lovegood.
She met his stare evenly.
"If you're expecting a different answer from me, you're going to be sorely disappointed."
"Alas, I am not so foolish." The lord of foresight acknowledged with a practiced sigh. "But in my defense, you didn't give me much of an answer, did you?"
That earned him another enigmatic look, and nothing more.
"No, I didn't. Take from that what you will."
Prometheus took that in, and then, to all their collective surprise, he tipped back his head and laughed.
Not long, nor hard, but enough.
"Oh," He said at last, ignoring the way they all stared at him. "Come what may, this is going to be a delight, isn't it?"
Daedalus once more resisted the urge to drive his fist through the wood in front of him in frustration as the moment dragged on again.
Then his shoulders tightened more when, as though he was sensing his spiraling anger, Prometheus turned to him at last.
"Daedalus."
"What do you want?"
It was an unapologetic demand, but he was well past the point of pretending to care - And if the threat of primordial judgment was to be levied against him in this farce, he might as well use it to his advantage.
"If you're expecting an answer from me as well, you won't have it. I want nothing to do with any of your ilk, titans or gods alike. Begone."
Prometheus didn't so much as flinch at the tone.
"We shall see. Ordinarily, I would approach this far more delicately, but I do believe this situation is beyond the theatrics of polite diplomacy." The titan's eyes narrowed. "Join us, and you have my word that Perdix and Icarus will be raised from the Underworld."
Pain.
Immediate, uncompromising pain.
It flashed across his face like a fire - he hadn't been prepared, too occupied with the grip of mortal terror to see it coming - and every quester and beast alike bore witness to it before he schools his expression.
"The wisest kinslayer's pain"
Somebody whispered - Annabeth, perhaps - but he barely heard her as he met Prometheus's gaze, viciously burying the millennia-old grief and the longing in the depths of his soul.
Curse you.
He didn't say the words. He didn't have to - the hate in his eyes must have roared volumes.
"Not just them, either. Any mortal attachments you may long for. A position in the Titans' court. A chance for vengeance on former enemies, from the most pitiful to that would-be Ghost King himself. It could all be years with but a word." The titan laid out his cards with the confidence only an immortal could tote. "Do consider-"
"Enough."
Prometheus paused... and then slowly inclined his head.
"Very well."
But it wasn't.
"This ritual is at an end. As Lord of the Labyrinth, I rescind my Hospitality." Daedalus declared, and the Darkness suddenly shifted. Prometheus went still. "Leave. Now, and darken not my halls again!"
The words cracked like a whip of thunder, and the icy presence surrounding them pulsed with unspoken, horrible threat.
He almost wished the titan would attempt to argue.
But Prometheus was never so great a fool as to try.
"As you wish."
He rose, smoothly and fluidly pulling back from the table in the same motion, and the heroes almost collectively jerked for their weapons.
They needn't have bothered.
Prometheus only offered them a look, eyes flickering from Jackson to Lovegood and everyone in between.
"Think on my words, young heroes. Time is a valuable commodity, and you simply don't have enough of it as it is." He turned to Apollo, at the very last. "My offer extends even to you... and perhaps even Artemis herself, should you play your cards right."
Apollo merely sneered and clenched his hands into fists, and Prometheus found it in himself to smile in amusement, one last time.
"That's the spirit. Now you need only temper it with the wisdom to match, and you might find your way to a victory after all. And for what it's worth?"
His form began to shimmer and glow.
"I truly do wish you the best, if for no other reasons than that you've more than earned it."
There was a sound not unlike to a burst of rushing a wind, a flare of silver-gold light, and the Titan of Foresight was gone.
...
A moment passed.
Then two.
Three. Four. Five.
And the Lovegood - of course - cleared her throat.
"And that, as they say, was that." The words were just as humorless as everything that had slipped out of her mouth from the moment she had called forth her Grandfather's presence.
He who still made his Presence felt.
Daedalus has no more patience left for either.
"And this, as they say-"
He stood from his chair and gestured to the side. His will pressed against the ephemeral, twisted thing that was the Labyrinth's own, and the latter bowed to the former.
The cavern shuddered. The walls rumbled. The mist flickered-
"-is over."
And at the spot he pointed out, a door appeared, engraved with a familiar triangular symbol.
The Labyrinth whispered to him what lay beyond it even as he turned back to the daughter of Thanatos.
"That will lead you back into the mortal world - San Fransico." He ignored the way his sister jerked at the corner of his perception. "Leave."
The girl looked at him, silver eyes clouded and devoid of a single tell.
...
And then she nodded.
It would have been far too trusting under ordinary circumstances, but these were not.
Daedalus would not dare lie while the oath of hospitality still held.
"Thank you for sheltering us within your domain, Lord of the Labyrinth. We shall take our leave."
She stood, slowly, because there was still an order to this sordid affair. The would-be heroes quickly rose with her.
Perhaps they would have insisted on getting more out of him had they the will to try, or perhaps not.
It did not matter now.
Even Apollo, the god, could barely meet any of their eyes.
Daedalus wanted to laugh.
He also wanted to rage.
He wanted and wanted and ended up with nothing at all.
In the end, he did nothing but watch as Lovegood turned, slightly, and bowed her head just so. Her hand rose and brushed against the shadows behind her, and Daedalus grit his teeth and snapped his gaze to the side as they w̶a̸r̷p̷e̷d̷ and c̵o̸i̷l̴e̴d̶ around her.
A̶l̵m̶o̷s̸t̴ ̵e̴m̸b̷r̸a̶c̴i̴n̶g̷ ̷h̴e̷r̵.̷
"Thank you, Grandfather."
And just like that, Erebus turned away.
Even as he made to sigh in relief as the attention of the Darkness receded. The Labyrinth reasserted control, for all the good it did him now.
But the cold lingered.
Warmth didn't return even as the demigods left - marching in a single file behind Lovegood as she strode out the door, the Ophiotaurus and the Labrador at their heels.
When the last of them passed through, shut behind them and vanished as if never were.
Leaving him alone, in the depths of the Labyrinth.
With only his shame and his guilt for company.
Elsewhere:
In another burst of silver-gold light, Prometheus materialized in the throne room of Othrys.
Atlas was waiting for him, sitting astride a seat that was only one step away from a throne in its own right - though never one.
Even in his diminished state, Kronos would never suffer such a slight, even from the greatest general of the Titans.
"Well?"
Prometheus sighed at his impatience.
"It went exactly as I expected."
He resisted the urge to smile again as he spoke.
What spine those mortals had.
"They rejected the offer, then?"
It was almost a shame, that which was to come.
"As we both knew they would."
"Then I take it the plan is still in motion?"
Prometheus nodded.
"They'll never see it coming - they're shaken, their confidence in tatters, and whatever horrors the Labyrinth has inflicted them on have done their part in making it so."
Regardless of their choices, they would be playing right into their hands.
Acknowledging this, Atlas simply barred his teeth in menacing delight.
"Good."
"It will not be as simple as it sounds." He cautioned. "The Daughter of Thanatos is an even greater threat than we'd first imagined."
Quickly, he recounted his encounter with them.
The state he had found the demigods in. The presence of the Ophitoarus.
Even Apollo, reduced as he was.
All of them right there, ripe for the picking.
And then came the Primordial Darkness, descending on him at the call of one little demigoddess.
Even Atlas grew silent at that.
And a silent Atlas was far more dangerous than a confident one.
"That girl must be dealt with." He drummed his fingertips against his throne's armrest with enough power to near-pulverize it. "First, before all the others."
"She cannot die at our hand."
After everything he had seen, he had no doubt that to take such an action without preparation would be to leave themselves open to the immediate consequences.
And those would be nothing short of cataclysmic.
"I am no fool."
"Leave her to me."
And then a third presence made itself known, breaching the throne room and appearing in their midst with a rush of utter power.
Prometheus's eyes widened. Even Atlas grunted in acknowledgment.
"So you've come."
"Yes." A cruel smile pulled at the newcomer's lips, and "Yes, I did."
Another wave of power shook the room, fiery and unrelenting and filled with deadly promise.
"And in two days time, our ultimate victory will be ensured at my hand."
And then - right then -Prometheus knew it, as did Atlas.
The die was cast.
We have one more prep chapter, a little lull, and we dive right into the third and final act of this quest.
As always, leave your comments and ideas, and if you don't like it, please be courteous.
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"Oh?"
"That's right - and if this conversation is meant to be an attempt to pull down some over-polished, prettied-up image of the gods you seem to believe I have floating around in my head, I wouldn't waste my breath." The corners of her lips curved up. "I've had a very comprehensive education growing up, and I am under no delusions as to the nature of the Olympians."
To his credit - as much of it as Daedalus would be willing to credit him with. - Prometheus didn't react overmuch to the suddenly looming presence of the primordial besides adjusting his seat and very carefully folding his arms over the table with a slow, almost languid movement.
It was still better than what he and the rest of them had managed - the demigods were stiff, backs ram-rod straight, the Ophiotaurus and the Labrador were prey-still, and a distant, hysterically amused part of him was fairly certain that Apollo had stopped breathing entirely.
"Well, you must forgive my assumption, bold though it may have been." The titan smiled humorlessly, which was par the course for this conversation at oblivion-point by now. "It is simply an ingrained reflex at this point, to assume that demigods who interact with me and mine would immediately expect us to be the monsters at the end of the tale. You would not believe the lengths and leaps in logic some have gone to in the past simply in an attempt to prove that we are the great evil to Olympus's good."
Prometheus's placid smile never wavered, but that last word still rang out between them with an undertone of acrid derision.
If Daedalus hadn't been focused very hard on not moving in any way whatsoever, he might have considered agreeing with the sentiment.
There was a reason that the reign of Olympus was only considered better than that of Othrys, and never good. - And even that was up for debate.
Luna Lovegood's empty smile smoothed out into a neutral look.
"None of us here are blind." For just a moment, she panned her eyes across the table, though no one could quite meet her gaze. "And I certainly don't share that opinion."
Prometheus raised an expectant brow, but he didn't say a word.
She wasn't finished speaking.
"There is no clear-cut good and evil between your factions, that much is true - but I also think that when one is expected to choose between leaping into a frying pan or running into the fire, they're much better off not picking at all." Her eyes narrowed pointedly. "Choosing one over the other on the off chance that you might come out the other side with fewer burns isn't the winning argument you seem to think it is, Lord Prometheus."
"Fair enough... however," Prometheus leaned forward, smile now wry, but undiminished. "It is the only argument I can truly offer you in the spirit of honesty, backed by my assurance that things are not as they once were, and the demigods of Olympus are unfortunately due for an inevitable collision with the precipe of a choice they must make."
"Is that right?"
"Come now, let us not insult one another's intelligence - you know it is."
She pursed her lips tightly - but she didn't refuse the point.
"You might have a remarkably greater degree of... let's call it leeway in how things are set to play out over the course of this inevitable war given your parentage and the sheer means you've demonstrated as of yet, to the extent that even now I find myself carefully choosing my next your words, but your fellow questers aren't quite so fortunate, are they?"
Another pause, heavier than the last.
And then someone else broke it.
"If there's a point to any of this." Every pair of eyes immediately snapped to Percy Jackson. Annabeth's grip on his arm was bone-white. "Get to it, and get this over with already."
The last words were a hiss that would have made a gorgon proud. The demigod was at the very, very end of his tether.
In spite of himself, Daedalus sympathized, he really did.
Anything that ended this debacle and got them all far, far away for him would be a fates-ordained miracle at this point.
"The point, son of Poseidon-"
The boy's face twitched and his free hand jerked like in an aborted movement that was almost certainly a reach for some manner of weapon. Annabeth's steadying grip somehow grew that much stronger.
"-is that you are halfway through a prophesized quest, with the gods at your heels and us titans to your front. You might be trapped in between a rock and a hard place, and you might very well despise it - I would far from bame you after all these ordeals - but come the end of this quest, you will have to decide on which side your loyalties would be better placed."
Jackson actually cracked a grin that was more teeth than smile.
"With you, right?"
"That, or the gods that even now forsake you."
The way that truth rang out between them, cold and impersonal and free of inflection made it hit that much harder, Daedalus could see it in their eyes.
Prometheus only watched as Jackson pretended to consider that.
"...Are you done?
"..."
Then, eerily enough, he leaned back.
"I suppose I am."
Daedalus almost jolted in shock.
What?
"Great. Good to know. We'll probably get back to you sometime in the next three to five business days." Jackson's eyes lit up with flat hostility. "Now leave."
If the vitriol in that world alone were made into poison, they would all be dead from proximity alone.
"There's no need for worry. I've made my offer, and accomplished everything I've set out here to do."
Prometheus spoke softly, acquiescing - and that was enough to set Daedalus's teeth on edge, how easily he seemed to be taking all of this.
Even with The Darkness's overbearing clawing grating at their souls, it still felt as if the words were coming from a coiled serpent.
And he would know about serpents - he was the son of Athena, cursed or not.
But he had no control or even the wish for here, and he said nothing as Prometheus shifted his focus back to Lovegood.
She met his stare evenly.
"If you're expecting a different answer from me, you're going to be sorely disappointed."
"Alas, I am not so foolish." The lord of foresight acknowledged with a practiced sigh. "But in my defense, you didn't give me much of an answer, did you?"
That earned him another enigmatic look, and nothing more.
"No, I didn't. Take from that what you will."
Prometheus took that in, and then, to all their collective surprise, he tipped back his head and laughed.
Not long, nor hard, but enough.
"Oh," He said at last, ignoring the way they all stared at him. "Come what may, this is going to be a delight, isn't it?"
Daedalus once more resisted the urge to drive his fist through the wood in front of him in frustration as the moment dragged on again.
Then his shoulders tightened more when, as though he was sensing his spiraling anger, Prometheus turned to him at last.
"Daedalus."
"What do you want?"
It was an unapologetic demand, but he was well past the point of pretending to care - And if the threat of primordial judgment was to be levied against him in this farce, he might as well use it to his advantage.
"If you're expecting an answer from me as well, you won't have it. I want nothing to do with any of your ilk, titans or gods alike. Begone."
Prometheus didn't so much as flinch at the tone.
"We shall see. Ordinarily, I would approach this far more delicately, but I do believe this situation is beyond the theatrics of polite diplomacy." The titan's eyes narrowed. "Join us, and you have my word that Perdix and Icarus will be raised from the Underworld."
Pain.
Immediate, uncompromising pain.
It flashed across his face like a fire - he hadn't been prepared, too occupied with the grip of mortal terror to see it coming - and every quester and beast alike bore witness to it before he schools his expression.
"The wisest kinslayer's pain"
Somebody whispered - Annabeth, perhaps - but he barely heard her as he met Prometheus's gaze, viciously burying the millennia-old grief and the longing in the depths of his soul.
Curse you.
He didn't say the words. He didn't have to - the hate in his eyes must have roared volumes.
"Not just them, either. Any mortal attachments you may long for. A position in the Titans' court. A chance for vengeance on former enemies, from the most pitiful to that would-be Ghost King himself. It could all be years with but a word." The titan laid out his cards with the confidence only an immortal could tote. "Do consider-"
"Enough."
Prometheus paused... and then slowly inclined his head.
"Very well."
But it wasn't.
"This ritual is at an end. As Lord of the Labyrinth, I rescind my Hospitality." Daedalus declared, and the Darkness suddenly shifted. Prometheus went still. "Leave. Now, and darken not my halls again!"
The words cracked like a whip of thunder, and the icy presence surrounding them pulsed with unspoken, horrible threat.
He almost wished the titan would attempt to argue.
But Prometheus was never so great a fool as to try.
"As you wish."
He rose, smoothly and fluidly pulling back from the table in the same motion, and the heroes almost collectively jerked for their weapons.
They needn't have bothered.
Prometheus only offered them a look, eyes flickering from Jackson to Lovegood and everyone in between.
"Think on my words, young heroes. Time is a valuable commodity, and you simply don't have enough of it as it is." He turned to Apollo, at the very last. "My offer extends even to you... and perhaps even Artemis herself, should you play your cards right."
Apollo merely sneered and clenched his hands into fists, and Prometheus found it in himself to smile in amusement, one last time.
"That's the spirit. Now you need only temper it with the wisdom to match, and you might find your way to a victory after all. And for what it's worth?"
His form began to shimmer and glow.
"I truly do wish you the best, if for no other reasons than that you've more than earned it."
There was a sound not unlike to a burst of rushing a wind, a flare of silver-gold light, and the Titan of Foresight was gone.
...
A moment passed.
Then two.
Three. Four. Five.
And the Lovegood - of course - cleared her throat.
"And that, as they say, was that." The words were just as humorless as everything that had slipped out of her mouth from the moment she had called forth her Grandfather's presence.
He who still made his Presence felt.
Daedalus has no more patience left for either.
"And this, as they say-"
He stood from his chair and gestured to the side. His will pressed against the ephemeral, twisted thing that was the Labyrinth's own, and the latter bowed to the former.
The cavern shuddered. The walls rumbled. The mist flickered-
"-is over."
And at the spot he pointed out, a door appeared, engraved with a familiar triangular symbol.
The Labyrinth whispered to him what lay beyond it even as he turned back to the daughter of Thanatos.
"That will lead you back into the mortal world - San Fransico." He ignored the way his sister jerked at the corner of his perception. "Leave."
The girl looked at him, silver eyes clouded and devoid of a single tell.
...
And then she nodded.
It would have been far too trusting under ordinary circumstances, but these were not.
Daedalus would not dare lie while the oath of hospitality still held.
"Thank you for sheltering us within your domain, Lord of the Labyrinth. We shall take our leave."
She stood, slowly, because there was still an order to this sordid affair. The would-be heroes quickly rose with her.
Perhaps they would have insisted on getting more out of him had they the will to try, or perhaps not.
It did not matter now.
Even Apollo, the god, could barely meet any of their eyes.
Daedalus wanted to laugh.
He also wanted to rage.
In the end, he did nothing but watch as Lovegood turned, slightly, and bowed her head just so. Her hand rose and brushed against the shadows behind her, and Daedalus grit his teeth and snapped his gaze to the side as they w̶a̸r̷p̷e̷d̷ and c̵o̸i̷l̴e̴d̶ around her.
A̶l̵m̶o̷s̸t̴ ̵e̴m̸b̷r̸a̶c̴i̴n̶g̷ ̷h̴e̷r̵.̷
"Thank you, Grandfather."
And just like that, Erebus turned away.
Even as he made to sigh in relief as the attention of the Darkness receded. The Labyrinth reasserted control, for all the good it did him now.
But the cold lingered.
Warmth didn't return even as the demigods left - marching in a single file behind Lovegood as she strode out the door, the Ophiotaurus and the Labrador at their heels.
When the last of them passed through, shut behind them and vanished as if never were.
Leaving him alone, in the depths of the Labyrinth.
With only his shame and his guilt for company.
...
Elsewhere:
In another burst of silver-gold light, Prometheus materialized in the throne room of Othrys.
Atlas was waiting for him, sitting astride a seat that was only one step away from a throne in its own right - though never one.
Even in his diminished state, Kronos would never suffer such a slight, even from the greatest general of the Titans.
"Well?"
Prometheus sighed at his impatience.
"It went exactly as I expected."
He resisted the urge to smile again as he spoke.
What spine those mortals had.
"They rejected the offer, then?"
It was almost a shame, that which was to come.
"As we both knew they would."
"Then I take it the plan is still in motion?"
Prometheus nodded.
"They'll never see it coming - they're shaken, their confidence in tatters, and whatever horrors the Labyrinth has inflicted them on have done their part in making it so."
Regardless of their choices, they would be playing right into their hands.
Acknowledging this, Atlas simply barred his teeth in menacing delight.
"Good."
"It will not be as simple as it sounds." He cautioned. "The Daughter of Thanatos is an even greater threat than we'd first imagined."
Quickly, he recounted his encounter with them.
The state he had found the demigods in. The presence of the Ophitoarus.
Even Apollo, reduced as he was.
All of them right there, ripe for the picking.
And then came the Primordial Darkness, descending on him at the call of one little demigoddess.
Even Atlas grew silent at that.
And a silent Atlas was far more dangerous than a confident one.
"That girl must be dealt with." He drummed his fingertips against his throne's armrest with enough power to near-pulverize it. "First, before all the others."
"She cannot die at our hand."
After everything he had seen, he had no doubt that to take such an action without preparation would be to leave themselves open to the immediate consequences.
And those would be nothing short of cataclysmic.
"I am no fool."
"Leave her to me."
And then a third presence made itself known, breaching the throne room and appearing in their midst with a rush of utter power.
Prometheus's eyes widened. Even Atlas grunted in acknowledgment.
"So you've come."
"Yes." A cruel smile pulled at the newcomer's lips, and "Yes, I did."
Another wave of power shook the room, fiery and unrelenting and filled with deadly promise.
"And in two days time, our ultimate victory will be ensured at my hand."
And then - right then -Prometheus knew it, as did Atlas.
The die was cast.
One way or another, come the winter solstice, the era of Olympus would end.
...
...
We have one more prep chapter, a little lull, and we dive right into the third and final act of this quest.
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There seem to be more typos than usual this chapter, although it's of the same quality in terms of events. For example, this line:
' Even he dared to sigh in relief as the attention of the Darkness receded. The Labyrinth reasserted control, and he no l '
seems to have been cut off and makes no sense because of it.
' Even he dared to sigh in relief as the attention of the Darkness receded. The Labyrinth reasserted control, and he no l '
seems to have been cut off and makes no sense because of it.
Thanks for the pointer, fixed.
Iapetus? Seems thematically appropriate as the father of atlas and Prometheus, as well as the titan of mortality.
ScissorSlipper
Barber cat
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Lol I'll get the popcorn. TFTC
Notice how Luna made it clear she wasn't on the side of Olympus or the Titans without declaring neutrality? Luna knows that if either wins they all lose, which means it's time to rally everyone who thinks they have no choice into a third faction.