Chapter Text
He knew his time would come; it came for all of them in the end. He didn’t expect it to be quite like this, sacrificed on an alter to an unknown god, his body broken down over months of isolation, cold, and hunger. It all happened so fast that he hadn’t really even been able to process it, the demigods caught entirely unawares. One moment they were eating strawberries on the field of camp Half Blood, and the second, bodies lay strewn about the grounds. Screams filled the air; the terror was tangible.
He didn't know who - if any - were still alive. Maybe he was the last one. The last demigod. It mattered little now, either way. He closed his eyes as the blade was raised over his head. He focussed instead on the happy times, the adventures he had and the friends he made along the way. He remembered his mom, the taste of her blue cookies, and the smile of his little sister. He dreamed of Elysium, believing that was the destination of his final adventure, where he would be reunited with all his loved ones. There was a moment of pain before he embraced the cold arms of death.
His eyes bulged open as he sucked in a breath so desperately it sent him into a coughing fit. His hands were grasping for purchase onto anything that might stabilise him before his brain could even process anything about his surroundings, let alone that he was moving unbound. As the coughing subsided, he weakly managed to drag himself over to a wall and use it to prop himself up. Gods, his legs were so weak from lack of use. You could see the outside of his bones around the threadbare rags that used to fit his body so snugly.
He was still bleeding from every wound he remembered having, bar the killing blow on his neck. The world was spinning and he wondered for a moment, as he stumbled and fell onto the hard dirt of the alleyway he found himself in, if there was Hell beyond Hades’ realm, because surely, he had to be there now.
He was vaguely aware of the rain that began to fall as his body gave into exhaustion and he fell over unconscious into the puddle of mud.
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This time he blinked blearily when he opened his eyes, and was met by a woman leaning over him. She had a face that reminding him of his mother’s; kind, with soft black hair, and earnest in the emotions it expressed. His heart ached. She said something to him, but he couldn’t recognise it as English so all he could do was stare at her blankly.
Percy tried to shrink further into himself. He didn’t know where he was, he was too weak to defend himself. Her worried expression softened in the face of his confusion and distress, and she tried to say something else as she reached into her bag. The sandwich she produced was hard to misinterpret though.
He clenched his weak hands around the bread, the first food he’d had since they had taken him. He bit into it and teared up at the forgotten feeling of soft bread. He blinked to try and clear his eyes, knowing how weak and pathetic he was, but the woman didn’t seem to care about that, offering him some fruit to replace the devoured sandwich.
The woman was kneeling next to him, uncaring of the mud staining her dress, uncaring of his own state; the sight, the smell. He knew he must look like death warmed over. He’d be disgusted looking at his own reflection, that he knew.
He watched her as she stood up once he finished eating and offered him her hand. Clearly she understood there was a language barrier and didn’t bother trying to speak, instead turning to actions to convey her meaning. She wanted him to go with her. He paused for a moment, the selfishness inside him warring with every other instinct never to trust a stranger, warring with every irrational thought that he deserved to die, with even every rational thought, that he should not take advantage of her.
She seemed to decide for him, reaching out to grip his tiny shoulders, no longer filled with the muscles that had long since been robbed of life, and pulled him up. Clearly he was light enough that this slim woman could just about carry him, which she seemed to easily do so for a few blocks until they arrived at what was likely her house.
She took him into the bathroom and pointed to the bath and then his clothes. Percy, swaying from the exertion of the walk there didn’t have the energy to care about a stranger wanting to bathe him, so he nodded weakly and collapsed into the bath after she removed his rags.
Percy floated in the warm cocoon. His eyes closed wondering if this was actually his own version of Elysium. If, having been sacrificed, he deserved something other than the afterlife of his dreams. The water would have to be home enough, foreign though it felt. There was no invigoration it provided him now, no magical healing of his wounds. Still, it reminded him of home in a very bittersweet way.
Her hands were gentle on his body, rubbing the mud and blood off of him, trying as if to take away the pain that they brought and that had brought them. Her hands were also firm, cleaning in a way that was efficient, never lingering in one place to long, massaging the tired muscles that remained. Her fingers threaded through his hair, washing the months on blood, oil, and dirt caked to his skull.
Percy thought she may have replaced the water three times, but he also thought he fell asleep at some point, so it may have been more. She shook him awake when she was finished, draining the water away and helping him balance while she patted him dry. Leaving for a moment only to return shortly after with some clean clothes that she helped him into, Percy found his mind floating. These luxuries were so utterly foreign to him, and anything akin to them that he might have once had, were echoes of a time forgotten, now.
She guided him to a bedroom and tucked him under the covers. She said something again, though Percy had no idea what, although the turning off of the lights, the closing of the door, the exhaustion that lay heavy on his body; that was clearer than anything. And so, he slipped into unconsciousness once more.
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This time when his eyes managed to open, he was a little more awake than he had been the day before. The surroundings were unfamiliar of course, but he remembered the day prior well enough to not completely freak out.
His body protested any movement he made, but gods dammit, Percy wanted to get his bearings. Every muscle screamed in agony and he pushed himself into a sitting position, and then rotated to slip his legs off of the bed. Grabbing onto the side table for support, he managed to stand on shaky legs and use the wall to make it over to the door.
He reached out, gritting his teeth at the strength required to open the door, but filled with overwhelming relief that it wasn’t locked, and peeked into the new room he was faced with. The woman he recognised from yesterday was there talking to a middle aged man. Both turned to look in his direction when they heard the door move, and Percy was frozen to his spot.
The woman stepped towards him, a bright smile on her face, while the man watched his movements with a narrowed eye that put Percy a little on edge. He had died - he knew that for a fact! So where was he? How did he get here? Who was this woman, and who was this man? Now more awake and alert, the questions were rushing forth faster than he could think them. The woman beckoned him to come towards them, which after a moment of hesitation, Percy decided to do as she asked.
At least, he tried. His legs gave out from under him. As he fell, the two rushed towards him, which rationally knew was to try and help, but his instincts weren’t rational. He floundered backwards, heart skipping and breath shaking. He was still weak and had no strength to truly retreat so he had to watch, paralysed with fear as the stranger leaned over him, hands holding something that he knew was a type of syringe. He’d felt enough enter his body, inject something, take blood, over and over.
“No…” his voice was hoarse, echoes of the damage he knew he had experienced over months and into his final moments. “Please, no more.” He was tearing up, sobs welling up into his chest. He thought dying would mean he could leave it all behind. He was so tired of it all, of everything he’d had to go through. The man, seeing his distress at least backed off a little, holding his hands out in surrender. He put the syringe in a bag before turning his attention back to Percy.
“Ah, English? My apologies young man.” The accent was fairly thick, but Percy at least understood what he was saying. “I’m not here to hurt you. Asami-kan found you yesterday and you were very hurt. I am the village doctor she called to help heal you.”
Percy wanted to believe him. Rationally, he knew the offer was sincere. Instinctually, which is all he’d been running on since they’d taken him all those months ago, he couldn’t trust anyone but himself. When the first attack had come they trusted each other, only for internal conflict to quickly break them apart. When their numbers dwindled far too fast, they’d trusted the gods, their parents, to help them. Instead, they were abandoned, even taking the strength of their powers with them. Both betrayals had cut him deeper than any of the others, what with his fatal flaw and all. That in and of itself had been the first form of torture he’d endured because of their killers. He had no one to rely on but himself now, his powers nearly forgotten in the depths of his memories.
He must have passed out because the next thing he knew, he was back in the bed he had woken up in, some soup steaming away on the table next to him. A flash of suspicion went through him before hunger demanded he eat it, no matter what it may contain. His hands were shaky and he spilled probably a quarter of it, but what he was able to eat made him feel a little better.
He tried to get out of bed again, but was only just swinging his legs around when the door opened. Startled at the sudden noise, he jumped back into the bed as worried eyes turned on him. It was the woman again, and as she saw him sitting up, bowl empty beside him, she smiled warmly. “Ah, you awake.” Her English was broken, not as fluent as the man had been, but Percy appreciated her words all the same.
“Where…?” His voice trained off into a croak of disuse.
She walked slowly over to him and offered him a glass of water. After taking it, she sat on the corner of the bed. “Minami, Kaifu District of Tokushima.” His blank look seemed to cause a frown line to mar her face. “Japan.” Oh, wow. That was not America. Although to be fair, he wasn’t sure where he had died - he might not have been in America for months.
“How…?” He forced his voice to cooperate, desperate to know what was going on.
Her expression softened again. “I find you yesterday morning in alley. Look like you need help.” Percy tried not the think about what he might look like - he’d look like a walking corpse. Well, he was one, really. “I do not know where you from, but I want to help you. You safe here. My friend is doctor. He will help, yes?”
Looking back, maybe Percy had stopped caring what happened to him now, that’s why he agreed to the doctor’s poking and prodding. Or maybe, his heart once more won out over his brain, and hope bloomed in his chest for the first time in a long, long, hopeless time. So he gave in to her request of letting the man enter his new space, and his personal space.
The man introduced himself as Ito Haruki, and his friend, the woman who had found him, as Hayashi Asashi. As Percy lay there, anxiety shaking his body, Ito gently explained everything he noticed and everything he was doing. Percy also expected questions like who he was, or what had happened to him. They never came. Ito said his job was to heal him, not to pry. He said he would listen if Percy wanted to talk, but he would not force it.
In the end Percy now knew the state of his body, and understood just why the doctor was surprised he was even conscious let alone alive. With seemingly every other bone broken or fractured, skinny to point of literal skin and bone, wounds littering his body, and many more things that Percy didn’t understand the technical names of.
The wound he cared about most though was the one the doctor pulled a snapped blade of celestial bronze from. The doctor found it buried in his thigh, and with a stricken face extracted the three inch length from his leg, cleaning and stitching up the wound.
Percy eyed the metal. He needed to keep it. Gods knew where he was, and there may be no other celestial bronze he may come across ever again. Besides, no mortal should learn about it - that had been drilled into him. Too, as a child of the Big Three, monsters would surely come looking for him at some point. Later, he would use it to make into a dagger, small enough to carry on him at all times. For now, Ito gave it to him when he asked for it.
“I’d like you to rest up for a few weeks my boy.” The endearing term gave him warmth, a faint memory of Chiron flittered though him. Maybe it would all be okay in the end. “I have no idea what you’ve gone though, but whatever it was you need a lot of recovery. I have plenty of medication I will prescribe you to start you on the healing process, and I know Asashi-chan’s cooking will do the rest. When you start feeling a little better we will work on your physical therapy. For now though,” Ito smiled warmly, “I think you’ll be okay.”
Hope fluttered in his chest, stronger this time.
Ito left not long after that, talking to Asashi in what he now knew was Japanese. Percy spared a thought to wondering why he had somehow come to Japan, and whether after he healed, if he should go home and try to find everyone.
The moment he had that thought though, he discarded it. No, he would never go back to America. He still had no real idea who it was that had destroyed them, but he knew they had. He doubted anyone was alive any more, and he definitely didn’t want anyone knowing he had somehow survived. They would torture and kill him agin. He would not go through hell a third time. Tartarus, and being a prisoner of War, that was more than anyone should experience in one life time alone, let alone both before the age of eighteen.
Percy would stay in Japan then. No one would think to look for him here. Gods, he would never have come to the place if he hadn’t woken up here randomly. He would stay and help Asashi as much as he could, forever thankful for her help in looking after him.
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The days turned into weeks, but eventually Ito - “Please, call me Haruki.” - was confident in his health enough to take him for a walk around the little village. They’d been working up the strength in his legs, and Percy could walk well enough on his own for short periods of time. They would not soon forget the months of disuse and trauma they experienced though.
Time spent healing was always tough for demigods, that Percy knew. It was the ADHD, that’s why ambrosia was so helpful. A, it meant they could get back into battle faster, especially given their limited numbers, but also b, it prevented them from dying of boredom. He was not so lucky here.
In saying that, the water still helped a little bit. Certainly not as much as it used to, and it took so much effort to heal even a paper cut, but it was more than nothing. That also gave him hope; maybe he could train his skill back up. It was something he was supposed to have been born with, and gods or no, it was his power dammit.
The smell of sea breeze filled his nose as he stepped outside. Tears filled his eyes and happiness filled his heart. He loved the sea, no matter that his father had abandoned him again, it still smelled like home. Asashi had bought him some clothes too, something else he was determined to pay her back for, and so, clutching Haruki’s arm, the pair made their way slowly but surely down the street of the little village, and onto the water’s edge.
The ocean touched his toes and Percy couldn’t help the bubble of laughter that came from his soul. The relief, the joy he felt. He was safe here, in this tiny little town by the sea.
As the sun set and Percy reluctantly followed Haruki back to Asashi’s house, he couldn’t help but notice the curious yet warm faces that watched him. He knows of course, being the small village that it was, that he presence would be noticed. No outsiders came here really, but what surprised him was when he heard them referring to him as Asashi’s adopted son.
That hope inside him grew brighter. Yes, he had a new home here. While he would always remember his mom, Sally Jackson, his new stepfather, and his sister, Percy knew he would never go back, and he was thrilled to have found a new home here, surrounded by such wonderful people.
His adopted mom had also sourced him a tutor, determined to get him fluent in Japanese. While Percy normally hated school, what with his ADHD and dyslexia, he had agreed to at least try as part one of his thank you to Asahi. He found it a lot easier that he expected, and he wondered occasionally how much that was down to the nature of the language, his determination to try, or his tutor actually understanding what his disability was and helping him through it, adjusting their teaching methods. It boggled Percy’s mind. He’s never had a teacher do that for him before.
When his strength slowly returned, he began to pick up some of his old training techniques, determined to get back into shape. He would not be caught unawares again, and he was determined to excel without the use of his powers. On top of that he had started Aikido, wanting not only to become more involved with the culture of his new home, but to expand his fighting styles beyond sword fighting.
Over time his confidence and peace regrew. His body had healed, as had his mind (for the most part at least). He was back into training, which he loved, in a little village by the sea. His old life he wanted to forget, and embrace this far more beautiful new one.
Except for one thing. Well two, really. The celestial bronze dagger he had reforged, and his water powers he had slowly been building back up. He was damned if he was ever relying on someone else to save him again, or be the source of his power at least. They had been crippled when the gods abandoned them. If Percy could emulate that power, then he’d never have to worry: he’d never abandon himself.
He started at home, in the sink or the bathtub, remembering the sensation of the water as he controlled its flow, its temperature, its movement. How it felt wrapped around his arm, healing wounds, returning life. He remembered the sounds fish made when they talked to him, and the sensation of sinking to the ocean floor, water filling his lungs and breathing anyway.
For a long time he worried he would never experience any of that ever again. Then, the water droplet moved. Elation burst out of him and he wanted to scream and cry and sing from the rooftops. It was small, oh such a small achievement. But he’d done it all by himself, gods be damned.
The learning curve was exponential. The one droplet turned into a puddle. The puddle became a wave. The wave became a sea, and the sea became an ocean. The drizzle became a torrential downpour and Percy swam through it all with the ease of the shark that he was.
The uncomfortable realisation came, however, when he realised the power he could put out, was relational to the feeling he was experiencing at the time. The angrier he felt as he subconsciously remembered his past, the stronger the pull. He didn’t know if he liked that, or even really understood it. But he would take it over the helplessness he’d felt in the parched desert that entombed him before. Emotions had always been tide to his powers anyway, and so he let them wash over him, experiencing them again and again, accepting what had happened to him, and refining his control in the process.
It wasn’t long after some of his power returned that he saw the first monster. It wasn’t the normal kind of monster he was used to though, but it certainly wasn’t human, yet no one seemed to pay it any mind. Meaning, they either couldn’t see it, or it looked normal to them. He could see it though, and once it realised he could, it went straight for him.
His form was still shaky, as he was still recovering, and his training had really only just begun, but he managed to stab its head with his celestial bronze dagger and watch it fade away. He frowned. No shower of gold sludge, but maybe they worked a bit differently in Japan? Regardless, Percy made it his mission to kill every single one of the damned things that crossed his path.
It became part of his training regime, after that. His walk around the village became a kind of patrol, and every other day or week he’d find one or two and dispatch them. It was a good feeling, attacking a real opponent. It let him process what he’d gone through, at the same time as helping his new village. It was a bonus seeing the positive influence it seemed to have, and while he still didn’t really understand it, he was more than happy to take on the silent role.
It wasn’t long before the people in the village grew to love him. Initially wary of a foreigner showing up randomly in their quiet town, nearly dead, and ready to keel over, to being Asashi’s newfound son, appreciation of his respect for their culture, and the increased happiness his presence just seemed to have brought (which was actually his killing of the curses, not that anyone knew that’s what it was).
Life, Percy admitted to himself, was looking up.