Writer’s Block Time Frame: None Pairing: None POV: Apollo
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“Allison grunted in frustration. Nothing rhymed with purple.”
-Wayside School Gets a Little Stranger By: Louis Sachar
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Damn English, I curse.
What kind of language has words that don’t rhyme with one another? How completely absurd!
Language is a moving, liquid being: the words should be able to bend and wrap around each other smoothly—naturally, the syllables all lining up, cadences clicking together…and above all: rhyming when needed!
I hate the word, I decide. Just like orange. Purple.
Maybe in the next hundred years or so, another of my children will be just as gifted in the art as my son, Shakespeare. Ah, William.
Now there was a son someone could be proud of.
Not only did his poetry inspire others for generations to come, not only did he use the language, worship and adore it, but he gave back. He picked the fruits, used it to nourish his work, and then planted the seeds—introducing over 1700 words the English language had never seen which are now a part of everyday speech.
And I mean, honestly. A great deal of things rhyme with “lonely” and “bump.”
Maybe my next premiere poet will invent a word to rhyme with this wretched “purple.”
I will make sure whoever does is plastered across the history books for all eternity.
“…the world could be burning ‘til there’s nothing but dark blue.”
-Dark Blue
By: Jack’s Mannequin
**
I watch as he disappears over the side of the ship and I feel the currents sway the boat as they pull him further away from me—to safety. He’s a good kid, a great fighter: a true hero. I hope they welcome him as one when he gets back to camp.
He will serve a greater purpose than I will. I know this, and am not ashamed or jealous…it’s just the way things are. He needs to be there when the camp makes the final stand of this war. He will be the one to lead us to victory or ruin.
I look back into the faces of my captors. They have no idea of what awaits them…unlike me. I know full well what is coming. I can feel the tiny clock on my wrist, its tiny mechanical gears whirring, ticking down the seconds like the quick, steady beatings of my heart.
I stare out at the ocean. It is dark today, despite the sun glittering on its surface. So deep and fathomlessly, beautifully blue.
Just like her eyes.
My eyelids close and I think of Silena. Good, sweet, beautiful Silena. One summer with her was not nearly enough. I think of how her eyes glitter like the ocean today—like some precious jewel reflecting the light of the stars.
For her, I think. Of course it is for her.
I do this, also, to save the camp further misfortune at the hands of the Titans, to save Western Civilization, to save the gods, Mt. Olympus… but really it is all for her, I realize.
To save my Silena and her beautiful eyes.
I do not hear the explosion so much as I feel it—I must be going deaf in the few split-seconds before I die, engulfed in the flames, like the tools of my father.
Entering and exiting the world in fire: forged and destroyed by flame—truly a son of Hephaestus.
But all I can think of is her.
Silena…Silena…Silena…
And then…the world does not go black—it goes dark blue.
Connection Time Frame: Post-Battle of the Labyrinth Pairing: None POV: Grover
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“The poetry of the earth is never dead.”
-John Keats
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It should feel the same, Grover thinks. This camp—his home—should feel the same as it has for every summer he has known it. But it isn’t the same.
Everything is so much more alive.
Walking through the strawberry fields, he can feel them—the little plants’ yearnings to grow tall and strong, to strangle the fences that keep them contained, to reclaim this soil that was once theirs. He can feel their lives and seeds and potential. He can feel the life-giving richness of the soil beneath his hooves. He reaches out to brush his hands along the leaves—so green and glowing in the bright sunlight.
Ever since that day, Grover is no longer only a spectator of the wild’s glory. He is a part of it. He stops, closing his eyes. He sits down among the strawberries, their green leaves creating a cocoon dotted with red berries around him.
Fishing his pan flutes from pocket, he brings them to his lips, and begins to play.
The music—ancient and glorious as the first towering tree—pours onto the plants and the soul, drifting up into the infinite sky above him. It is almost a tangible thing: strands of sound weaving from his pipers, caressing the plants and pulling them closer to him. They lean towards him, as if anxious to better hear his music.
Beneath him, Grover can feel the sparse blades of grass punching up through the earth, as if breaking the surface of water to breathe. He is surrounded by the warm kiss of early summer air, his music floating upon its gentle winds.
Now you see, child, the ancient earth seems to whisper to him. There is a change somewhere inside him as he feels the spirit of the wild earth and all the life around him, swirling about him, singing and dancing and sighing and laughing in the afternoon sun.
His song slowly ends, and he sets his piped down into the rich earth, opens his eyes…
“What we do for ourselves dies with us. What we do for others and the world remains and is immortal.”
-Albert Pine
**
A flash of searing pain and I am down, my back smacking into the hard pavement of the Williamsburg Bridge, and I know I’m not going to get up again.
There is a slash in my chest and I can feel my life slowly ebbing away, trickling to the pavement creating a pool of red around me. Pandemonium has erupted all around me. No one can see me—a giant chunk of steel and cable having fallen loose from one of the towers and dropped near me, shielding my body from all who might heal me. But, being a healer myself, I know it is no use. I am not long for this world, anyhow.
All demigods know it is a good chance we would die before the age of twenty, but in the back of our minds it is always the little voice of human doubt saying: “Not me! I’m too quick and smart for that!”
But I guess it was my time.
I can hear the sonic arrows—the gift from my father I can divvied up among my cabin—soaring high along the bridge, diving into the throngs of monsters that threatened our home.
It was not such a bad way to die, I think—dying to protect those you love. Sure, I had been snarky, sarcastic, rude even…but that didn’t mean I didn’t love each and everyone one of them. At camp, we’re the only family we’ve got. We may quarrel, we may fight, but at the end of the day, it’s us against the evil of the world and everyone else who doesn’t understand.
To die protecting that is not so bad.
I relax into the hard pavement pressing against my back, peering up at the brilliantly blue sky as my vision blurs. The pain is dulling—even distant now. I gaze up on the sun, the bright, brilliant sun. It flickers—yellow and bright and fierce.
Keep fighting. It seems to urge me. Pick up your bow again, Son.
Yes, I agree although my side burns and my arms feel like concrete, my work is not done. Until the last second, I must fight. For each monster I do not kill, could be the one that kills my brothers or my sisters, or any of the other campers that I hold dear.
I struggle to my knees, my vision flickering and whirling wildly. I grasp around and finally feel my hand brush over the shape of my bow. The familiar feel of my fingers closing around its form gives me strength.
I tip my head back once more, feeling the sun warm my face for the last time. I close my eyes, the sun setting the inside of my head aglow with warm, yellow light.
“Father,” I whisper to the sky, “guide my arrow…this one last time…” I weakly notch my last arrow. I can feel my hands shaking as my body loses more blood, more blood, pouring to the pavement like an offering…but I pick my target.
“…guide my arrow…” I manage to move my lips, but no sound escapes…only air…my final breath.
…and I release the arrow.
And as I collapse back to the pavement, my eyes finally closing, I know it found its mark.
“It was as if all of the happiness, all of the magic of this blissful hour had flowed together into these stirring, bittersweet tones and flowed away, becoming temporal and transitory once more.”
-Alexandra Starr
**
One-hundred and fifty three incredible sunrises, one-hundred and fifty three unbearable sunsets. Five months and everyday was a new wonderful day of life and love—the world set ablaze with orange flames as sunlight touched every inch of my life.
My sunrise had been the most wonderful day of my life—as if a light had finally lit up my soul and the world around me began to glow when he was with me. Golden haired and beautiful: bright and alive.
But as those days flew by, my sun slowly moved across my sky.
As the noon of my romance approached, I was pregnant.
When I told him, he positively glowed. Child of the sun, I thought. My child would be bright and brilliant like him.
But I knew I wouldn’t be able to take care of him properly—my lover had told me as much. I would have to send him off each summer, maybe even during the year, to keep him safe. He would have to train and be strong in order to survive.
But he was his son, I thought. He will be strong and agile and quick and smart. My child will overcome all that comes his way.
But I knew. I knew this brief affair would have to end once I really knew the nature of his situation.It was only natural that a romance with the god of the Sun would burn hot and bright and much too fast.
It would be over, I knew.
His attention would drift as it had for millennia . He would find other woman. He would move across the land like the sun across the sky, causing sunrises and sunsets for different girls everywhere.
So the sun set low across my horizon on that one-hundred and fifty third day, and we said our goodbyes. He was leaving. It was not his fault, I knew—only his nature. Every day must have a sunrise and sunset. He knew this more than anyone.
The world once again was lit with the orange of the sun on a horizon, only it was west instead of east, the orange mixing with pinks and purples.
It was so beautiful I started to cry.
And so, as the sun set, I wept: my arms around me where my baby inside me grew warm and alive — my little sun that still had yet to dawn.
Time Frame: The Lightning Thief – Chapter 8: We Capture a Flag
Pairing: None
POV: Annabeth
P.S. I don’t have TLT with me right now, so I don’t know the exact details/dialogue
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“You must never be satisfied with losing. You must get angry, terribly angry, about losing. But the mark of the good loser is that he takes his anger out on himself and not his victorious opponents or on his teammates.”
-Richard M. Nixon
**
I can see them running and I can’t believe it.
That complete idiot of a boy really did that.
I can see him—streaking through the trees, the giant red flag fluttering behind him as his too-big helmet slips down over his eyes as he runs. Who does this little unclaimed nobody think he is? Big three material?
I let out strangled, frustrated curse as I see the other team running towards our line. I call for reinforcements, but they’re all following the plan—like he was supposed to do!—and are over by where the Ares flag should have been.
Through the trees I can see him running and for a moment, a glimmer of hope spurs in my chest—maybe this lunatic, spontaneous, completely illogical move might work. Maybe we’ll win…..?!
And then I see the Ares kids stride across our line, flag in hand far down the boundary line. We’ve lost because of this stupid kid.
I throw down my spear and shield, ripping off my helmet in frustration as I stalk over to give this newbie, nobody a piece of my mind.
He may have killed a Minotaur, but he’s lost us Capture the Flag. And one is way more important than the other. He may have been cool for a while because of his initial rep, but now my cabin-mates and I are going to make his life a living hell.
My feet stomp against the forest ground, my armor clanking as I draw close to him, trying to shoot arrows from my eyes at him.
Who does this kid think he is?
It’s about time someone told him how things are done around here.
