not the victory but the action
Fitz had hoped that having more of their siblings around as the summer started would improve Donnie’s mood, and the younger boy had certainly seemed happier as more and more kids got to camp, although he suspects it has more to do with the improvement in Seth’s mood than anything else. The other boy had seemed to recover from a lot of his disappointment about the amount of time it had taken his mother to claim him, especially as he’d gotten closer to Raina, the head of Aphrodite, and Fitz was hoping that Donnie could develop something similar with Anne Weaver or some of the other Hephaestus kids.
The camp has been in full summer mood for about a week now, and the dining pavilion is buzzing when Fitz and Jemma arrive for breakfast. Trip and Ward talk animatedly about something while Skye shakes her head at the both of them.
“What’s got them so excited?” Jemma asks once the two of them have scraped some of their eggs into the fire and taken their seats, and Skye rolls her eyes.
“Chiron announced that the first Capture the Flag game of the summer is tonight, so they’re trying to figure out how the teams will shake out. Nerds,” she explains, raising her voice on the last word to make sure the other two hear her. Ward grimaces but Trip just sticks his tongue out and goes back to speculating.
“Ares has one flag, who has the other?”
They didn’t play during the school year with so few kids in camp, so the last winners of the summer kept the flags for close to eight months, and it was hard to miss the bright red ten foot long banner emblazoned with bloody spear and boar’s head that had hung over the front door of the Ares cabin for so long. But now that Jemma mentioned it, he didn’t remember seeing another flag outside any of the other cabins, or who had possessed it at the end of the year.
“Demeter. They keep their flag inside their cabin though. May says that’s the best way to make sure nobody steals it,” Trip says, grinning when Ward scowls.
“Freaking Hermes kids,” he mutters, although not very loudly.
Coulson had whole-heartedly denied his cabin’s involvement in what amounted to monthly thefts of Ares’s prominently displayed flag, which usually ended up prominently displayed elsewhere; the top of the bathroom had been a favorite, although one time they’d stolen one of the camp canoes as well and left the flag floating a couple hundred feet out into Long Island Sound. Everyone in camp had found this hilarious, except for the four kids in Ares who had stayed over the school year and their siblings when they’d returned for the summer.
Fitz listens to Ward, Trip and Jemma talk strategy and make predictions for the rest of breakfast, then sets off in search of Anne once he’s finished with his food. Since the cabin heads are usually the ones forming alliances for Capture the Flag, he’s pretty sure she’ll have the best idea of which side they’ll be on after dinner tonight, and what she wants him specifically to do. Hephaestus isn’t a particularly sought after cabin, since there’s only six of them, but they’re naturally the best at booby traps in the whole camp, so they usually end up a team fairly early after the bigger cabins like Apollo and Hermes are sorted. If any cabin but Ares had the flag, Fitz probably wouldn’t bother asking this early, but he’s pretty sure everything has already been settled without much bartering today, at least for his siblings and him.
He finds her at the forge, watching a couple of their siblings work while she does inventory on extra weapons for the armory, and she smiles when she sees him.
“Morning, Fitz. We’re with Demeter tonight, and I’ve got a special plan for you, if you’re up for it.”
“Sure,” he says with a shrug as he sits next to her. He’s pretty much fine with doing what he’s told when it comes to Capture the Flag, although he likes when the cabin heads ask his opinion. Jemma’s the one with the head for battle strategy and they’re usually with Athena anyway, since they and Ares are the two most common holders of the flags, meaning the other cabin makes most of the plans and does most of the attacking, leaving Hephaestus to work on their traps in defense of the flag.
“How come we’re never with Ares?”
Anne answers without looking up from her inventory sheet, “Dad’s not exactly the war god’s biggest fan, and not just because of the business with Aphrodite. And I’m not what you could call John Garrett’s biggest fan, especially not when it comes to strategy games. He’s not much for planning.”
“They end up with the flag a lot for being led by someone who doesn’t like planning.”
“Well, there’s only so much you can do against a plan like ‘a dozen huge screaming kids with spears who spend all their time training appear out of the woods and rush at you.’ Plus, I think Ward does more of the work than he lets on. But tonight, you and I are going to beat them, and then we’re going to hang the flag outside our cabin and turn any Hermes kid who tries to steal it an alarming shade of pink for at least a week.”
“You’ve got something better than twelve kids with spears screaming bloody murder?”
“Of course. I’ve got the Hephaestus super kid on my side,” she says, looking pointedly at Fitz, who laughs at the description.
“Let me know what your plan is tonight and I’ll do my best to help.”
“That’s one of my favorite things about you, Fitz- you’re always willing to help. It’s right below ‘can set himself on fire at will with no ill effect’ on the list.”
———-
“It’s going to be a repeat of Yorktown tonight,” Trip says, bouncing on his toes, and Jemma rolls her eyes next to Fitz.
“The French are coming to help you?” she asks, and Fitz snorts before he can stop himself. Trip looks less offended and more pleased that someone is willing to go back and forth with him.
“Well, we’ve got the goddess of love on our side. That’s like the French, with Paris and all, right?” he says, and Skye, leaning against Ward’s back as they all wait for Chiron to come dismiss them to hide their flags and start the game, groans, tilting her head back to rest it between his shoulders.
“Please make him stop,” she whines, but Ward just chuckles.
“Is all your trash talking going to be based on a war that’s two and a half centuries old?”
“Did we throw all that tea into Boston Harbor?” he says, dancing out of the way of Skye’s attempt to whack him in the side with the flat of her sword, grin not faltering.
Chiron gallops up with his leather medical bag, and the two teams split across the creek that forms the boundary line, Ares and their allies to the north while Demeter’s team stands on the southern bank. Fitz pulls his helmet on, running his fingers over the tall blue horsehair that matches the rest of his team, and watches Ward help Skye straighten her red plumed helmet across the creek. Most of the campers are holding huge shields, much larger than the ones they use in one-on-one combat practice, but neither Fitz nor Jemma have one, and only the youngest few kids from Demeter. Coulson has an empty hand as well, although he does have the sword he rarely uses at his waist to accompany his own shield.
“I know most of you are aware of the rules, but I’ll repeat them anyway for our new campers and for those of you who may have gotten fuzzy on the specifics since last summer. Your flags must be prominently displayed, and have no more than two guards in the immediate area. Captured members of the opposite team can be disarmed but not restrained, and injured members of both teams should be brought to me for treatment. All magical items and abilities,” he glances over toward the Demeter side, “are allowed and the entire forest is fair game. The first team to cross the boundary,” he indicates the creek between the two teams, “with their opponent’s flag wins. No maiming or killing allowed. Good luck to both sides.”
That’s the signal for the two groups to take off in opposite directions at a run, Fitz glancing over his shoulder to watch the huge gaggle of red plumes disappear into the trees.
Apollo, Hermes and Aphrodite had all sided with Ares, which meant that the four biggest cabins in camp were all on one side and Demeter’s forces were a little shorthanded. This didn’t seem to bother May or her siblings very much as they planted their dark green flag on the back slope of a small hill and the cabin heads started to give instructions on what they needed them to do.
“Fitzsimmons, come with me,” Anne says, gesturing them over with her shield.
“Fitzsimmons?” Jemma asks, and the older girl shrugs.
“I’ve decided it’s what I’m calling the two of you when you’re together. Saves time. Now come on.”
“Are we guarding the flag?”
Anne laughs, “Fitz, I tell you I have a plan to utilize your gift to bring honor and Capture the Flag glory to our cabin, and you assume I’m going to leave you behind to watch the flag. I’m disappointed, little brother. I’m leaving Bailey back here with Donnie, so he can learn how to work the traps before we inevitably have to defend our flag against all comers in the next game.”
“What are we doing then?”
“We are going to get their flag. And Jemma’s going to help us, because she’s a good person and she likes us, and also because I already worked it out with Nate that we’ll help them get the flag next time we play. Don’t tell May about that last part though.”
In the distance, a conch shell blows to signal the start of the game and Anne taps her weapon against her shield, the metal ringing softly. Like Fitz, the rest of the Hephaestus campers use swords, but the head of the cabin prefers a heavy war hammer, the head made of celestial bronze. It’s not exactly a traditional Greek weapon, but when Fitz had asked her about it, she had shrugged and said that it was just as effective as anything else if you knew how to use it. Having sparred against her, Fitz has personal knowledge of exactly how well she uses it.
The two Hephaestus kids follow Jemma as she picks her way through the woods, heading north. They have to move further down the creek to avoid a group of Aphrodite kids guarding the border, and then swing back the opposite direction to miss being seen by another patrol that Fitz can’t identify through the trees. No red plumed defenders confront them, although they can hear other fights breaking out across the battlefield as both teams search for the flags.
They’ve been walking for about fifteen minutes when Jemma suddenly stops, a grin breaking out on her face that Fitz knows means she’s pleased with herself as she points ahead of them. Clearly visible in the little valley between three or four small hills sits the bright red Ares flag, the sun catching on the shiny bronze helmets of the two kids left to defend it. Anne taps her hammer against her shield again in approval, resting it on the ground for support as she surveys the scene.
“All right, what next?” she asks, and Fitz can tell it takes a second for Jemma to realize that the older girl is asking her.
“You want me to figure it out?”
“You’re the one with the mom who always has a plan. We’re just the muscle today.”
Jemma nods absently, already focused on considering the situation in front of them.
“I think we should split up,” she says eventually, nodding to herself, “There’s three of us and only two of them, and I’m pretty sure one of them is an Apollo girl, which means she spends more time at the range than practicing close quarters combat. There’s probably more guards posted around, and splitting up means they can’t all concentrate on us in one group.”
It takes them a few minutes to figure out each of their routes down to the flag, and then they set off separately towards their goal. Don’t get shot is Anne’s last piece of advice to them before they split up, and Fitz is pretty sure his heart nearly stops when he hears what he’s pretty sure is the soft twang of a bow string off to his left thirty seconds after leaving the others; freezing, he expects someone from Apollo cabin to appear at any moment, but he continues forward when it doesn’t seem that the shooter had been aiming for him, hoping that Jemma and Anne are both still fine as well.
There’s a little clearing at the edge of the woods, just before they open to the area where the flag is, and Fitz stops for a moment to catch his breath for the final run, still mostly hidden in the shadow of the big pine trees. He’s just about to start forward when a figure wearing a red plumed helmet emerges from the other side of the open grass, unable to disappear into cover before the other camper spots him.
Fitz lifts his sword, ready to defend himself, but lets it drop slightly in surprise when he realizes that it’s John Garrett standing across the clearing. He would have expected the Ares cabin leader to be at the front of the offensive charge to grab Demeter’s flag, like he usually is. The older boy doesn’t move, but a savage grin splits his face, and although Fitz has never met Ares he has no doubt that Garrett has never resembled his father more.
The stillness in the clearing is almost unnerving, as he had been expecting an immediate mad rush from the other boy, and the silence as well, since Garrett isn’t exactly known for his restraint when it comes to making comments in any given situation. Fitz pulls himself up to his full height, unimpressive as it may be, trying to keep his breathing steady as he watches Garrett with one eye and checks the surrounding woods for more opponents with the other, not wanting to be ambushed from behind. The other boy still hasn’t moved except to adjust his grip on his spear, and there’s something about him in this moment that makes Fitz wildly consider reminding him of the no maiming, no killing rule; instead, he clenches his jaw and pushes a long flame up Pyrrhos’ blade, which just seems to make Garrett smile more.
He takes two steps forward, Fitz’s eyes drawn to the sharp tip of his spear, and then crumples to the ground with a sound like a bell being rung. It takes a few seconds for him to figure out what’s happened, until he glances up to see Anne standing there, spinning her hammer in one hand.
“I think you might have dented his helmet,” Fitz says, and Anne shrugs.
“I’ll fix it for him when he wakes up. Or make you do it.”
“Sure. Um, thanks, by the way. How’d you know where I was?” he asks, and she nods down at his sword, which he realizes is still burning.
“You might want to put that out. Don’t want to draw any more attention to ourselves than absolutely necessary this close to the flag.”
Fitz nods, letting the flame die, and the two of them creep forward, sticking together without discussing it. The Apollo girl guarding the flag is facing them, and although she doesn’t seem to have seen them yet, he doesn’t know how they’re going to cross the open space to disarm her or get the flag without her noticing the two of them and firing the arrow she already has nocked. He’s just turned to ask Anne if she has any ideas on what they should do when he spots Jemma making her way across the grass at a crouch. She manages to get within a few feet of the other girl before she’s noticed, darting forward before she can shoot and using her twin knives to twist the daughter of Apollo’s bow out of her hands. There’s not much time to admire the move, though, as the girl yells when her weapon is tugged away from her, drawing the attention of her fellow guard and other members of her team.
“Get the flag!” Jemma shouts as she turns to deal with the Ares camper advancing towards her, and Anne pushes Fitz toward the bright red banner as they crash out of the trees before turning to challenge several of the red plumed opponents charging down the hill towards them. He sprints forward, expecting arrows to rain down at any moment as he crosses the wide space between him and the flag.
May and her siblings had wrapped small roots and vines around the base of their flag to make it harder to grab, but the Ares side didn’t have that particular advantage and Fitz slips his sword back into his scabbard to free up both hands to pull the huge flag from the dirt. He turns just in time to see Anne slip in front of him, three distinct pings sounding as arrows launched by a row of Apollo campers at the top of one of the hills impact her shield.
“Your flame trick is great and all, but there are just some things you need a big piece of metal for,” she says with a grin as the next set of arrows comes towards them. Before she can raise her shield, Fitz slashes one hand through the air in front of him, an arc of flame cutting the projectiles out of the sky.
“Show-off,” Anne says, though she’s still grinning as they start towards the boundary line, Jemma appearing on his other side as they run.
“I didn’t know you could do that,” she shouts as they crash through the trees, the flag flapping above them as more red team pursuers appear around them.
“I didn’t either,” he replies, shrugging as best he can while running and carrying the flag, “I just sort of did it.”
“You know what might make these guys way less enthusiastic about getting their flag back?” Anne calls, and it takes Fitz only a few seconds to catch on to her idea.
“If it was entirely engulfed in fire?” he says, already pushing flames up the pole as they break free of the trees and the creek comes into view. A couple of their teammates have appeared to back them up, engaging the campers chasing them, but a few break free towards the flag, led by Coulson and his giant shield.
Almost at the creek, Fitz hesitates, nearly tumbling over as the giant flag above his head throws off his balance at the sudden stop. Caught up in the excitement and action of the moment, he’d grabbed the banner when Anne had pushed him towards it, even though he’d been planning on letting her bring it back. Anne, who had figured out how to build a team around her to get the flag, who led their cabin, who had only ever been claimed by Hephaestus. He’s worried that if he crosses the boundary line with it, his father won’t be the parent it defaults towards.
There’s not much of a choice though, as he’s right at the edge of the creek with none of his siblings free or close enough to take the flag from him. As Fitz splashes into the cool water, Coulson makes one final lunge for him, which comes to an end as Anne meets his shield with her war hammer, driving him to his knees and resulting in a truly magnificent metallic clang as cheers break out among the blue team. When they don’t trail off at all, he chances a glance up towards the flag he’s holding and grins at the sight that greets him.
The flag is still red, but far more orange than the previous deep blood color, and the boar’s head and spear have been replaced by the dark shape of a hammer. He turns to see Anne helping a dazed looking Coulson back to his feet, and she grins when he meets her eyes, holding the banner out in her direction. She shakes her head though, before nodding towards their siblings, crowding around him now. It takes some effort, but after a few swings Fitz really gets the flag waving, snapping with its movement, and the Hephaestus kids send up a cheer that seems much bigger than the four of them should be able to produce. The other blue team campers join them as Chiron trots up to officially end the game, and Fitz smile grows as hands join his around the staff, lifting the flag higher above all of them.
—————-
The campers are spread out across the amphitheater, the new flag moving among groups of kids as the Hephaestus siblings pass it around. It’s been awhile since their cabin has claimed one of the flags, and they’re taking full advantage of having it now. Fitz hands the flag to Donnie, who earns a laugh from Seth and a glare from Callie for waving it above his head with a whoop once he’s got his hands on it.
Demeter had returned their flag to their cabin after the game was over, not wanting anything to happen to it in the aftermath, but Anne still seems intent on displaying their prize and has already filled Fitz in on her plans for protecting it. She’s sitting down near the fire with May and some of the other cabin leaders from their team, laughing and joking.
It’s a stark contrast to the scene about ten rows up, where Garrett sits silently, holding an ice pack against the back of his head and slowly eating a square of ambrosia, occasionally nodding or shaking his head when Raina leans over to say something to him. Fitz feels kind of bad for him, but remembering the look in the older boy’s eyes as they’d stood across from each other in the clearing, he can’t help but be glad that Anne had shown up when she did.
“Is he all right?” he asks Ward as he sits back down next to Trip, nodding across the amphitheater towards Garrett.
Ward shrugs, “I guess. He’ll have a bad headache tomorrow. And he’ll be pissed about losing for a week, and Dad’s probably going to come down and give him a hard time about it, especially since it was you guys who captured it. Ares can be…” Ward trails off, looking up at his older brother, and Fitz can surmise from the look on his face that whatever he was going to finish the sentence with wasn’t exactly a kind description of his father.
Another shrug. “He really doesn’t like to lose. He always says that he understands it’s just a game, but he’s not very convincing about it.”
“Couple of summers ago, he nearly put his spear through one of Dionysus’s kids when she was trying to cross the border line with the flag,” Trip says, and Ward grimaces.
“That wasn’t- that was more of an misunderstanding than anything else. He didn’t mean-”
“How does someone misunderstand a spear to the side?” Trip responds, but he’s laughing, and the argument continues without much actual heat.
“Where’s Jemma?” asks Fitz, turning away from the others to see if she’d gone up to the fire to make a s’more, but there’s only a couple of Apollo kids.
“She mumbled something about being tired and left right after you went to give the flag to Donnie,” she says, poking at Ward’s shoulder to get him to stop arguing with Trip.
“I’m gonna go look for her.”
“Shocking,” Skye replies, but she smiles at him as he makes his way down the steps, waving back at them when the other two look up as he departs.
He checks the Athena cabin first, then heads toward Hephaestus, since he doesn’t actually know where else she would go. Jemma’s sitting cross-legged on his bed and looks up when he pushes the door open; she hasn’t really been crying, but she sniffles as he settles next to her, and he doesn’t say anything for a few minutes.
“You should be out celebrating with your siblings.”
“I was. Waved the flag around my head and everything. It was quite the show.” She smiles softly and he bumps his shoulder against hers. “Sorry you did all that work and didn’t really get anything to show for it.”
“Anne’s smile was payment enough, I think. Besides, we get the flag all the time. We need to let some of the less fortunate cabins have some fun every once and a while.”
“That’s cold, Jemma Simmons,” he replies, trying to sound serious, and she returns the bump against his shoulder, not bothering to retreat, just leaning against him.
“You hesitated. Before you crossed the creek today. You stopped for a moment.”
Fitz nods, takes a few seconds to figure out how he wants to answer.
“I was worried that- I’m not exactly close to my dad,” he says, and even the word feels strange on his tongue, sits crosswise in his mouth even after he’s finished it, “And I was worried that the flag- Anne had done all that work, and I’d figured she would want to carry the flag across, so it’d be fine. But then we actually got to the boundary line and I had it instead, and I was worried that it would default toward-” he swallows hard, and it is Jemma’s turn to nod.
“You were worried it would turn into Hestia’s flag.”
“Yeah. Don’t even know what that looks like. But Anne and the others, they don’t deserve that. I appreciate everything Hestia’s done for me, and I usually feel a lot more like her son than Hephaestus’s, but still, you know.” He trails off with a sigh, not sure what else there is to say, and glances down at Jemma when she doesn’t reply. She’s smiling up at him softly, and he shifts slightly, careful not to dislodge her from where she’s leaning against him.
“What?”
“You can be very sweet, you know that, Leopold Fitz?”
He blushes, and thinks, rather ridiculously, of the rule about one guy and one girl being alone in a cabin, like he and Jemma haven’t been breaking that since the day they showed up at camp. Fitz doesn’t know why the harpies are less strict when policing him than the other campers, and he’s got a sneaking suspicion that it has something to do with how much they may or may not know about the prophecy, but he’s grateful for it right now, whatever the reason.
Jemma sighs, and he glances down at the photograph in her hand. In it, a pretty woman, clearly very pregnant, leans back against a brick wall, hands crossed over her rounded stomach; a man with dark hair and big glasses has one hand against the wall, attention focused entirely on the woman and not on the camera in the slightest. Both of them are laughing, and the photo is just slightly blurred, like maybe the person who took it was shaking with laughter too.
“Your parents?” he asks, and she nods, “They look like you. Or, um, you look like them.”
“Yes, the phenotypes match up quite nicely,” she responds, and it’s such a Jemma thing to say that Fitz would laugh if he hadn’t caught the particular note in her voice just then. Instead, he just waits for her to continue, her fingers tracing the edges of the photograph.
“I’ve talked to May, you know. And Coulson and Anne, and most of the older kids, even Chiron, and they’ve all told me the exact same thing: you can’t be granted demigod status. You are either born one or you’re not, you either have a godly parent at birth or you don’t. They can’t pick you, at least not at first. They can claim you later, like Hestia did for you, but if you weren’t already the son of another god it wouldn’t have meant anything as far as your status as a demigod is concerned. You can’t be-be picked as a demigod. You have to be born one.”
“And you were.”
“Yes. There’s no other way I that I could be here otherwise. There are places for mortals within the mythology, but not as sons or daughters of the gods. Champions, yes, like Odysseus, but Athena claimed me as her daughter.”
“Even though you have two mortal parents.”
“Correct.”
“Maybe you could ask your mom about it. She might tell you, you never know. Or Hestia, she might be willing to help,” he says, unsure what else to say. Not knowing things bothers Jemma, and she’d come to this place with so many answers and gotten more questions out of the deal. And she couldn’t just take the pieces of what she knew and fit them together to figure out what she didn’t, because she didn’t have enough pieces.
“Do you know who took the picture?”
“A university friend of my parents. Their best friend actually. They talk about her, sometimes, but I’ve never met her.”
“They look happy.”
“Yes,” she says, and then they’re out of things to say. The silence they fall into isn’t awkward though, and at some point Fitz realizes she’s nodded off against his shoulder. He’s just considering his options when his siblings come clattering in, raucous and with the flag in tow. Jemma stirs slightly, and he glares down toward the other Hephaestus campers, who all smile sheepishly; Donnie gives a half-hearted little whoop that sets the rest of them off again, though they at least try to muffle it behind their hands or with their orange shirts pulled up over their mouths. Fitz shakes his head, helping a still half-asleep Jemma to her feet.
“I’m going to make sure she gets back to her cabin okay,” he says, and Anne nods, moving the flag from the doorway so they can duck out of the cabin, Jemma leaning most of her weight against him. Once they’re a couple steps away, noise fills the cabin again, and Fitz smiles, shaking his head again.
All of the other cabins are dark as they cross to the other side of the horseshoe of buildings, and by the time they reach Athena’s cabin, Jemma has mostly woken up again, although she’s still slightly out of it. The two of them stand at the door for a moment, and then she pushes up onto her tiptoes to press a kiss against his cheek, smiling as she falls back onto her heels.
“Congratulations, Fitz,” she says, and he wonders if this is how normal people feel when it’s hot outside, overly aware of every little movement.
“Jemma,” he whispers, more of a breath than anything else, and she stares up at him expectantly for several long moments before he shakes himself out of it. “Thanks for your help.”
“Anytime. Except when we beat you, of course.”
She’s slipped into her cabin before he can think of anything to say back, and heads back across the open square, nodding at Hestia as he passes her campfire, returning to the light and noise of Hephaestus cabin.