Chapter 5
Percy
So these guys thought they could go through Percy's stuff without him noticing. Well, it wasn't that way. Not after that place. He could sense everything around him and woke up to the most subtle of movements completely alert, not mentioning how everyone who dared to wake him up with water ended up with a sword at their neck. Fortunately, the Avengers didn't; it would have been just a little bit difficult to explain where he got an expandable sword.
But that wasn't what Percy was thinking about. No, he was too angry for that. These people had no right to do what they were doing. He would have allowed them to see the books and pictures if they had simply asked, but they hadn't. Instead, they had decided to betray his trust and go through his stuff.
Percy tried to calm down, he knew bad things would happen if he didn't, but he couldn't manage to do it. It made him so mad to see how he had accepted to give them his help, getting himself into yet another prophecy and another war, and they disrespected him. He hadn't done anything to deserve that. But what really bothered him wasn't the fact that he was being disrespected in itself, he had never been one to care too much about self-benefit, but rather what it meant.
And what did it mean? It meant that it would take them a long time to start trusting each other, more so for that trust to be enough to fight together, and with the world on the brink of destruction, time was something they lacked. Their suspicion could literally get the whole world killed.
The earth started to shake.
"Leave," he said, his voice unusually calm, making it deadly scary for anyone who heard him.
"I'm- I'm sorry, we didn't mean-" Steve started, feeling unexpectedly nervous and guilty.
"Just leave," he said through gritted teeth. The ground shook harder. Everyone except Percy started gripping anything stable they could get their hands on, trying to stay standing.
"What's happening? What-" Bruce started but he was interrupted by Thor bursting through the door, panicked.
"Percy, calm down. Please, for the sake of everyone in this building, calm down. Breathe," he said in Ancient Greek.
The man who the god referred to started trying to steady his breathing, to no avail.
"If they hadn't invaded my privacy after I accepted to help them-"
"Yes, I know it is unfair, disrespectful and you have all the right to be angry, but please," he begged.
Percy breathed in and out a few more times. He really didn't want to end up harming innocent people, but his powers were out of his control now.
He closed his eyes. "The pool," he told Thor, who understood his request and hurried to get him there.
The earthquake gradually stopped, but it didn't stop completely until they reached the water.
The liquid of the pool embraced Percy as he willed it to lift itself, making him fall backward. The water started swinging dangerously around him; he was just so angry with all of them. They didn't have any right to go through his stuff, least of all through pictures of all of them. The people on them didn't deserve to be disrespected; they were all heroes.
But Percy's usual need to help, to avoid confrontations with his team in order to save everyone, was what finally made him ask himself what would Annabeth tell him in this situation.
He thought for a second about those heroes; Silena, Charles, Zoë, Bianca... They all deserved to be known and remembered. Only that thought put his mind at rest. It was alright.
The water stopped swinging around him and he allowed the water to sink him, gently leaving him at the deepest part of the pool. Thor thankfully stayed at the door to keep everyone away, though it wasn't really necessary, all of the Avengers were too busy recovering from the sudden earthquake to go to the pool.
It wasn't really a big situation, but Percy had been a little susceptible ever since the war ended. It was getting better slowly, very slowly. So there, at the bottom of the peaceful pool, he forced himself to be rational. He knew he couldn't allow himself to lose control again, his powers were one thousand times stronger than they had ever been so he could harm or even kill many people if it happened again. That thought was enough to make him calm down, but he figured he'd need more to come back to his senses if anything else happened. He then thought about his friends and fellow demigods. He didn't want them slaughtered or in cages, he didn't want them to become laboratory rats just because he couldn't keep his powers and identity a secret.
So, no more powers for now, no more talking in Greek, no more recognizing gods, no more sword-fighting, and definitely no more check-ups. He suddenly realized how suspicious everything he had done was. He wanted to facepalm. He did.
Percy got out of the pool, willing himself to stay soaked. Next, he asked Thor for some drachmas, went to a place where there was sunlight, and formed mist by heating the pool's water with his powers, there wasn't anyone there so there wasn't any problem. Maybe there were cameras. Well, the Mist could hide it... That's it! The Mist! He was going to IM Annabeth and ask her for advice, but he got a good idea. Instead of contacting his fiance, he called his cousin.
"Oh Fleecy, do me a solid. Show me Thalia, probably somewhere with the Hunters of Artemis." The drachma disappeared and the rainbow shimmered before the image of the dark-haired girl came into view.
"Kelp Head, what a pleasure," she said when she noticed him, playful sarcasm dripping from her voice.
"Pinecone Face," he greeted. "I'll go straight to the point: I need you to manipulate the Mist for me. As you probably already know, I'm with these mortal heroes and I've been quite obvious about my heritage without noticing-"
"You really do have seaweed as a brain, don't you?"
"Yeah, I know. Well, I'm trying to be more cautious but you'll have to make them believe they never saw me sword-fighting with a god and actually winning. And that I didn't cause an earthquake."
"You did what? You know, I'm not even surprised. Which god?"
"Thor, Norse."
"Great," she muttered.
"When will you come? It's kinda urgent."
"Tomorrow morning, we just finished a quest for our Lady and we're heading to Mount Olympus anyway so I should be there before midday."
"Thank you," Percy said, feeling really grateful.
"Oh, no, you owe me a good hunting knife now." He sighed at the request but nodded, saying goodbye and then cutting the connection.
After that, he IMed another person that would be crucial for his plan to work.
"Oh Fleecy, do me a solid. Show me Leo Valdez in Camp Half-blood." Leo had come back from the dead some weeks before with Festus and Calypso. At the beginning, it was a little awkward and Percy was reluctant to completely trust her. He did apologize for not making sure the gods kept their promise of freeing her, but he couldn't forget the fact that she cursed Annabeth. He would never be able to erase the image of the woman he loved screaming for him in pain, not being able to see him and almost dying. He wasn't one to hold grudges and he knew that she probably did it on impulse, but it still wasn't something he could let go easily.
Back to the IM, Leo appeared in front of him in the rainbow. He was in the Bunker 9, working on Festus.
"Hey man!" Leo said when he saw him, grinning.
"Hey!" Percy greeted. "Well, I need a favor... I'm with the Avengers and I'm planning on manipulating the Mist to make them believe that I never fought with a god in their gym and caused an earthquake. I know this place is full of cameras so I wanted to ask you if you could somehow erase the footage?" Percy asked, a little uncertain.
"Yeah, of course. That's a child's game, no problem for someone as great as me," Leo agreed easily. "Did you say you would manipulate the Mist? Did you finally learn to do it?" Leo asked curiously as he unconsciously built something tiny in his hands.
"Nope, I still suck at it. Thalia's coming. I also need a new and good hunting knife; do you think you could get me one? I'd pay you."
"What kind of payment would I be getting?"
"Five of my mom's blue cookies."
"Fifteen," Leo argued.
Percy frowned in disagreement.
"Eight." He crossed his arms.
"Twelve," Leo demanded.
"Ten, don't ask for more," he answered grumpily.
"Deal." Leo's grin widened. "I'll send it via Hermes Express tonight," and the connection was cut.
Percy turned around and saw Thor leaning against the wall near the door, looking at him.
"I will be more cautious from now on, young Percy. I apologize if I caused you any problem."
"It's fine, but please act as if I was as normal as any other teenager, not one of..." he trailed off, glancing at the ceiling where there were cameras, "of my kind." The god nodded.
•ψψψ•
Thalia appeared through the elevator casually, sirens sounding downstairs.
"Who are you? What are you doing here? How did you get past security?" Tony said as he turned around to face the invader. Natasha, on the other hand, had already taken a dagger from her boot and was about to try to knock Percy's cousin out.
Percy watched from the distance because he knew that Thalia didn't need his help (and he was right). He saw how the red-headed threw the weapon at the immortal girl, obviously trying to take her down, but she caught it just before it hit her, examined it, and then put it in her own boot, where another dagger was visible (only for expert eyes).
"This one doesn't count, Kelp Head."
"Nice to see you too, Pinecone Face." The girl only glared at him halfheartedly.
"So, are these the mortals you need to... Alter?"
"Hold up. First: who are you? Second: mortals?" Clint asked, his hand discreetly reaching for his gun.
"Yes, they are. I haven't been careful enough so..." Percy made weird gestures with his hands. "And, Clint, put the gun away," he said, without even looking at him.
"Alright, then. What exactly?" Thalia asked her cousin.
"I never fought with a god with a sword, nor beat a super soldier in push-ups. Oh, and I also didn't get angry at them for looking at my stuff." If he wasn't angry then they wouldn't relate the earthquake with it. Thalia seemed confused but complied nonetheless.
"You never saw Percy fight a god. He never beat a super-soldier. He didn't get angry at you for looking at his stuff. He's just a common teenager," she said and then snapped her fingers. All the team's eyes glazed and Thalia made sure to go away before they came back to their senses, taking the new hunting knife out of Percy's stretched out hand on her way, of course.
The son of Poseidon felt really sad and guilty that he had to do this. He was changing people's memories without their knowledge and it actually hurt him to do so, though he knew it was necessary so demigods weren't put in danger- not more than usual, at least.
His fatal flaw was personal loyalty, after all. If using the Mist kept the people he cared about safe, he had no qualms on using it.
He ran to the bathroom and IMed Leo.
"It's done. Now you only have to delete the recordings from the pool, the gym, and the Avengers' floor from yesterday and today and we're safe. Do you know how long it will take?"
"No more than half an hour. If Tony Stark's actually as good as everyone says then it should be a little difficult to get past his defenses and hack- Never mind, it's done," Leo said, grinning with satisfaction.
"Thank you," Percy sighed in relief. "The cookies will be there any moment now. There are twenty. Mom wouldn't let me give you only ten," he said, pouting. As an only response, Leo's smile grew and he cut the connection.
Finally, everything was taken care of.
"Oh Fleecy, do me a solid. Show me Annabeth Chase at Camp Half-blood." The rainbow shimmered before it turned into the image of the woman Percy loved. "Hey, what are you reading?" he asked quietly, trying not to scare her. She looked up from the book she held, smiling softly when she saw her fiance.
"Hey," she said back. "It's just a book about architecture, so I can take ideas for Olympus." Now that the war was over, she had gone back to designing what had been destroyed of Mount Olympus. "What are you doing? Wait, where are you? That's not your mom's apartment," she noticed, frowning.
"Didn't Chiron tell you yet?" She shook her head so he sighed and explained the whole situation to her. "You know, you're cute when you are concentrated." She glared at him but her cheeks were red. It was funny how, no matter how much shit they had gone through together, they were still a couple that liked to be in each other's company and enjoyed making the other blush.
"Shut up, Seaweed Brain. I'm thinking of ways to make them believe you're normal, which, might I add, is a really difficult task." Percy rolled his eyes playfully. "Well, monster attacks are inevitable so you'll have to sneak out to kill them. If you get covered in dust, tell them it's this thing called glitter."
"Glitter? And that is...?"
"Basically, some mortal saw a demigod after they killed monsters and thought the dust looked good on people. There are many colors apart from gold, maybe you should get some others to dissimulate. Tell them you're really obsessed with it because people don't usually wear nearly as much as you get after killing monsters," Annabeth explained. Percy thought it was ridiculous, but it helped him with his cover so he wouldn't complain.
"Okay, I'll tell them that. Do mortals really believe dust looks good?"
"It's strange, I know," Annabeth conceded to her fiance with a fond smile. "Well, you'll also have to practice control over your powers, especially when you're angry, so the earthquake situation won't repeat. You can't lose control now if you want to stay hidden. I can ask Nico to help you; maybe you could meet somewhere in central park, there's a lot of space. There you can also practice all your other powers so you don't get weak and you can even try new things that could be useful."
"I don't know... Are you sure about practicing in a public place? I don't want to hurt anyone," he said in worry.
"He won't let you hurt anyone, relax.. We'll take the necessary measures. You need to train."
"Fine..." he trailed off, a thought wandering through his mind.
"What do you want to ask me?" Annabeth asked softly, recognizing the look on his face.
"Did you- did you sleep?"
"No," she answered while looking down.
"Neither did I. I can't sleep without you. Even if I could, I wouldn't. Nightmares would be hard to cover up."
"We'll find a way; we'll get over this," she reassured and Percy knew she didn't only mean sleep. She was also talking about the new prophecy, now knowing that, again, it was about him.