#and chris and julie make it so easy because | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

gerrystamour · 1 year ago

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here i have found some peace of mind [chapter two]

Rated E | Steddie

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Steve gets to know 'Chris' a lot better. CW: This chapter deals a bit with dysphoria and deadnaming. Steve is deadnamed by a colleague in the chapter (which is based on a situation I actually went through and I'm personally working with HR to address). This chapter also delves into grief a little bit, particularly about the loss of a parent. Because apparently I not only wanted to process my Trans Feelings, but also my Grief Feelings. (Though my relationship with my dad before my dad passed was not strained) NOW INCLUDES AMAZING FANART drawn by my lovely lovely lovely friend Simon @sentient-trash !!

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longing for isolation, for starlit skies

Steve sat at his desk typing up an email to one of the event managers’ clients, quietly grumbling to himself about why he had to email them without any real heat. The managers were busy, and sometimes it just made more sense for Steve to email the clients outright. He would do it, he would just bitch about it while he did it.

“Steve.”

Looking up, he met Joyce’s eyes and cringed under her stern expression.

“Yes, Joyce?” he asked, but he already knew what this was about.

“I was looking through the turnovers. Did Nancy give you a group the other day?” she asked, and Steve looked at his computer.

“It’s just a band and film crew. I’ve already made contact with the client,” Steve said, his ears heating up when Joyce sighed.

“I’d like to speak to you in my office, please,” she said and walked away.

Sighing heavily, Steve finished the email he was working on, sent it, and locked his computer. When he got up and turned, Nancy was hovering at her cubicle and chewing her bottom lip.

“Sorry,” she mouthed, and Steve just rolled his eyes and trudged across the room to Joyce’s office and shut the door.

When he sat down heavily, Joyce sighed again.

“I’m not mad at you, Steve, so you can relax,” she soothed, and Steve tried to do just that. “I’m concerned because I don’t want you burning yourself out again.”

“I know. It’s just rooms, and it’s a band so it’s super easy,” Steve replied quickly. “She wanted me to handle it.”

“Then she should have turned it over properly and put it in the notes that she wanted you to handle it,” Joyce said sternly.

“Nancy seems to think that if she turned it over properly and asked for you to assign it to me, you would assign it to one of the other managers,” Steve said with a knowing raise of his eyebrows when Joyce looked away and cleared her throat. “C’mon, she has a point, Joyce.”

“That’s because if I agreed to assign every group she wants given to you, you would be back in the same mess you were last summer,” Joyce said a bit defensively. “Tell me about the group, and I’ll decide if you can keep it.”

“I already made contact with the client!” Steve said.

“And you were not actually assigned this group properly. If I decide I want to take the group from you, that is my decision to make as your manager,” Joyce said, standing her ground.

Steve sat up straighter and narrowed his eyes. “You would undermine your team like that in the eyes of the client?” he asked, and Joyce pursed her lips.

“And Nancy didn’t undermine me by assigning you a group?” she challenged, and Steve sighed heavily.

“It’s a band and film crew, about twenty rooms if I remember correctly. They’re arriving in July, have already sent the rooming list and the riders, and the tour manager has already received the confirmed rooming list,” Steve rattled off and leaned back in the chair to stare up at one of the motivational posters on the wall above his boss, getting ready for Joyce to take the turnover.

“Is there any catering?” she asked.

“Nope,” Steve replied, trying not to sound dejected. He really liked working with bands and film crews, so the two being combined? He was looking forward to it.

“Steve, you know I’m not trying to punish you, right?” Joyce asked imploringly.

“I know, but you’re also refusing to give me work that you know I actually enjoy,” he replied with a sigh as he looked back at her. “I know you’re worried about me burning out, but that means all I’ve gotten for almost a year has been small little meetings and pop-ups. I haven’t had a single tour, or band, or film crew in months and I’m starting to get sick of my work.”

“Why is this the first you’ve mentioned this?” Joyce asked, and Steve cringed at that.

“Because I knew you were just trying to help me, and I figured if I just kept going without complaining you’d stop babying me,” Steve replied honestly, shrugging one shoulder.

“Oh, Steve, I wasn’t trying to baby you or treat you like you were less capable,” Joyce replied with a big sigh. “And you telling me how you’re feeling about your work is not complaining.”

“Yeah, well,” Steve started, but just trailed off with another shrug. “Just… don’t give it to Tammy. She screws up rooms-only blocks like this every time, and I’ll practically be handling the group anyway.”

Joyce huffed a big sigh and shook her head. “You can keep this group. It has been a while, and I don’t want you burning out because you’re bored either,” she said and Steve looked at her, shocked. She still had a stern expression as she added, “I will be speaking to Nancy about going above me like that.”

“Of course,” Steve said quickly, so happy that he was keeping the group to feel bad that Nancy was going to get chewed out.

“And you! If you’re feeling that way about your work, you tell me, got it?” Joyce added firmly, pointing at him.

“Right, of course, absolutely,” Steve agreed, nodding quickly. Just then, there was a knock on the door.

“Come in,” Joyce called and Tammy, one of the event managers, poked her head in.

“Hey guys, sorry to interrupt, but there’s someone calling for Steve?” she said with an apologetic grimace. “He said his name is Chris? I have him on hold right now.”

Steve nodded and turned to Joyce. “Are we good?” he asked, and Joyce smiled and nodded.

“Yep, we’re good,” she replied and waved him off.

When Steve got back to his desk, he heard Tammy speaking to Chris before she transferred the call. Steve picked up on the first ring.

“Good afternoon, Steve speaking?” he said quickly.

“Good afternoon, handsome. How are things going in hotel land?”

Steve chuckled and rolled his eyes a little bit. “Busy, as always. Can’t complain though,” he replied as he tapped his pencil against his notebook. “How can I help you, Chris?”

“What if I just wanted to hear your voice?” Chris teased, and Steve rolled his eyes.

“I’m on the clock. How can I help you?” Steve asked again, but there was a part of him that was still flattered by the attention, interested in the attention even.

And so began the almost-daily calls from Chris. Steve never actually reached out from his end because there was no reason for him to until they got closer to the actual stay. It was always Chris calling him to make requests, to discuss the area a bit more, or sometimes just to chat. As their work relationship progressed, Steve found it easier to fall into more friendly banter, even returning some of the flirting.

Steve still refused to try to find out who the band was or look Chris up, but mostly because he didn’t want to give a face to the man he was talking to on the phone just yet. He knew that if Chris was even half as hot as he sounded, he wouldn’t stand a chance.

As it stood, most days Chris would call, they would discuss matters pertaining to his band’s stay in July for five minutes, then spend the next twenty just talking about other stuff. Usually, it was just Steve talking about his job and complaining light-heartedly.

“The worst way to receive a rooming list is as a PDF,” Steve grumbled into the phone as he painstakingly copied and pasted a rooming list into a spreadsheet. “Please know that if a Group Housing Coordinator receives a rooming list as a PDF? They hate the client just a little bit.”

On the other end of the call, Chris chuckled before stopping abruptly. Steve smirked a bit as he could practically hear the dots connecting in Chris’ head.

“Didn’t we send our rooming list as a PDF?”

Steve snorted. “Maybe,” he replied cheekily, and Chris groaned.

“Is that why you are resisting my charm?” Chris whined and Steve laughed.

“That, and I’m also on the clock,” he reminded Chris teasingly.

“You could always give me your number?”

Steve sighed and thought back to the employee conduct manual. It would be wildly inappropriate to give a client his number. “Not while you’re my client,” he responded, resolving to pull out the conduct manual and read it over again.

“So… after?” Chris pressed and Steve laughed.

“I’m not making any promises, Chris,” Steve sighed, chewing his lip while a grin tugged at the corners of his mouth.

There was some shouting on the other end of the call and Chris sighed. “Alright, Stevie, that’s my cue to go in a bit. I’ll talk to you tomorrow?”

Steve almost said yes, but then remembered he had requested the next day off. “No, unfortunately I won’t be in the office tomorrow. I’m taking a personal day,” he replied.

“Oh, doing anything fun or interesting?” Chris asked, and Steve actually grinned at how interested he sounded.

“I wish. Uh, nah, I have appointments and then visiting a cemetery, so,” Steve trailed off with a shrug before cringing. Chris couldn’t see him shrugging, what the hell?

“Oh shit, sorry. That was really stupid of me to ask,” Chris said, and Steve laughed.

“It’s all good, man. I wouldn’t’ve answered if it bothered me,” he admitted and on the other end of the line, Chris chuckled lightly.

“That makes sense. I’ll talk to you another time then.”

“Or you could relax and not call me again about your stay in July,” Steve insisted as he always did when they were about to hang up.

“Mm, no. I think I’ll continue to micromanage our stay, just to keep you on your toes, Stevie,” Chris replied and then hung up.

Steve sighed with a little grin as he hung his receiver up, rubbing the back of his neck bashfully.

“What the hell was that, Dingus?”

Steve nearly jumped out of his skin and looked up at Robin peering over his cubicle with wide eyes.

“Nothing,” Steve lied, and he could feel his face burning with his blush.

“Stephen, are you flirting with a client?” she hissed as she hurried around the cubicle wall to sit on his desk.

“No,” Steve hissed back, glancing around but thankfully no one was paying attention. “No, he is flirting with me.”

Robin gasped dramatically. “He?” she asked excitedly.

“Did you need something? Because I’m kind of busy,” Steve said, shoving his glasses up to scrub at his face.

“I texted you about food in Dustin’s Office, but you didn’t respond so I came to find you,” she immediately replied, smiling when Steve locked his computer and got up.

“I’m definitely in,” he replied happily.

“We’re talking about everything I overheard tomorrow, you hear me, Harrington?” Robin said as they walked, pointing at him accusingly.

“Yeah, yeah,” Steve sighed, rolling his eyes with a chuckle.

❖

The next morning, Steve woke up with his normal alarm, even though he technically had the day off. It was a bit nice, being able to get up and not rush through his morning routine. He even had time to make a proper breakfast and eat it while listening to an audiobook.

Steve took his time in the shower and then shaving and doing his hair. With a small grimace, he put on gloves and tried to hold his breath as he smeared his testosterone gel on his shoulders. Holding his breath never seemed to work as the sting of the alcohol evaporating always hit his sinuses.

Once he was showered and groomed, Steve went back to his room to get dressed. “Robbie, time to get up!” he called as he passed Robin’s room, pounding on her door without pausing in his steps.

Forty-five minutes later, Steve and Robin were in the car on their way to the first of several errands and appointments. The two of them tried to schedule as many of their things for the same day as they could so Robin wouldn’t have to worry about catching the bus. Plus, it was generally just better to have company for errands and appointments.

“So, what’s up with you and your client?” Robin asked around a yawn, scrubbing her eyes. She had been working a huge dinner party until two in the morning the night before, and hadn’t gotten home until after three.

“Nothing is up, Robs,” Steve muttered, trying to recall the perfectly good explanations he had come up with for what she overheard yesterday but drawing a complete blank. “He just calls a lot, and he just flirts with me. It’s nothing.”

“Okay, but you were definitely flirting back,” Robin said, and Steve shot a quick glare at her. “C’mon, Steve, I can tell when you’re flirting, and you were definitely flirting. I’ve heard you shutting people down before and you were not doing that. Maybe you thought you were, but you weren’t.”

“Fine, maybe I was flirting back. It’s not like it matters, or like anything’ll come of it. He’ll get bored eventually, and he’s only going to be in town for like… three days,” Steve said explosively, running a hand through his hair. “If we hook-up, and that’s a huge if, it’ll be super casual because he’ll be off to the next place, so, whatever.”

There was a long pause, the silence between them deafening.

“Steve,” Robin finally started, and her voice was the gentle one she only brought out when Steve was being especially reckless. “You know how you are with casual…”

Cringing, Steve tried to wrangle up some kind of defense against that. But it was true, it was largely why he struggled so much with dating and a huge factor in why he and Nancy didn’t work out. Steve’s feelings for people seemed to move at the speed of light with zero in-between, whether they were platonic or romantic. The reason he only had one friend was thanks to Robin being very similar, or at least receptive to having someone immediately prepared to die for her after two proper conversations.

“Like I said, he’ll get bored eventually,” Steve said instead of addressing Robin’s point out loud. “It’s not like he even talks about himself much.”

“Maybe you should ask him about himself,” Robin suggested, shrugging when Steve glanced at her questioningly. “If he’s just in it for some casual sex while he’s in town, he’ll probably avoid opening up, right? But if not… just because he’s not in town long doesn’t mean it has to be casual.”

Steve considered Robin’s words for a few moments, rolling them around in his head. “Maybe,” he conceded after a bit, ignoring the smug smile that split Robin’s face.

A few hours later found the two of them at the big cemetery near the posh neighbourhood where Steve grew up in the suburbs. It was one of the errands Steve dreaded, but he did it every year anyway.

Steve didn’t like visiting graves. It felt performative, fake, like it was an act he was putting on. There were better places for him to visit where he felt closer to that person than their grave. But Steve knew that if his mom arrived tomorrow and there were no flowers from Steve on his dad’s grave, she would immediately call him and demand an explanation.

He didn’t hold it against her, not at all. Melissa Harrington was amazing, even if she wasn’t very present in Steve’s life as he was growing up. She was doing what she could to make up for that, and even now that Steve had moved out to the city, they met up regularly for brunch on the weekends.

Steve’s relationship with his dad had been strained just before his unexpected passing. Thomas Harrington had grand ideas about Steve’s future, and he pushed Steve hard to reach that potential. He hadn’t done it cruelly, by any means, just thoughtlessly and without considering Steve’s wishes at the time. When Steve had gotten his first job at a hotel and fallen in love with hospitality, Thomas was not very happy and made his displeasure known.

Ultimately, though, Thomas had been coming around. He’d started showing an interest in Steve’s work and growth at his property. They were fighting less and enjoying each other’s company more often again.

One of the last conversations Steve had with his dad had been an aborted attempt to come out of the closet. Steve never got the actual words— “Dad, I think I’m a boy…”—but there was something in the way Thomas had gripped his shoulder firmly and pulled him into a tight hug that said he knew and that it was okay.

If Steve had known he wouldn’t get another chance to try again…

After a lengthy walk, they finally arrived at Thomas’ grave and Steve immediately began tidying it up. The graveyard was well maintained, so there wasn’t much for him to do, but it felt better fussing over brushing grass off the gravestone than just standing there. Once he was done, Steve laid the flowers on the grave and stood back up.

Robin had joined Steve on his annual visit to his dad’s grave since the first anniversary of his passing. She never questioned why he didn’t say anything when he was there, and she never tried to make him. It was the one reason he always visited the day before the actual anniversary to avoid running into his mom. Melissa would spend hours at Thomas’ grave talking to the gravestone, and she didn’t understand why Steve couldn’t.

It just felt weird to talk to a slab of granite in the middle of a silent field of slabs of granite. The body six feet below them wasn’t his dad anymore; that body stopped being his dad suddenly and quietly—painlessly, the doctors all insisted—in the middle of the night seven years ago.

“Need more time, Dingus?” Robin asked quietly, and Steve took a deep breath. Reaching up to rub his eyes, he found that he’d been crying.

Quickly wiping the tears off his cheeks, Steve shook his head. “No, I’m good,” he said, and he sighed happily when Robin tucked herself under his arm.

“We should get take-out tonight. We earned it after all our running around, yeah?” she said and wrapped her arm around Steve’s waist.

Steve smiled and nodded. “Yeah, take-out sounds perfect,” he hummed, tugging Robin in tightly against his side to kiss the top of her head.

❖

Returning to work the next day was hard, but Steve needed to keep up the momentum. If he took the rest of the week off like his mom always tried to get him to do, Steve would wallow and come back to work in a worse mood.

Unfortunately for him, he had the absolute displeasure to open his emails to find one of the above-property sales managers deadnaming him to not one, not two, but three different clients.

It wasn’t the first time she used his deadname in an email directly with a client. She did that a lot, and Steve was endlessly patient about it because he knew this came with the territory of not legally changing his name yet. The main system where this sales manager would see his name still had his legal one, and Steve reasoned that she oversaw too many properties to remember his preferred name.

It was different this time.

Good afternoon Martha,

Thank you so much for reaching out about your request to add more rooms to your block! I am connecting you with my amazing on-property colleague Carly (Steve) who will follow-up with you if they have availability. She will be delighted to assist you.

It was the first time she added his preferred name in parentheses like that with a double-whammy of using the wrong pronouns. Steve stared at the email, and then the other two and, yup, sure enough she did the same exact thing in every email. The kicker for him was the fact that the sales manager had, at some point, added her pronouns in her signature.

Steve drafted an absolutely scathing email that would absolutely get him fired if he actually hit send. The vent helped a bit, so he deleted it and focused on actioning the requests and replying to the clients. His signature obviously had his proper name and pronouns, so he hoped politely responding would make her look like the moron she was to the clients.

But he was set even further off-kilter by the whole interaction. On top of his grief, he felt like he was drifting outside of his body, above it and slightly to the left so that he could observe himself. Everything felt wrong, things he hadn’t felt dysphoria over in years crawling back up to suffocate him.

He felt nauseous at the way his hands moved on the keyboard or lifted his cup of coffee to his lips, the way he crossed his ankles under his chair or waved to Nancy as she walked past. Steve laughed at a joke Tammy told him, and the sound of it in his ears was like shards of glass and he just barely concealed his grimace long enough for Tammy to turn away. Steve caught himself chewing his nails at some point because they were too long, people could tell.

Steve was proudly out as trans. He managed to get his pronoun and pride pins approved against his property’s dress code and all of his public social media disclosed that he was trans. All anyone had to do was look him up online and they would know.

That didn’t mean he wanted to be seen as trans all the time.

He knew he was fortunate enough that HRT treated him well and he had been able to afford top surgery, so he “passed” pretty well. That meant he could have the safety of people’s assumptions in situations where that person might be hostile if they found out. Passing made his job a lot easier, even if a lot of his work with clients happened over emails and only face-to-face once they came to the hotel.

To be outed from the get-go in those emails? It, quite frankly, sucked.

The giant shit cherry on top of the shit sundae was that Steve had to renew his security badge with the airport that day, too.

All of his paperwork was under his legal name, obviously, but the security agent the year before had let him put his preferred name on his badge. When he made the same request to the agent this year, she argued with him about it in front of the other people in the pass office. The agent only agreed to put his preferred name on the badge when her manager came around to investigate the hold-up and gave her a stern look.

If Steve wasn’t so raw from everything else, he would have been grateful. However, he just felt sick, like he had bullied them into letting him keep a badge that didn’t have his deadname on it.

Like he was getting away with something because he was a big enough dick about it.

By the time he returned to his desk, he had more emails from the bitch from sales and one of the clients responded asking who “Carly” was, and Steve was ready to go home.

Just then, his phone rang, and he couldn’t even muster the energy to check who it was.

“Chicago In-Terminal Hotel Events, this is Steve speaking. How can I assist you?” he rattled off in his best customer-service voice given the circumstances.

“Heya, Stevie! You kinda sound like shit, man.”

Steve laughed humourlessly, even as something loosened in his chest at hearing Chris’ voice. “Thank God someone knows how to use my actual name,” he blurted before he could stop himself.

There was a pause before Chris sternly said, “Of course. What sort of asshole doesn’t use your actual name if they know it?”

“You’d be surprised,” Steve said vaguely, minimizing his emails so he didn’t have to look at them while on the phone with Chris. “What’s up, Chris?”

“Honestly? I’m just kind of bored and I missed chatting with you yesterday,” Chris replied, and his tone was so sincere that Steve felt bad that he was in such a messed up mood. “I know you’re on the clock, but if you have time…?”

Steve tapped his pencil against his notebook as he considered. He was in a rotten mood, but he already felt himself settling back into his skin, feeling a lot less jagged and wrong just after a couple minutes listening to Chris’ voice. That was a bit scary to consider, given the nature of their relationship. This guy shouldn’t have that much power over Steve’s moods, yet he did.

Remembering Robin’s suggestion from the day before, Steve decided to try that.

“Listen, Chris, I’ve had a really shitty day and talking about myself would suck for you,” Steve started slowly, taking a deep breath. “Maybe you could tell me about you? It feels like I do most of the talking…”

There is another long pause. “I dunno, man, there isn’t much to say about myself…”

Steve’s stomach dropped at the deflection. So, did that mean the interest was just casual on Chris’ end? He didn’t want to open up because he was just looking for a quick fuck, nothing more? Steve lied to himself and decided he could live with that, probably.

“Okay, sure. I’ll have to talk to you some other time then,” Steve said, his voice going tight.

“Steve, wait, don’t hang up. I didn’t—there’s just not a lot to talk about that isn’t already all over the internet, y’know?” Chris laughed a bit and added very quietly, “like, I’m surprised we’re even still talking at all at this rate.”

Steve frowned at the last bit, and reconsidered his decision not to sleuth out who the band was. Were there some shady details surrounding Chris Cunningham or the band he was managing the tour for?

“Dude, you—I haven’t even looked up the band you’re managing. I have no idea who you are,” Steve admitted, and the startled laugh he received brought a smile to his face. “Besides, why would I take what the internet says about you when I could get the real details directly from the source? Would you look at my socials and decide you knew me based on that?”

Chris chuckled. “I mean, I have peeked at your socials, Steve,” he confessed, and Steve felt his blush all the way down to his bellybutton. “I didn’t do much digging, I promise! I just—I’m very visual and wanted to put a face to your voice.”

“No, you’re all good, my public socials are, well, public for a reason,” Steve said with a laugh, chewing his lip a bit. “You, uh, like what you saw?”

Chris gave a quiet groan. “You’ve no idea, big boy,” he confessed softly, his voice deep and rumbling through the line, raising goosebumps up the back of Steve’s neck. Then Chris took a deep breath and asked, “okay, Stevie, what do you want to know about me?”

Everything, Steve almost said, and he barely stopped himself. “You mentioned your uncle once. Can you tell me about him?” he said instead, and Chris’ laugh was beautiful.

“My Uncle Wayne, literally one of the best things to ever happen to me, honestly,” Chris sighed.

“Only one of the best things?” Steve questioned curiously.

“I mean, the band actually breaking onto the scene makes that list,” Chris laughed, then added, “getting to talk to you is on there, too.”

“Shut up,” Steve laughed, blushing at how genuine Chris managed to make that absolute line sound. “Okay, tell me about your uncle.”

“Uncle Wayne basically raised me. I lived with my own folks until I was like, thirteen? I think? Then moved in with Wayne. My old man wasn’t a fan of my lifestyle and all that,” Chris explained, his tone flippant, like it didn’t hurt anymore, but Steve had a feeling that wasn’t true.

“It sucks that your parents were like that,” Steve said quietly, hoping Chris heard the sincerity in his voice.

“Yeah, but hey, I wouldn’t’ve met the boys or—yeah, the boys, y’know? Wayne taught me everything I know about guitars and music and shit,” Chris said fondly.

“You play guitar?” Steve pushed, a little embarrassed at how much more attractive Chris was with that little bit of new information.

There was silence over the line for several moments, long enough for Steve to get concerned the call was about to drop when Chris finally said, “Yeah, uh, like a little bit? I don’t play as much as I used to, and obviously not good enough to actually be in the band or anything.”

Chris was laughing at that in a way that didn’t quite sound forced but it didn’t sound real either. “Well, I still think that’s really cool. Always had a thing for musicians,” he teased instead, smirking at the startled laugh that bubbled out of Eddie.

“I’ll keep that in mind, Stevie,” Chris said, his voice low in a way that had Steve shivering.

The next couple of weeks passed with daily phone calls from Chris where he vaguely talked about his life prior to the band taking off, about the band mates and their antics. He mentioned a YouTube channel briefly once, and Steve was tempted to find it but… he liked getting to know Chris without that crutch. Steve liked the mystery of not knowing what Chris looked like.

Steve was really smitten with the way Chris talked about the people in his life, the way his tone would turn so painfully affectionate that Steve could see the smile tugging at the corners of his lips. Did Chris have dimples? He hoped Chris had dimples. Steve was always a sucker for dimples. Steve couldn’t help but wonder if Chris told his friends about their conversations, and if Chris spoke about him with that same tone.

If Steve also became a bit more active and a bit sluttier on his socials knowing Chris was maybe monitoring them, that was his business.

“You seem really close with the band for a tour manager,” Steve commented one day after Chris told him a funny story about the frontman nearly falling off the stage during a recent soundcheck. Apparently, he went to lean on his cane purely out of habit, forgetting he wasn’t using it at that moment, and was barely saved by one of the other band members.

“We’ve all been best friends since, like, middle school,” Chris said quietly, and Steve’s smile was big enough to hurt his face. “The band got serious about the dream in high school and then the five of us just… did what we had to to stay together.”

“That’s amazing. I only have, like, one friend that I’ve had more than a year,” Steve said, and he cringed at how pathetic that sounded.

“C’mon, no way,” Chris laughed, and Steve cringed again.

“I’m serious, man. I was… I used to be an asshole,” Steve confessed lightly, thinking back to the way he was in high school and his only attempt at college.

It was a lot of desperately performing a gender that felt wrong and overcompensating for his feelings of inadequacy. He remembered the way he lashed out and held people at arm’s length, the way he would sling cutting remarks at anyone who seemed to be thriving in their own weirdness. How dare they be weird and happy, when Steve had been trying so hard to be normal and was so miserable for it?

Steve felt bad for Carly when he looked back on those memories. She wasn’t real and, on some level, she knew that, even back then when she had no vocabulary for it. Not being real was scary, confusing, painful, and like a wounded animal she bit and clawed anyone who came near enough to see how hollow she was.

That didn’t mean Steve stood by those actions, that he didn’t feel immensely guilty for them, but he was working on showing compassion to that part of himself. It was something he learned in therapy the handful of times he actually went.

“Hm, well, you don’t seem like an asshole anymore,” Chris said, breaking Steve out of his thoughts.

“I’m trying everyday not to be,” Steve agreed, smiling as he tapped his pencil against his notebook.

Chris paused for a bit, sighing. “Go to dinner with me,” he said abruptly. “We’re at the hotel for three nights, right? Go to dinner with me.”

Steve’s breath left him in a whoosh at the blunt request. It was more of a command and that thought left Steve feeling a bit lightheaded. “You’re my client—” Steve started, and Chris made a bit of a noise.

“The way I see it, I stop actually being your client at five that Friday when you clock-out, right?” Chris said a bit suggestively, and Steve blushed.

Steve had looked up the employee conduct manual and the official rules were that dating clients was allowed as long as it happened off the clock and off-property. Their phone calls were blatantly against those rules, but they discussed enough about the room block each time to justify the conversations a little bit.

“Stevie?” Chris sounded so unsure that Steve instantly felt bad for letting his brain run away with him.

“It definitely has to be when I’m off the clock, and we can’t have dinner on-property,” Steve practically whispered into the phone and Chris made a triumphant little noise that brought a grin to Steve’s face.

“Fuck yeah, Stevie, I can’t wait! I know the perfect place!” Chris gushed and then some shouting in the background caught Chris’ attention. “Yeah! I know—I’ll be there in a—fuck off Garebear, I’ll fucking cut you—Stevie, I gotta go, okay?”

Steve laughed and nodded. Grimacing as he reminded himself that Chris couldn’t see him, Steve said, “yeah, of course. Talk to you later.”

“You know it, gorgeous,” Chris cooed and then dial-tone was droning in Steve’s ear.

It took Steve probably a full minute to actually hang the receiver up and wipe the grin off his face.

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Thank you so much for reading! Please consider reblogging!! Taglist! @scarcrossdlvrs, @sidekick-hero, @afewproblems, @mylilplanet, @starryeyedjanai, @steddieas-shegoes, @estrellami-1, @hellion-child, @princess-eddie, @pluckedstrings, @patchworkgargoyle, @findafight, @spookednsaucy, @inairbinad, @lillemilly, @matchingbatbites, @lets-try-to-be-normal-otakus, @scoops-stevie, @steddierthings, @bylerwillnotwriteitself, @indigohightide, @vecnuthy, @stobinesque If you want to join the taglist, just request it in the tags or reblog comments!!

#steddie #steve x eddie #steve/eddie #steve harrington #eddie munson #steddie fic #gerry writes #peace of mind

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try-set-me-on-fire · 2 years ago

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Can I do a soft prompt not on the list ? I love your writing 😊 Buck and Eddie driving back from a zoo trip or something with Chris and Chris falling asleep in the back seat.

Going to count this under “road trip” for list checking purposes. Send me soft prompts! Find the finished ones on ao3!

Sometime in May when the end of school was weeks away but felt like eternity even to a kid who liked the place, Eddie had come home from running errands to find Buck and Chris laying out flat on the living room floor marking up a giant piece of paper. Eddie doesn’t know where they got it - it must be 18x24 at least - or why the floor was the best option for putting it to use - a mystery shortly solved by finding the remains of lunch still scattered over the kitchen table - but Eddie is careful not to step on it or any stray limb or crayon as he makes his way through to put groceries away. When anything perishable is safe someplace cold he comes back to sit between them, at the long edge of the sheet.

“What are you up to?”

“Read the paper, dad,” Chris says, exasperated. Eddie makes a face at him, and Buck tries not to laugh from his spot on the floor. The two of them share a look before Eddie puts his attention on Buck and Christopher’s work. Written at the top of the paper in chunky block letters is BIG SUMMER IDEAS, decorated by a smiling sun with cool guy shades and what Eddie assumes is a flamingo judging by the shades of pink. There’s more writing all over the page, half of it upside down because Chris is laying along the top edge. Eddie picks out BEACH DAY and GARDEN WITH PEPPA and NEW PIZZA (RESTAURANT? INVENT?) and, mirrored in both hand writings and circled twice, ZOO.

“You two aren’t sick of the zoo by now?” Eddie asks, and then raises his hands when they both look scandalized.

“Never!” Buck proclaims. “Besides, San Diego and Santa Barbara are both not that far away, we thought we’d maybe try and branch out.”

Chris nods seriously. “We need to expand our zoo repertoire,” he says, confident around the big new vocabulary word.

“Alright,” Eddie gives in, easily. “This is a big list, we gotta do all of these? I don’t know if we’ll have the time…”

Buck pushes himself up to sitting, and shrugs. “Just ideas. We were getting antsy waiting for Summer, huh?” Chris nods emphatically and Buck grins at him, before looking back at Eddie a little less sure. “Thought we’d write out some things to look forward to. We- you don’t have to do all, or any-“

“We’re definitely going to the zoo,” Chris frowns.

“Except for the zoo, of course.” He still has that look on his face, like he’s overstepped somehow, and Eddie wants to say please don’t apologize for finding a way to make Chris happy when he’s feeling down, and of course “we,” of course you’re coming with us, I haven’t the first idea how to invent new pizza.

“It’s a good list,” is what he says. “We’ll see what we can pack in there.”

That was May, and it’s the end of July now, and history books worth of things have happened in between, and Buck and Eddie’s Relationship (capital R, for Romance) is so new it’s stumbling around on doe legs. Eddie thinks they’ve spent years planting a pretty nice meadow for it to stumble around in, though, and taking his hand in public for the first time ever as they trail Chris around the Santa Barbara Zoo is easy as anything. It helps that they both start laughing - giggling, really, he’s a grown man giggling at the zoo - whenever they make eye contact. They hold hands in front of an island full of tiny little monkeys, and in a cave where you can watch penguins swim around, and by the statue of the giraffe with the crooked neck, and on the train that loops around the whole thing and gets so close to the lion enclosure that it’s almost a little frightening. They spend a fair amount of time not holding hands, too, as Buck and Chris pour over every informational plaque in the place. Eddie is perfectly content to watch them have at it and provide sunscreen reapplications and snacks, probably smiling just as sappily at his two favorite people in the world having a good time as he did at holding hands (holding hands!) with his boyfriend (boyfriend!).

They only stay at the zoo until about four, but they’d had to get up at the crack of dawn to make it up the coast in a reasonable amount of time, especially with the mess of construction Buck had to white knuckle through on the northbound 101 past Ventura. Chris is starting to wilt a little, and Eddie’s running on several cups of coffee, and even Buck has yawned once or twice by the time they’re eating an early dinner at a sandy little outdoor restaurant close to the beach outside of town. A train goes right past during the meal and all three of them stand up for a good look, Buck hefting Chris up on his back for a better vantage point. If Eddie gets distracted by watching the joy on their faces instead of the train, well, his sappiness was never going to be contained just within the walls of the zoo. He finds it a little hard to believe, sometimes, the amount of happiness he gets to experience. It jostles around inside of him like loose parts, or a bag of treasure. He’s been happy before, he’s been happy for years here in LA with the family of the 118 taking root around him, but it’s felt… more, these days, almost dizzying since he and Buck had either suddenly or finally closed the distance. It bubbles away inside of him, somewhere near Camarillo with Chris falling asleep in the back seat and pink California summer sunset light washing over them all. Buck’s got the windows rolled down just a little, to feel the air, and the radio is on low, and Eddie has been trying to leave less things unspoken, so.

“Thank you.”

Buck glances at him with a little smile, then looks back at the road. “For what?”

Eddie shrugs, because how is he supposed to encompass all of it with words? “For driving. For coming with us. For holding my hand.”

Buck’s laugh is just a soft exhale. “I should be thanking you for all that.”

“Even the driving?”

“Okay, well, the construction was bad, but yeah even the driving. You know I don’t mind it.” Buck’s smile is still small, and it feels important, suddenly, to try and get across the enormity of all this.

“Thank you for- everything, Buck. For inventing new pizza.”

Buck laughs loud, and then sheepishly checks Chris in the rear view mirror. Still sleeping. “I don’t think we’ve quite perfected it yet,” he says, quietly. “Give me a few more tries.”

Eddie shakes his head. “I don’t know how to- the time you give us, the- everything- Do you know? How happy you make us? Make me?”

Buck glances at him, twice, three times, keeps his eyes back on the road. “It feels like…” Buck is almost whispering, and gestures at his chest. “Like that little bag of rocks Chris got at the gift shop.”

Eddie laughs, folding a little closer to Buck, because a bag of treasure, they’re sharing metaphors. “Yeah. Like that.”

“I know,” Buck says, like he can’t believe it sometimes either. “You know? Me- me too?"

"Yeah. Yeah, I know." There's hardly been any complete sentences in this conversation but Eddie thinks they've never really needed words to communicate anyway. He knows. Buck knows. "We've still got 23 items on the list."

Buck laughs, and lets go of the steering wheel to grab Eddie's hand again. "Well, tomorrow's a new day. Summer's not over yet."

Eddie thinks, holding Buck's hand with Chris sleeping in the back, on the road headed home, that with each other summer is never going to end.

#buddie #eddie diaz #evan buckley #christopher diaz #my writing #I feel like the two modes of my writing are ADHD or Vibey #and this straddles the two so. sorry. or you’re welcome?#also wrote part of it in the drive through of an in n out

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fandomfluffandfuck · 2 months ago

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Romeo & Juliet by Peter McPoland is SO evanstan you don’t understand

its literally all I think about when I hear that song

"Someday, down the road, I hope to be your Romeo I'll climb the wires to your landline While you're crying on the telephone And you're sitting, feet dangling Cheeks so rosy red and saying "Baby, I was so upset, I thought you'd never set me free" "Hello?" I'd say, "Oh, I love you" to my Juliet If you only knew, I'd kill for you, I am for you I am just who you need me to be Let's get down, and let's grow old This fire escape is getting cold I love that dress, I love the rest Of all that you've got going on One day when the lines have all been read and memorized I hope you mean it when you say that I am yours and you are mine Singing down here, on my knees I'm begging, "Won't you marry me?" I love that dress, I love the rest So Julie make me go, go on But how do you know? Is it just something hits you? Yes (look, just do a bit for me) No (no, I don't, I don't mean it, I don't mean it) I mean just the words Um (no, my babe, it's done so many times) Oh for goodness sake Alright do another bit, any bit Um... Oh God I have nothing to fucking sing"

Aw!

That's so fucking cute, like I know how Romeo and Juliet ends so it's not cute there, but, like, the song is really sweet. Also, I love the part about memorizing and reading lines for them <3 that and the mention of fire escapes because fire escapes will ever be attached to pre-war stucky for me, so, in a song about evanstan, it seems like it connects their origin back to those days when they were first cast together. Sweethearts

Thanks for sharing!!

You have a very wholesome song that makes you think of evanstan, but you know what songs make me think about them the most? Rumors by Jake Miller and Strange Love by Halsey. Both of them are much less wholesome songs 💀💀

For some reason, I can only link the live version? Idk, listen to the normal one, haha, I enjoy that recording much more

Rumors feels self-explanatory, like, that's just easy to picture--what if the tabloids caught wind of evanstan? Shit would go insane.

Strange Love is less obvious and more about the fact that I've been meaning to, for literal years, write an evanstan fic using that song. But-! It's still so coded for them: the fucking in the bathroom reads like quickies, the fame of it all, everyone wanting to know, the lyric "you walk like you're a god" makes me think of Chris and his insane strut and "I made you weak" for Sebastian, the saying your name, the keeping it a secret but letting everyone see it, etc.

Yeah 😮‍💨😮‍💨

Thanks again!

#asks #evanstan #chris evans #sebastian stan #rpf #Spotify

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capoteera · 1 month ago

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4days ago

CapT:

Like tell us, when does Sacrifice wrap then huh? Because the crew member posted Day 11 of 47, making the filming go until November 15th.

Rogers:

Looks like they are on day 11 of 47. Safe to assume filming ends November 15.

Yesterday/today:

Capt:

If a crew person said loosely "3 months" they're gonna be in the hotel, then again, there's multiple UNITS people, Greece is also next door to Bulgaria, so you'll just have to wait and see.

He’s filming in Bulgaria until December - test me on that one

Sorry I know we shouldn’t give Capt and her crew any time of day but this point out some inconsistencies. First they were the ones to claim it finished in November based on a crew member then changed it to Dec based on a hotel staff comment. Test her it’s not even her information what’s to test.

So just goes to show they do in fact know nothing about the shitty movie they can to not be interested in.

Now don’t get me started on the immigration status as someone who has worked with many different types of visa nothing is as straight forward as it says on the website. Every situation is different. Example a foreign national living in LA married her American fiancé in PT and then travelled back to the US within a month and has travelled in and out of the country since. They got their green card 6 months after their marriage. (any guesses who🤭) Then you have 2 American celebrities marrying foreign actress in 2 ceremonies in US and overseas. One married in Vegas then travelled to France for another ceremony before return US and again traveling in and out of the US. Another married overseas first and once again travelled back to the US soon afterwards and continued to travel. I don’t remember anyone questioning their visa status and I know some just refuse to acknowledge what visa AB had at the time because it doesn’t fit their narrative hence why they scream she has no US reps. (funny her last 2 movies are by US production companies)As for marriage certificate who’s to say they even lodge it in MA and just did PT? For all their screaming it’s not as easy especially PT to obtain and let’s face it if PR found it there is no way they are going to produce it. First it exposes the fact they lied to officials about why they required it and their real details would be officially recorded.

Yes Capt you can share your ‘husbands’ experience but again I can give you a hundred different ones. The point is you can’t guess what an actress’s status is and say with confidence what it is. Now as to the latest claim:

I don’t get or know why you all don’t get shit . Most PR stunts are public two years.

Count fucking backwards and get back to me . And NO, crumbs don’t count. Public! Public means revealed …. God . I’m not explaining it again.

One from their ‘anon’:

I myself remember regina actually theorizing this would be 2 years public . that makes it November 10 that it hits that mark doesn't it? maybe these fucks should just go hang out on the edge of a cliff. Just be sure not to sneeze. Now according to Capt this was meant to be over April 2023, then July 2023, then September 2023 then it was oh he signed another contract because of the strike then July 2024 it ended and there was a small window of opportunity to end it. Then it moved out to 14 October then end of October now it’s Nov the 2 year anniversary of reveal. Once again claiming they don’t care and saying they don’t know when it’s coming no one does but Chris and the ‘writers’ but now:

None of us care because we know that’s coming and when.

So guess we will see what happens and I see it’s back to calling him coke head.

Let’s just also point out Capt has been wrong more than right with her claims and she has made some pretty obvious blunders which long time Chris fans quickly picked up on. Let’s say about the wedding there is more evidence to something happening in MA and PT with family and friends in the locations and people saying they were there and pics from friends/family at the locations. And don’t start about the weather if a friggin MLB game could be played late afternoon/night & his niece can have a petting zoo outside under a tent supposedly on his front lawn then a wedding could take place add on he and his sisters were meant to have been seen out and about that day.🤦🏻‍♀️

Thank you for this! 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻

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adamwatchesmovies · 1 year ago

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Scott Pilgrim vs. the World (2010)

Each viewing of Scott Pilgrim vs. The World reveals new depths to its narrative and humour, making its failure at the box office an even bigger shame. Well, better late than never. Go in for the memorable characters, arresting visual style, humour, and creative story. Come back to catch all the gags you missed. See it a third time to see what this movie is REALLY about.

22-year-old Scott Pilgrim (Michael Cera) is a slacker musician dating 17-year-old high schooler Knives Chau (Ellen Wong). He's with her because he knows it’ll go nowhere. It's only a matter of time before he dumps her, which will be easy. Enter Ramona Flowers (Mary Elizabeth Winstead). Promptly ditching Knives for the Amazon delivery girl of his dreams, Scott learns he must defeat her seven evil exes before they can date.

If the plot sounds crazy, it is. Director Edgar Wright (who co-wrote the screenplay with Michael Bacall, based off the comic series by Bryan Lee O’Malley) injects special effects in nearly every scene. References and Easter eggs to video games are everywhere in the form of health meters, bonus points, sound cues, non-sequiturs, and more. You can have a great time with a notepad playing “spot the reference” but it’ll be tough. There are so many and the deluge of gags is one hell of a distraction. It’s an outlandish tale with many characters and to ensure you never forget who’s who, we have a hugely talented cast bringing these quirky people to life. Kieran Culkin as Scott’s gay and very seductive roommate, Chris Evans, Brandon Routh, Jason Schwartzman and more as Ramona’s evil exes, Anna Kendrick as Scott’s disapproving younger sister, Aubrey Plaza, Brie Larson, Alison Pill, Johnny Simmons and Mark Webber as Scott’s friends/bandmates... Every time one of them appears on-screen again, you perk up. What hilarious new line are they going to deliver? It never fails. You always laugh out loud.

This is sort of a “battle of the bands” movie, meaning you get all sorts of musical talents adding extra oomph to the dazzling visuals. The score & soundtrack is another character, another reason to re-watch the film so you can properly see (well, hear) how every note perfectly compliments the characters’ actions and the point we’re at in the story.

While you’re dazzled by the audio and visual, you might overlook one of the most important aspects of Scott Pilgrim vs. The World: its theme. Those references to bands and video games? They’re just gravy. The fact is, this movie has a great message. It’s not actually about battling a bunch of crazy enemies in order to get a prize lady. All that’s a metaphor. What this movie is actually about is a slacker, a person you’re not really supposed to like. Scott is lazy and he’s stringing Knives along. Even when it’s obvious he wants to move on to the new hot thing, he takes way too long to admit it. When he does get with “the girl of his dreams”, he takes forever to get over the fact that she has a past, that Ramona broke some hearts and was selfish in her past relationships despite Scott having done the same thing to Knives. The battles he fights are actually against himself. To win Ramona, what he must actually do is learn humility and self-respect. This is what pushes Scott Pilgrim vs. the World from being “merely” good to being great. If you really look at it, you’ll learn something.

I might change my mind about this the next time I view it but right now, the only flaw I’ll bring up is the running time. Scott Pilgrim vs. the World a fast-paced, highly economical movie, which makes seven evil exes A LOT of enemies. The combat actually winds up slowing the film down and I can think of a couple of bad guys who could’ve been removed without losing much. Otherwise, it’s an instant favorite. You’ll want to come back to it over and over thanks to its unmistakable style, the ample creative choices made throughout, the humor and the characters. (On Blu-ray, July 24, 2020)

#scott pilgrim vs. the world #movies #films #movie reviews #film reviews #edgar wright #michael bacall #bryan lee o'malley #michael cera #mary elizabeth winstead #kieran culkin #chris evans #anna kendrick #alison pill #brandon routh #jason scwartzman #2010 movies #2010 films

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nancydrewwouldnever · 8 months ago

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To be honest, I was surprised how fast his agency found him a replacement third project in the form of Pain Hustlers.//

That whole movie happened fast. The rights brought in May, Chris casted beginning of July and filming started later that month.

I wonder if they already had him in mind and once PA was delayed they moved in.

I think it was easy to make it happen that fast because the whole production was CAA-backed and controlled. All the people working on it in big roles were CAA clients. I think CAA therefore had the ability to just stick him in when the Project Artemis conflict came up. I don't know if it really means he was already considered for it, so much as he was already "in house" and in need of a new job.

#ask #project artemis

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starrsarchive · 8 months ago

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if you wouldn’t mind would you like. explain the first few resident evil games for me bc I wanna buy them but I’m so insanely bad at video games and I wanna know if it’s worth it

AAA i love this question!!! (sorry if i over explain things)

i'm gonna explain resident evil 0 and resident evil 1 because their stories connect really well!! (i'm gonna try not to spoil anything lmao)

re0 takes place in 1998, on the outskirts of raccoon city were there have been reports of unusual murders. the city's sends the bravo team from the special forces division (S.T.A.R.S) to investigate. while the bravo team is investigating the woods, they find an abandoned train car and decide to continue their investigation there. rookie cop, rebecca chambers, ends up getting separated from her team. while investigating, she's finds out there's been a zombie outbreak in the car, and the passengers are dead. rebecca ends up meeting ex-convict, billy coen, who hid in the traincar after the military transport vehicle escorting him was forced off the road by a pack of zombie dogs. the pair decide to team up and look for an escape after the traincar starts again.

re1 begins on the night of july 24, 1998. the S.T.A.R.S. bravo team (rebecca's team), which was sent out the night before to investigate the killings, has dropped out of radio contact with the alpha team. the alpha team is then dispatched to the arklay mountains in their own helicopter to find them. while searching the area, this random guy named joseph frost finds a severed hand still clutching a handgun. he is soon attacked by zombie dogs and killed. the other alpha team members flee back to their helicopter, but the pilot brad vickers had already taken off and abandoned them. spotting a mansion in the distance, the four remaining members (jill, chris, barry, and wesker) run toward it in hopes of finding shelter from the dogs. you have the option between playing as chris or jill, and both character's have their own advantages. jill (or if you play as chris, but i think jill is better lmao) is instructed to begin exploring the mansion, and she/he ends up discovering the mansion's secrets.

the first few games are relatively easy, there's quite a few puzzles that can be frustrating, as well as the weird camera angles, but nonetheless, i definitely recommend it. also sorry if the explanations don't make sense/weren't what you were looking for, i'd tried my best to explain without spoiling😭

i went into the games knowing quite a bit of the lore, which was really helpful, so if you do end up getting the games but want more context before playing, i can recommend a few videos!! (also after re0 and re1, the game order gets super confusing, so i can help with that!)

if you havw like anymore questions please please send me an ask🙏 (i am insanely hyperfixated on these silly games)

#the only thing i've consumed today is an energy drink #my brain felt fuzzy while typing this

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thelonesomequeen · 2 years ago

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Even weirder that HE's been spotted many times this whole time alone or w/Dodger, family & friends but nothing with her. // I’m struggling to think what “many” sightings are being referenced here? I can recall a few off-the-set solo sightings of him over the last year, but not many. Re: your similar point not spotting them in friends’ pictures or posts, can you think of any photos that his friends or family have posted this year which feature even just Chris (no Alba)? Cause I can’t.

On the other hand, there were alleged sightings made by a journalist in Lisbon in May, and a Twitter sighting of him in Vancouver in June, but these are often discounted because they don’t fit people’s theories. Tara followed Alba in late June and commented on one of her posts in July. Chris was filming from late August onward, and we know Alba was in ATL beginning in September because of the yoga course (as much as people will protest otherwise). Earlier in the year, we know her IG location was in the US for all of February / part of March. (Yes, I acknowledge knowing all this overkill. It’s why I take weeks-long breaks from Tumblr. 😆)

I dunno, I’m curious about examples of the holes you see in the timeIine cause I’m not seeing them tbh. The only one I can maybe see is Shanna’s wedding, but if I were in Alba’s shoes I might’ve sat that event out so as not to steal thunder. Imagine the fandom abuse Shanna could’ve gotten following such a joyful day, or the news articles a couple sighting might’ve spawned. I can see if they decided Shanna deserved not to have her day overshadowed that way.

Not trying to be combative at all, by the way. Y’all know I think the PR theory is bogus, but that doesn’t mean I’m the authority on the relationship timing. I’m genuinely trying to understand what others are seeing that I’m not.

There actually were a few photos of him in friend’s posts from this year where he is pictured and she isn’t there. But on the reverse side of that, I think these photos all came at the same time she was knowingly preoccupied with other things. Examples: Tara posted a photo with him from his LA home before The Gray Man premiere. His friend Chelsea posted a photo from a mutual friend’s wedding over the summer plus a golf outing. I think Scott’s boyfriend Steve also posted some cute photos from the Lightyear premiere to his story. I remember thinking it was sweet he was still invited along to join the family even though Scott couldn’t be there. But I believe all of those line up with the same time she was doing Mrs. Harris press?

I also think it’s entirely possible for her to had visited him while he was filming and go essentially undetected. I really don’t think she’s very recognizable to the public at all.

The only issue I have with the Vancouver sighting is that it apparently took place in a mall? Unless I’m confusing that with some other sighting. I just feel like if he was in such a public place that at least someone would have snapped a picture that would have ended up on twitter or something? It’s so hard to know when sightings are real or not anymore when there are so many trolls running around the fandom these days. I feel like I don’t remember the May Lisbon sighting at all, but I don’t doubt the sighting didn’t happen. So much has happened that it’s easy to lose track of. I was also doing a huge home renovation at the time, so I was only occasionally popping in to see what was going on, and I’m sure I missed things because of that.

I do think it makes sense that she didn’t attend his sister’s wedding if they were together. If anyone remembers, I actually played devil’s advocate back then and pointed out that it didn’t make sense for her to fly in when they wouldn’t be able to spend time together. He literally flew in for that weekend only and went right back to filming. He was also a part of the wedding party. Anyone who has been in a wedding party knows how busy you are the entire weekend. There really isn’t much time to spend with a significant other if they’re also not in the wedding party. It’s essentially only part of the reception and that’s it. If she had flown in, they barely would have had any time together that entire weekend between the festivities and returning back to set. So if they were together, I don’t find it odd that she didn’t go for that reason alone. But I also completely agree with you about not going to avoid stealing Shanna’s thunder. If she was there and had been spotted, it would have been articles galore about Chris and Alba. I just can’t see him being the type of person to steal the spotlight from Shanna on her big day like that.

Where I get a little stuck on things is the photo we received of her over the summer with another man. While it doesn’t prove she was dating that guy, it’s still pretty close for two people to be if one of them is in a relationship with someone else. I certainly wouldn’t be happy with my husband if he was wrapped around another woman that way. He’d have a lot of explaining to do 😂 that’s the one kink in the story I can’t really get past. It’s what makes me wonder if they only casually saw each other for a while before making things official? But that’s also a theory of mine that could be wrong. But long story short, late spring through summer is where I see potential holes in the relationship. But it could simply be explained away as them both being busy or us just not being entitled to see every moment they’ve spent together. I think that’s a concept a lot of fans tend to forget about. Just because we want to see them together, doesn’t mean we’re entitled to that.

For the most part, the longer this all lasts, the more I’m inclined to think it’s all real. Specially when she and her friend group pop up and it isn’t being used for PR in any type of way like this year’s NYE Vermont trip. People love to argue that “PR is for the fans to see, too!” but it’s really not. PR is for the public and it’s something that’s very blatantly obvious. You shouldn’t have to follow private accounts of friends, friend’s significant others, and whoever else in order to connect the dots of them being in the same location. I think there are a small handful of PR theories that make sense, but a majority of them are so out of this world I don’t even know what to say about it. I really don’t. I honestly wonder if people hear themselves sometimes. The idea that absolutely everything that happens is part of some elaborate conspiracy theory in order to control a narrative is a bit much for me, personally. That’s when I wish people would truly log off and spend some time in reality to hopefully be able to see some of this with clear eyes and an open mind. Or at least be able to hold respectful discussions about it all. And I also don’t negate the fact that this really could be both. A real relationship that will be used for PR when it suits one of them best. Anyway. This was super long and I feel like I’ve rambled on and on. Sorry! 😂🦎

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wrestlingisfake · 1 year ago

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All Out preview

Orange Cassidy vs. Jon Moxley - Cassidy is making his 31st defense of the AEW international title. He has not lost a one-on-one match since September 21, 2022, but this is easily his toughest opponent yet.

These two were scheduled to meet for the first time one-on-one in November 2021, but that match was canceled. Other than that, these two had very little to do with one another until July 21, when Cassidy and the Best Friends confronted Moxley's partners in the Blackpool Combat Club. Moxley wasn't there, but on July 26 he made up for lost time with an ambush on Cassidy. The two factions and their allies have been feuding for weeks, including a ten-man brawl last week at Wembley Stadium, where Cassidy scored the winning pin. I wouldn't say these two in particular have had a personal issue, but they're the biggest stars on either side, and sooner or later they had to face off.

This is the biggest match of Orange's career. You wouldn't expect a guy with a comedy gimmick to last two minutes against a protected badass like Moxley. But a win, or even a well-fought loss, would prove Cassidy can hang with the tippy-toppy guys despite (or because of) his silliness. Beating Chris Jericho in 2020 meant a lot, and an 11-month title reign helped even more, but this match can take him to the next level.

It's pretty clear at this point that CM Punk vs. Ricky Starks was supposed to headline this show, until Punk was suspended last week and fired yesterday. Now this match has to close the show, in Punk's hometown. Both guys are making this match about which of them will carry the company through troubled times. We know Moxley can handle that kind of pressure. Cassidy has a chance to prove he can too. The best case scenario for AEW would be if Moxley makes his opponent a bigger star, so that people remember this week for Orange stepping up to make chicken salad out of Punk's chicken shit.

I could see this match going either way. Moxley has expressed a desire to "give back" by putting over younger guys; that doesn't mean he'll always do the job, obviously, but he's looking for the right time and place to do it. On the other hand, Cassidy's storyline for months is that he's fighting hurt and refuses to take a break, and that clearly won't end until someone breaks him, so he can return stronger than ever. I'd kinda like to see Moxley hold the international title just to add to its prestige, so I'd be cool with him winning here to set up Orange winning a rematch later on. But under the circumstances, you've only got one chance to headline a PPV with this matchup, for this title. So there are plenty of reasons to just let Cassidy win the big one.

MJF & Adam Cole vs. John Silver & Alex Reynolds - Max and Cole won the ROH tag team title at Wembley Stadium last week; Silver and Reynolds, representing the Dark Order, won a battle royale to earn this title shot.

I expect both sides to get a babyface reaction. The fans love MJF and Cole, even though the entire basis of their friendship is that they bonded over being pricks, and we'll never be sure one won't betray the other. I think the Dark Order is supposed to have turned heel, but they're still so lovable and cuddly that I'm not sure anyone really buys it. Their whole deal now is that they resent Adam Page for "abandoning" them to reconcile with the Elite, so now they're ruthless and looking out for themselves. But it's not going to be easy to get over as selfish heels in the ring against MJF of all people, even if he is a babyface.

It's pretty clear this match is just a pit stop for Cole and MJF, on their way to a reckoning with Cole's former friends Roderick Strong, Mike Bennett, and Matt Taven. Unless those three guys interfere somehow, I don't see any chance of Silver and Reynolds winning the belts. Actually, even if there's a bunch of interference, I'd say the champs are heavy favorites to retain.

Kenny Omega vs. Konosuke Takeshita - Omega and Takeshita have since clashed in various tag team matches, but this is their first singles encounter. As Don Callis has helpfully pointed out, Kenny has not won a singles match since Don betrayed Kenny on May 10.

When Callis arrived in AEW in late 2020, he was symbolic of Omega's heel turn. Once Kenny basically went babyface in 2022, it was only a matter of time before Don turned on him. By November 2022 Callis was scouting Takeshita, raising questions about whether he was looking to replace Kenny. It seemed like Takeshita was too pure of a cinnamon roll to become a ruthless enforcer for Callis, but that's exactly what happened on May 28.

Omega does need to get some payback against Callis and Takeshita, but I don't know that he needs it right now. If he just beats Takeshita clean in the middle of the ring, the storyline's over. That doesn't make any sense when Don has spent months talking about building a new "Don Callis Family," and despite working with half a dozen heels he hasn't actually recruited anyone except Takeshita. We need more guys in this faction, which makes this the perfect opportunity for a new recruit to run in and cost Omega the victory.

Bryan Danielson vs. Ricky Starks - This is a strap match, so the participants will be tied at the wrist to either end of a long leather strap. The goal is be the first person to touch each corner of the ring in succession. I hate strap matches, because the build is "dudes whipping the shit out each other" but then the payoff is "dudes tangled up and reaching for turnbuckles." They always try to lash each other with the strap, but with both ends tied to the wrestlers it's hard to get your body in the proper position for the strappation, dudes.

The setup for this was when Ricky Steamboat refereed CM Punk vs. Starks on August 5, and Starks took Steamboat's belt off and whipped him with it. That was probably going to set up a Punk-Starks rematch on this show, but once that was off the table Starks issued a challenge to Steamboat. Steamboat produced a contract, except it was for Starks to wrestle Danielson, who unexpectedly returned from breaking his arm ten weeks ago. I assume Danielson let Dr. Proper know, and Dr. Unger know, and Dr. Hughes know, that the release forms have been signed, so those guys aren't responsible for the last couple fractures in the forearm, brother.

I assume Danielson will play babyface and get the big comeback win. But I'm rooting for Starks, because he did an amazing promo on September 2 about starting over after the rug was pulled out from under him. Danielson needs to be protected but not nearly as much as Starks needs to be elevated.

Luchasaurus vs. Darby Allin - Luchasaurus is defending the AEW TNT championship, even if his mentor Christian Cage is the one carrying the belt and all but calling himself the titleholder. Cage will be in Lucha's corner, and Allin will be cornered by his young ward, Nick Wayne. Last night Cage told Nick he'd have to throw in the towel for Darby, which may be telegraphing the finish. I suppose it'll be interesting seeing Allin fight someone the size of Luchasaurus, but this feud has been ice-cold for me and so has the Nick Wayne storyline, and combining the two hasn't made either of them better. I get the feeling Luchasaurus retains to drag this out further.

Kris Statlander vs. Ruby Soho - Statlander's AEW TBS title is on the line. Soho is 2-0 against the champion. I vaguely remember that after one of those matches people were outraged because Statlander deserved to win, but honestly that happens so often nowadays that I'm not even sure the match I'm thinking of was these two. Anyway, I don't see much point in a title change right now so I'm sure Statlander will get one of her wins back.

Samoa Joe vs. Shane Taylor - This is for Joe's ROH television title. Taylor was the runner-up to Dalton Castle in a July tournament to earn a title shot, but after Joe defeated Castle they immediately booked another tournament to choose another contender, and this time Taylor won. I have not been terribly impressed with the storytelling in Ring of Honor.

This is a huge opportunity for Taylor. He was with ROH for years, and Tony Khan brought him after the buyout, but he's not one of the ROH guys that got an AEW contract or time on AEW television. This may be the biggest crowd Shane has ever worked in front of, and I think he can deliver at this level. I mean, Joe's still going to beat his ass and retain. But I still think Taylor will turn a few heads.

Miro vs. Powerhouse Hobbs - I decided not to attend this show (last time I went to see wrestling I got COVID) but this is the one match that gives me second thoughts. I don't know what the hell these guys are fighting about but I don't care, and I don't think they do either. They're both huge and mean and they're gonna have a MEAN GUY MATCH~! and I am here for it. Well, not as "here" as I could be, I guess. I am on my couch for it. I'm always gonna root for Hobbs, but honestly it doesn't matter who wins as long as both guys pound the stuffings out of each other.

Dax Harwood & Cash Wheeler & Matt Jackson & Nick Jackson vs. Jay White & Juice Robinson & Austin Gunn & Colten Gunn - FTR (Dax & Cash) and the Young Bucks (Matt & Nick) continued their rivalry last week, and the Bucks were salty that they lost. They were trying to have a civil conversation about it on August 30 when Bullet Club Gold interrupted and suggested an eight-man tag match.

Last night's Collision (in the same building as tonight's show) ended with the Bucks saving FTR from Bullet Club Gold, and the Chicago crowd was hostile to CM Punk's top enemies asking for handshakes from CM Punk's top buddies on CM Punk's show, on the night where they announced CM Punk is fired. Thew show went off the air with the Bucks smugly shaking each other's hands, which seems like a ballsy thing to do in Punk territory, when so many weirdos think the Bucks set him up somehow.

Anyway I expect Chicago to be radioactive for the Bucks for years to come, but if they are they'll just love FTR all the more. So the crowd reaction here could be complicated. Kinda thinking White's team should win.

Eddie Kingston & Katsuyori Shibata vs. Claudio Castagnoli & Wheeler Yuta - Claudio vs. Eddie and Shibata vs. Yuta were two top matches on Ring of Honor's April pay-per-view, so I guess we're running those back as a tag match. We have to be getting back to Claudio-Eddie for the ROH men's world title at some point, but they don't seem to be in a hurry. The babyfaces should win, and it'd be nice if one of them pinned Claudio to set up a title bout.

Billy Gunn & Max Caster & Anthony Bowens vs. Jeff Jarrett & Jay Lethal & Satnam Singh - This is scheduled for the pre-show. Last night Jarrett's group gave celebrity guest star Dennis Rodman a hard time, so the Acclaimed and Billy offered to give them a shot at their trios title, with Rodman in the champs' corner. Billy and the Acclaimed just got new custom pink title belts, so there's no way they're going to lose the championship this soon.

Athena & Diamante & Mercedes Martinez vs. Hikaru Shida & Willow Nightingale & Skye Blue - Another pre-show match. I heard Tony Khan wanted to book Athena vs. Billie Starkz for the ROH women's world title, but Billie's not medically cleared. I don't know why that means Athena can't defend her title against one of the other five women in this match, but whatever. WIllow has has been feuding with Diamante and Martinez of late. Skye is a local girl so she always gets a good Chicago pop. Shida should probably be higher on the card, but maybe she can get an ROH title shot out of this if she wins. Actually, I think Athena's side will win.

Over the Budget Battle Royale - It's a battle royale for the pre-show, and that's all I've got. No participants have been announced, as far as I know. The winner will get to donate $50,000 to the charity of his choice. I assume that's 50k of AEW's money, not the winner's. Literally anything could happen with this, but I suppose a babyface needs to win.

#aew #all out #orange cassidy #jon moxley

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halothenthehorns · 1 year ago

Text

Chapter 17: I PUT ON A FEW MILLION EXTRA POUNDS

Happy Fourth of July! I celebrated it by writing the chapter of Artemis's freedom from the sky! I hope my fellow Americans enjoyed the day off, and I hope everybody reading this enjoys their day!

PJOPJOPJO

"All those cheeseburgers and pizza finally caught up to you?" Alex nodded without surprise when Percy read the new chapter title.

Percy prodded his stomach for a moment in confusion with his pen before shrugging.

The horrible thing was: I could see the family resemblance.

"And here I thought you liked Zoe now," Thalia smacked his shoulder.

"So you don't want to hear you've got some of your dad in you too?" Percy said.

"No! I don't!" She snapped, not even remotely joshing now.

Atlas had the same regal expression as Zoe, the same cold proud look in his eyes that Zoe sometimes got when she was mad, though on him it looked a thousand times more evil. He was all the things I'd originally disliked about Zoe, with none of the good I'd come to appreciate.

Thalia let her seething annoyance of Percy wash away just as fast, as usual. She found that a pretty good comparison of her thoughts, again, as usual. The asshole.

"Let Artemis go," Zoe demanded.

Atlas walked closer to the chained goddess. "Perhaps you'd like to take the sky for her, then? Be my guest."

Zoe opened her mouth to speak, but Artemis said, "No! Do not offer, Zoe! I forbid you."

Thalia's eyes glimmered with a shared knowledge she, Zoe, and the Hunters all would have felt at that moment. How much Artemis valued them, her family away from that counsel. Enough to forcibly stop them from giving her but a moment of freedom, a chance to escape or fight Atlas at his choosing. Any of them would have offered it for their Goddess in that moment, and she would have given each of them the same response.

Atlas smirked. He knelt next to Artemis and tried to touch her face, but the goddess bit at him, almost taking off his fingers.

"I love her," Alex declared.

"You will get your heart broken," Thalia said with pride.

"Won't stop me from imagining her taking a few fingers and spitting them back in his face," Alex said gleefully.

"I've heard it's as easy as biting a carrot, is that true?" Magnus asked, trying his best not to sound jealous. He realized he'd never asked if Alex was attracted to guys or girls, or how that even worked with the whole gender fluid thing.

"No, that's a myth," Alex said with complete confidence. Magnus felt a strange jolt that wasn't fear as he decided he believed her.

"Hoo-hoo," Atlas chuckled.

"What is he, Santa Claus?" Will scoffed.

"Maybe, if Chris Cringle stole that from Krampus," Alex scoffed.

"That wouldn't work, if he's normally trapped under the sky he couldn't deliver coal," Nico said.

"Yes, that was the part that made no sense," Magnus sighed.

"You see, daughter? Lady Artemis likes her new job. I think I will have all the Olympians take turns carrying my burden, once Lord Kronos rules again, and this is the center of our palace. It will teach those weaklings some humility."

Percy imagined his dad under there, and felt the anger flash through him like liquid inferno. He quelled it quickly this time, but then the image of Zeus under there next made him wince. With guilt. Because the idea had some perverse appeal. Thalia was so afraid of her own dad she'd believe he'd kill her rather than let her make a choice. He'd ignored and dismissed everybody who tried to warn him of this moment. He was worse than Gabe, a power hungry moron who deserved some humility.

But Percy wasn't like Luke. Letting Kronos win for the petty satisfaction would never be more than a fleeting thought.

I looked at Annabeth. She was desperately trying to tell me something. She motioned her head toward Luke. But all I could do was stare at her. I hadn't noticed before, but something about her had changed. Her blond hair was now streaked with gray.

"I always knew Luke was a constant stress on her life, but I never thought it would hit like that," Alex said sadly.

"You amaze me Alex," Percy told her even if he didn't disagree.

"From holding the sky," Thalia muttered, as if she'd read my mind. "The weight should've killed her."

"You're not hard to read Perce," Will told him in a choked up voice. It really hit him in moments like this Annabeth might never have come back to camp, lead her siblings into lunch, been there to help them win another capture the flag game.

Percy couldn't even imagine it. His brain shut off like it couldn't bare the images.

"I don't understand," I said. "Why can't Artemis just let go of the sky?"

"Do you want a pancake cosmos Percy?" Nico asked. "Because that's how you break the entire universe."

"Got to say, really not thrilled to find out the fate of the world literally rests on somebody's shoulders, a job nobody wants," Percy shivered.

And guess who steps up to the challenge every time, Nico shook his head fondly as Percy absently brushed away strands of his own gray hair.

Atlas laughed. "How little you understand, young one. This is the point where the sky and the earth first met, where Ouranos and Gaia first brought forth their mighty children, the Titans.

Jason puzzled over that for a moment, he felt like Atlas was skipping an important detail for some reason, but he couldn't imagine what.

The sky still yearns to embrace the earth. Someone must hold it at bay, or else it would crush down upon this place, instantly flattening the mountain and everything within a hundred leagues. Once you have taken the burden, there is no escape." Atlas smiled. "Unless someone else takes it from you."

"So the shackles are just there for his amusement?" Magnus asked uneasily. Wasn't Artemis being humiliated and forced into doing this enough?

"I'm sure it also has something to do with dimming her godly strength and masking her. Why Apollo couldn't find her," Thalia answered quietly. It was probably a childish wish, but one all the same. She wanted Artemis here now. Did she even know she was missing? Had she already picked a new Lieutenant after blaming some god for her vanishing and moved on? Now that she knew somebody had taken and hidden away Jason, she was weary of trusting any god too implicitly, and yet her patron had been a sort of friend, big sister even, somebody she'd always thought she could count on.

He approached us, studying Thalia and me. "So these are the best heroes of the age, eh? Not much of a challenge."

"He clearly hasn't seen Percy in an eating contest," Thalia grinned.

"Or heard Thalia try to sing," Percy smirked, and no he would not elaborate if her vocals made her a credible threat by hurting their eardrums or being of siren quality.

"Fight us," I said. "And let's see."

"Have the gods taught you nothing? An immortal does not fight a mere mortal directly. It is beneath our dignity.

"Explains a lot about Ares actually," Percy said.

Thalia snorted and Jason chocked, but nobody else looked much better as they glanced nervously around again.

I will have Luke crush you instead."

"Pssht," Percy made a noise like a broken faucet, more bravado than he really deserved as he'd yet won a fight against Luke. He was nothing if not confident.

"So you're another coward," I said.

And impertinent. Couldn't forget that one.

Thalia sighed and kneaded her forehead where the Percy sized pain was lodged. How was he still alive again?!

Atlas's eyes glowed with hatred. With difficulty, he turned his attention to Thalia.

"Am I losing my touch!?" Percy sounded legitimately offended Atlas hadn't attacked him.

"He's supposed to be the smart Titan or something," Thalia grinned. "He turned his attention to the bigger threat."

Percy scowled and opened his mouth with what they were all sure was a very colorful retort, but he restrained himself at the last minute and turned back to the book. He wanted Annabeth free of this nightmare, then he'd show Thalia.

Thalia grinned without surprise. Percy wasn't always an impulsive idiot.

"As for you, daughter of Zeus, it seems Luke was wrong about you."

"In every way that matters," Thalia agreed nastily. If he'd ever for a second deluded himself she'd run back to him and make every person on earth suffer like they had than he'd never truly known her at all.

"I wasn't wrong," Luke managed. He looked terribly weak, and he spoke every word as if it were painful. If I didn't hate his guts so much, I almost would've felt sorry for him.

"You are definitely a better person than I am Percy," Thalia said quietly. She hadn't let herself feel anything but contempt for him, and it wasn't until much later, alone in her newly minted tent and staring at a crown once braided into Zoe's hair had she let herself feel everything else.

"Nah," Percy tried to settle in his seat comfortably beside her. "I'm just more gullible," he finished glumly. He still felt that pang of sympathy now and hated himself for it. After all this guy had done to Annabeth and his camp, the hating his guts part really shouldn't be as equal as the sorry.

"Thalia, you still can join us. Call the Ophiotaurus. It will come to you. Look!"

He waved his hand, and next to us a pool of water appeared: a pond ringed in black marble, big enough for the Ophiotaurus. I could imagine Bessie in that pool. In fact, the more I thought about it, the more I was sure I could hear Bessie mooing.

Thalia clenched her fists tight and swallowed a great mix of emotions. Relief. Jealousy. Easily the most dominant was still anger for Luke putting her in this situation, but the other two were a mingled mix so twisted together she was still unraveling it many years later. She'd never been the child of the prophecy, she'd never even heard Bessie mooing as focused as she'd been on Luke. Zeus's child was not important enough to be The Child. She wasn't important enough.

"Oh crap!" Alex snapped at Percy. "You would find the one thing you could focus on!"

Percy looked plenty put on the spot now and was pretty sure he couldn't have answered what two plus two was as his brain froze up in shock.

Don't think about him! Suddenly Grover's voice was inside my mind—the empathy link.

"Confirmed, Grover can talk to you while awake, but apparently it's only one way," Jason said with his usual interest for all things Grover. Percy was beginning to suspect the guy had a crush or something for as interested as he always was.

I could feel his emotions. He was on the verge of panic. I'm losing Bessie. Block the thoughts!

Percy snapped back attention to the book in a flash of his own panic. If Bessie vanished, would Grover drown underwater?!

I tried to make my mind go blank. I tried to think about basketball players, skateboards, the different kinds of candy in my mom's shop. Anything but Bessie.

"Just to clarify, would hamburgers make this situation better or worse?" Magnus asked.

"I didn't have the time to ask, and my mind thought of something better," Percy chuckled all the same, but his mind had found quite a few things distracting enough from that cow serpent.

He considered, for a moment, trying it here now. He didn't know what would happen if he tried to summon Bessie to him or how it would help, but maybe he could leave with her to go find Annabeth...he dismissed the idea before the first moo could echo in his brain. He wouldn't be able to make it out with all of his friends, and he needed his memories back. He had to remember what he was heading back to first.

"Thalia, call the Ophiotaurus," Luke persisted. "And you will be more powerful than the gods."

Not, 'Hi Thalia, long time no see!' Or 'Hey bestie, you're out of the tree!,' or even, 'I have missed you so deeply every day and I've risked everything for this moment where I single handedly rescue Annabeth and take care of her just like I promised while helping you finish off these losers.'

You will be more powerful than the gods. That's what he had to say to her after all these years. Was that the last bitter thought he had every day before dreaming of Kronos? Had he thought of her at all except to wish he had a powerful alley on his side...

"Luke..." Her voice was full of pain. "What happened to you?"

Everything happened to this guy, Jason thought with a kernel of his own pity. He'd been homeless and lost Thalia, been used by the gods and been told the entire time it was all for a greater purpose. His skin crawled, he didn't know why he found it so easy to sympathize with Luke, but it wasn't hard at all. Had Hermes ever visited Luke in person to tell him he valued him as head councilor? As anything to him?

"Don't you remember all those times we talked? All those times we cursed the gods? Our fathers have done nothing for us. They have no right to rule the world!"

"Nobody has a right to rule, they earn it."

For a scary moment it sounded like Alex was agreeing with Luke, but her voice was more vehement, a challenge. She'd never begrudged Odin calling himself the All-Father. He'd done a fair few things in myth to interest her enough she didn't hate him, though he'd never done anything specifically to earn her respect. There was no such thing as one leader to her.

Thalia shook her head. "Free Annabeth. Let her go."

"If you join me," Luke promised,

If. There should never have been an if. Will winced at the sense of betrayal radiating off of Percy and Thalia combined. Either Luke cared about these girls and would have done it, or he never would. The only if after that was when he'd kill the next person to get what he wanted. Luke had made the right decision in the end, and he wondered if there had been any if's left in his mind about why Percy did what he did.

"it can be like old times. The three of us together. Fighting for a better world. Please, Thalia, if you don't agree..." His voice faltered. "It's my last chance. He will use the other way if you don't agree. Please."

I didn't know what he meant, but the fear in his voice sounded real enough. I believed that Luke was in danger.

Thalia's bow appeared in her hand again. She was tense, as if expecting a fight soon. She had no regrets about joining the hunters, but she still had her own if's. If she'd never trusted Luke to begin with, bottled up her anger more, not shared so much of herself with him, maybe it wouldn't have fed Luke's as much. If she'd never sacrificed herself and he'd had to chose all those years ago who was most important, maybe it would have been Luke's tree.

If she'd already been to late, and the reason he'd survived that fall off the cliff because this was just another lie.

His life depended on Thalia's joining his cause. And I was afraid Thalia might believe it, too.

She'd hesitated, again. She'd looked at her first friend who she'd shared so much of her life with and saw the world splintering around him, a flash of lightning mocking her.

Her dad warning her? Or cautioning her? He could have sent another eagle to knock her off the cliff. He could have sent that lighting bolt.

He could have shown up.

It was her choice though, that's what he'd given her by not doing any of that.

"Do not, Thalia," Zoe warned. "We must fight them."

Luke waved his hand again, and a fire appeared. A bronze brazier, just like the one at camp. A sacrificial flame.

"Thalia," I said. "No."

Behind Luke, the golden sarcophagus began to glow. As it did, I saw images in the mist all around us: black marble walls rising, the ruins becoming whole, a terrible and beautiful palace rising around us, made of fear and shadow.

Nico winced as one person came easily to his mind. That's how everybody described his dad. Had Bianca been there, would she have discovered her heritage by now? Would she have been tempted to defect from the Hunters too and join to understand the whispers of death they heard, felt how easy it was to traverse into shadows and use fear until she forgot how to get back to the mortal world?

Probably not. She probably would have been better than him and found some way to combine Artemis's blessing with their heritage and figured out a way to use it for something good.

"We will raise Mount Othrys right here," Luke promised, in a voice so strained it was hardly his.

Percy shivered for reasons beyond him. An image came like a hazy mist to mind, like the ruins had left him with their own haunted, twisted idea. Luke's eyes flashing gold, a voice not his own speaking through his mouth. Percy shook it off well enough, but it didn't fade as far back into his mind as he'd hope.

"Once more, it will be stronger and greater than Olympus. Look, Thalia. We are not weak."

"Nobody's been accusing him of that, he can stop showing off," Magnus frowned. Luke had been many things since the beginning, but a weak showing was never one.

He pointed toward the ocean, and my heart fell.

"First time that's happened," Jason frowned.

Percy's stunned and discouraged expression shifted just slightly into an eye roll enough he felt better reading for just a moment.

Marching up the side of the mountain, from the beach where the Princess Andromeda was docked, was a great army. Dracaenae and Laestrygonians, monsters and half-bloods, hell hounds, harpies, and other things I couldn't even name.

"There's a game of ISpy nobody can win," Alex said.

"Only you would think to play a game at a time like this," Magnus told without surprise.

"At least it wasn't who can behead the most," Thalia sighed. Better to try convincing Alex it was okay to do Where's Waldo Monster Edition on the move than deter her from charging in.

The whole ship must've been emptied, because there were hundreds, many more than I'd seen on board last summer. And they were marching toward us. In a few minutes, they would be here.

"This is only a taste of what is to come," Luke said.

"I bet it tastes salty," Nico frowned.

"Nope, nuhu, not even touching that one," Percy groaned.

"I've never tasted the dust they turn into," Will ignored him and looked intrigued at Nico. "Or do you mean because they came off the ocean in a ship?"

"I mean Luke's essence is all over them," Nico grinned while Percy kept reading loudly over Will's quiet snicker.

"Soon we will be ready to storm Camp Half-Blood. And after that, Olympus itself. All we need is your help."

"Oh, so they're never going to be able to do it. That's great," Jason sighed with relief.

Thalia grinned back, but it wasn't the celebratory hurrah where all their problems would be solved kind of smile they'd hope for.

For a terrible moment, Thalia hesitated.

Again. Thalia winced with shame, she couldn't believe how weak she'd been. Still was. She couldn't lie to herself and say she wouldn't still hesitate at these prospects, she like her father, was horrible about learning her lesson.

Percy threw a commiserating arm over her shoulder and kept reading casually. He couldn't imagine being on the opposing side of Annabeth on something like this, it rattled him to even consider the position Thalia was in. His full confidence was still in her that she'd make the hard choice. Like Annabeth had said, they were a lot alike.

She gazed at Luke, her eyes full of pain, as if the only thing she wanted in the world was to believe him. Then she leveled her spear. "You aren't Luke. I don't know you anymore."

There was no triumphant cheer, no sense of peace. Thalia closed her eyes and still felt she hadn't said the right thing even if she knew she'd made the right choice as she leaned into Percy's side. Was there anything she could have said to make him run to her instead?

"Yes, you do, Thalia," he pleaded. "Please. Don't make me... Don't make him destroy you."

Jason bit his lip uneasily at that. He didn't really think Luke was much of a match for Thalia, but then, he'd bested Percy on that cruise and it still bothered him how very powerful this demigod clearly was being backed by a Titan, somehow. The phrasing of that bothered him more than anything. Had Luke stopped himself because he couldn't make himself hurt Thalia, or because Saturn had to much influence in him? How far gone was Luke? If he could even come back if he wanted to?

There was no time. If that army got to the top of the hill, we would be overwhelmed. I met Annabeth's eyes again. She nodded.

I looked at Thalia and Zoe, and I decided it wouldn't be the worst thing in the world to die fighting with friends like this.

"It might not be the worst, but I wouldn't call dying the best either," Will muttered quietly.

"Now," I said.

Together, we charged.

Thalia went straight for Luke.

"And it was entirely personal," Thalia told as if anybody had been in any suspense about that.

The power of her shield was so great that his dragonwomen bodyguards fled in a panic,

"Did they take a piece of Kronos with them?" Magnus asked without hope.

"I can't decide if I should laugh at the idea of Kronos or Luke needing bodyguards more?" Alex asked with twitching lips for whatever the answer. "And bad ones at that!"

"They were guarding the bad guys from doing anything until all the dramatic reveals were out of the way," Magnus nodded solemnly.

dropping the golden coffin and leaving him alone. But despite his sickly appearance, Luke was still quick with his sword. He snarled like a wild animal and counterattacked. When his sword, Backbiter, met Thalia's shield, a ball of lightning erupted between them, frying the air with yellow tendrils of power.

Percy licked his lips nervously for several moments. He had a feeling about what he'd done back then, what his mind instantly went to. Whether that turned out to be a good thing or bad thing was really questionable. He knew he'd have liked to split off and help her, maybe the two of them together could do what one hadn't and finally subdue Luke...but that didn't feel like his fight for some reason.

As for me, I did the stupidest thing in my life, which is saying a lot.

"Stupider than intentionally crashing a bus?" Will grinned.

"Stupider than getting turned into a guinea pig?" Nico muttered with a suppressed smirk.

"Stupider than mouthing off to Ares?" Jason was not letting that one go, and Percy winced with a bad feeling.

I attacked the Titan Lord Atlas.

There were a lot of exasperated sighs echoing in the room, but nobody was really surprised.

He laughed as I approached. A huge javelin appeared in his hands. His silk suit melted into full Greek battle armor.

"That is seriously rude," Alex brushed her hand over her shirt as if it had offended her.

"If anyone can pull that off it's you Alex," Percy told her with full confidence.

"And nobody's going to dare accuse you of plagiarism," Magnus said to nobody in particular.

"Go on, then!"

"Percy!" Zoe said. "Beware!"

"What was she planning on doing if not that?" Jason demanded.

"Something just as crazy," Percy promised, his eyes narrowed shrewdly and already trying to convince himself not to react to every blow he'd have to deal and dodge.

I knew what she was warning me about. Chiron had told me long ago: Immortals are constrained by ancient rules. But a hero can go anywhere, challenge anyone, as long as he has the nerve. Once I attacked, however, Atlas was free to attack back directly, with all his might.

"And yet he didn't snap his fingers and turn you into a platypus, so I think you turned out all right," Will told him cheerfully.

"First the Guinea pig, then the jackalope, now this. Why is everyone trying to turn me into an animal?" Percy sighed.

"You might get into, like, five percent less trouble and Annabeth would think you're adorable," Thalia shrugged. "More adorable," she added at his startled, put out look, that quickly morphed into a blush, now of all times.

I swung my sword, and Atlas knocked me aside with the shaft of his javelin. I flew through the air and slammed into a black wall. It wasn't Mist anymore. The palace was rising, brick by brick. It was becoming real.

Jason swallowed a nasty sense of deja vu. He rubbed the back of his head and swore the room blurred out of focus for a moment trying to show him the very same. Not Atlas, but something...someone else had once done the same to him in that exact spot...

Thalia snapped her fingers in front of his nose. "Hey, pay attention! The one time Percy wants you to take notes on his awesome skill."

She got to see a twin reaction of both of them rolling their eyes at her at the same time, and she smiled gleefully.

"Fool!" Atlas screamed gleefully, swatting aside one of Zoe's arrows. "Did you think, simply because you could challenge that petty war god, that you could stand up to me?"

"Percy would have done that without prior experience," Nico said confidently. It was admirable, and yet for the first time Nico could admit to himself kind of foolish and not nearly as cool as he used to think it was.

The mention of Ares sent a jolt through me. I shook off my daze and charged again. If I could get to that pool of water, I could double my strength.

The javelins point slashed toward me like a scythe. I raised Riptide, planning to cut off his weapon at the shaft, but my arm felt like lead. My sword suddenly weighed a ton.

And I remembered Ares's warning, spoken on the beach in Los Angeles so long ago: When you need it most, your sword will fail you.

Not now! Percy had been fiddling with it in his other hand just like always, tapping it against his knee, shaking it between fingers, being his generally fidgety self. Now he flung it to the ground and looked like he was trying not to step on it as his eyes flashed wildly between print and weapon in betrayal.

Not now! I pleaded. But it was no good. I tried to dodge, but the javelin caught me in the chest and sent me flying like a rag doll. I slammed into the ground, my head spinning. I looked up and found I was at the feet of Artemis, still straining under the weight of the sky.

"Gods I hope that isn't a bad omen, I can't take being turned into a Jackalope right now too," Percy groaned as he face planted the pages for a few moments before forcing himself to find out what went wrong next.

"Run, boy," she told me. "You must run!"

Run where? Percy was still frowning she was calling him a boy, now of all times. She probably still saw him as Hercules, ready to steal something useful and then duck out of there and take all the glory later if it even worked out.

Thalia was fighting for her life, Zoe wasn't going anywhere, and Annabeth was up there. He was right where he needed to be.

Atlas was taking his time coming toward me. My sword was gone. It had skittered away over the edge of the cliff. It might reappear in my pocket—maybe in a few seconds—but it didn't matter. I'd be dead by then. Luke and Thalia were fighting like demons, lightning crackling around them. Annabeth was on the ground, desperately struggling to free her hands.

"Die, little hero," Atlas said.

He raised his javelin to impale me.

Nico could see it all perfectly in his minds eye as if Percy's soul had whispered the death he'd almost had right in his ear. Percy would be scowling, that fierce look that could topple mountains and patiently rescue baby cow serpents all mingled into one cold stare, raising himself on one arm, even trying to angle himself as if to shield the actual goddess behind him.

Thalia winced, the guilt gnawing at her like the lightning was corroding her slowly from the inside out. She'd been so invested, too invested in besting Luke she wouldn't have even noticed her friend had died until it was to late. She didn't know what had saved him from this moment, because it wasn't her.

"No!" Zoe yelled, and a volley of silver arrows sprouted from the armpit chink in Atlas's armor.

Percy was weighing that in his mind on the best way to get his life saved ever. It was tied with Annabeth trying to wrestle a gorgon while Grover threw tin cans around.

Ah well, who needed a winner anyways. Any time his life was saved was number one, the embarrassment of that victory was just cake.

"ARGH!" He bellowed and turned toward his daughter.

I reached down and felt Riptide back in my pocket. I couldn't fight Atlas, even with a sword. And then a chill went down my back. I remembered the words of the prophecy: The Titan's curse must one withstand. I couldn't hope to beat Atlas. But there was someone else who might stand a chance.

"I don't like how you chained that thought," Jason told him with a twisted up face like Percy was coming for him next.

"I mean," Magnus scratched uncomfortably at his ear as he once again wondered how on Earth Percy was alive apparently fixing to attempt to do something a goddess was struggling to do. "At least he didn't skip a link and think of summoning worse?" Better to incorporate the prophecy?...but he couldn't think of any worse options than this either.

"The sky," I told the goddess. "Give it to me."

"Never, a sentence, I thought I'd hear," Will said with vibrant awe. There was something very different about Connor telling these as mythic stories over the campfire, and something else entirely hearing the words actually coming out of Percy's mouth. No showiness, no great gasp from an audience. He said the words with the same quiet tartness in his voice as if telling Clarisse to give up the posturing for the night, they just wanted to go to bed without one more duel. He'd just told Artemis what to do and was sitting here to tell the tale!

"No, boy," Artemis said. Her forehead was beaded with metallic sweat, like quicksilver. "You don't know what you're asking. It will crush you!"

Percy's mind was still sort of on pancakes and hoped his would come out with blue chocolate chips in them or something before they unflattened him as he squared his shoulders and read.

"Annabeth took it!"

"She barely survived. She had the spirit of a true huntress. You will not last so long."

"I'll die anyway," I said. "Give me the weight of the sky!"

I didn't wait for her answer.

Alex had to smile at anyone who flat ignored what a goddess or god told them to do while they stubbornly insisted they were perfectly capable of making their own choices. Percy might be a doof, but he was an admirable doof.

I took out Riptide and slashed through her chains. Then I stepped next to her and braced myself on one knee—holding up my hands—and touched the cold, heavy clouds.

A memory struck Percy, sharp and fast like someone pegged him in the forehead with a rock. Visiting Rockefeller center and seeing the statue of Atlas in this exact position. He didn't know if it was a rare trip with his mom, just out to get away from Gabe, or some school trip or what, but he remembered craning his neck to see as high up as he could into that lifeless face.

And thinking what an idiot that guy was. That position looked so uncomfortable to be holding something.

For a moment, Artemis and I bore the weight together. It was the heaviest thing I'd ever felt, as if I were being crushed under a thousand trucks. I wanted to black out from the pain, but I breathed deeply. I can do this.

"Self motivation for the win," Thalia muttered, her only scrap of hope this had worked was the fact that he was sitting beside her. She fought off the urge to cut off that chunk of grey hair, it would only grow back.

Then Artemis slipped out from under the burden, and I held it alone.

Afterward, I tried many times to explain what it felt like. I couldn't.

"Was the pain equal, or more than, being a disappointment?" Alex asked steadily.

Percy cast his mind around for a moment, considering. Even trying to think of how to describe it now escaped him, his muscles wanted to tremble and collapse him right out of this chair at just the memory of what he'd once been through. "I'm actually pretty proud of the fact I didn't die doing it, so, less, I guess."

Every muscle in my body turned to fire. My bones felt like they were melting. I wanted to scream, but I didn't have the strength to open my mouth. I began to sink, lower and lower to the ground, the sky's weight crushing me.

Percy had been Nico's whole world from the moment he laid eyes on him, until he'd found out his sister was gone. Even after that, in those dark nights of the Labyrinth, he'd spend countless hours wondering what Percy would be doing now to help if he cared, what would Percy say to lighten this mood and what cool move combo would he do to fight off the monster that had just chased him down another endless corridor, those skilled hands offering to hold his hand or patch him up.

The yearning never buried deep enough inside him still amazed at the son of Poseidon being able to do everything.

Fight back! Grover's voice said inside my head. Don't give up.

He wasn't even over there being smug and bragging about it, Will marveled. He was smiling and touching the side of his head where he seemed to imagine his empathy link with Grover connected him, his first friend always there to encourage him.

I concentrated on breathing. If I could just keep the sky aloft a few more seconds.

Percy's mind, as always, flickered to Annabeth first. She'd managed this for gods knew how long, she would definitely be in the blast zone if he failed this. He just kept breathing through the pain then and reading about it now, his goal always just to get back to her side.

I thought about Bianca, who had given her life so we could get here. If she could do that, I could hold the sky.

Percy gave Nico another of those looks. A flash a guilt, a question in his eyes, a hope that Percy was so clearly transcribing an apology and a plea to be understood he hadn't wanted that for her.

It was still missing something, like a key ingredient Nico couldn't put his finger on why he still grew more anxious by the moment what Percy so clearly wanted to say to him when this was all over.

My vision turned fuzzy. Everything was tinged with red. I caught glimpses of the battle, but I wasn't sure if I was seeing clearly. There was Atlas in full battle armor, jabbing with his javelin, laughing insanely as he fought.

Jason could hear that laugh in his ears with a cold clarity he didn't like. He swallowed a nasty feeling that told him to be grateful he couldn't have nightmares anymore than dreams.

And Artemis, a blur of silver. She had two wicked hunting knives, each as long as her arm, and she slashed wildly at the Titan, dodging and leaping with unbelievable grace. She seemed to change form as she maneuvered. She was a tiger, a gazelle, a bear, a falcon. Or perhaps that was just my fevered brain.

"Revenge," Alex hissed with satisfaction in a deep, raspy voice that mocked those dracaena a little to well.

"That's not even in the top ten of things to surprise me in this world anymore, you don't have to blame a fever pain," Magnus promised him.

Zoe shot arrows at her father, aiming for the chinks in his armor. He roared in pain each time one found its mark, but they affected him like bee stings. He just got madder and kept fighting.

Thalia and Luke went spear on sword, lightning still flashing around them. Thalia pressed Luke back with the aura of her shield. Even he was not immune to it. He retreated, wincing and growling in frustration.

"Yield!" Thalia yelled. "You never could beat me, Luke."

He bared his teeth. "Well see, my old friend."

Thalia still felt sick to her stomach every time she heard that. Luke saying it with such a malicious edge, a cocky confidence as familiar to her as the sword he'd been using was foreign. Hearing Percy say that, spitting it out and clearly frustrated Luke was getting to her. It felt wrong on every level.

Sweat poured down my face. My hands were slippery. My shoulders would've screamed with agony if they could.

"Now that's fever dream worthy," Magnus made an 'uck' face at the next Greek myth that probably had body parts talking.

I felt like the vertebrae in my spine were being welded together by a blowtorch.

Atlas advanced, pressing Artemis. She was fast, but his strength was unstoppable. His javelin slammed into the earth where Artemis had been a split second before, and a fissure opened in the rocks. He leaped over it and kept pursuing her. She was leading him back toward me.

Jason leaned forward in his seat, a hunger clear in his eyes to see a Goddess strategy at play and full confidence it would come true. Thalia looked pretty smug herself, it was an insane plan worthy of Percy.

Get ready, she spoke in my mind.

I was losing the ability to think through the pain. My response was something like

Agggghh-owwwwwwww.

"You get credit at all for still making noise," Will said bracingly. "Better than static," he even gave him a thumbs up, and Percy couldn't help a light snicker instead of recreating that noise now as vivid as the memory really was. If he wasn't in the ocean, every part of his body would probably be a charley-horse right now.

"You fight well for a girl." Atlas laughed. "But you are no match for me."

"All of that going on in this book," Alex still gave a roll of her eyes, though it somehow didn't surprise her coming from a Titan. Tethy's was the only one she'd met so far, and she seemed no more competent than any of the others.

He feinted with the tip of his javelin and Artemis dodged. I saw the trick coming.

Atlas's javelin swept around and knocked Artemis's legs off the ground. She fell, and Atlas brought up his javelin tip for the kill.

"No!" Zoe screamed. She leaped between her father and Artemis and shot an arrow straight into the Titan's forehead, where it lodged like a unicorn's horn.

"No," Thalia echoed in here, a quiet whisper among the halfhearted snickers at the mental image. If Thalia hadn't known it was a trick, she would have done the exact same thing. The Fates had ordained it so any way this happened, Zoe was not going to make it off this mountain top.

Atlas bellowed in rage. He swept aside his daughter with the back of his hand, sending her flying into the black rocks.

The collective wince that went around the room didn't feel like enough to emphasis the impact. Percy had been half out of his mind with pain and he still didn't feel like it was enough to understand what had just happened in that moment. The Prophecy had come to fruition.

I wanted to shout her name, run to her aid, but I couldn't speak or move. I couldn't even see where Zoe had landed. Then Atlas turned on Artemis with a look of triumph in his face.

Artemis seemed to be wounded. She didn't get up.

Alex looked on in interest at Artemis playing possum. A trick only the arrogant tended to fall for, so it wasn't the most dastardly even if she didn't like it herself.

"The first blood in a new war," Atlas gloated. And he stabbed downward.

As fast as thought, Artemis grabbed his javelin shaft. It hit the earth right next to her and she pulled backward, using the javelin like a lever, kicking the Titan Lord and sending him flying over her, I saw him coming down on top of me and I realized what would happen.

I loosened my grip on the sky, and as Atlas slammed into me I didn't try to hold on. I let myself be pushed out of the way and rolled for all I was worth.

"That's some lawyery legal loophole going on," Jason almost looked like he wanted to burst into applause. "Technically, he did take the sky from Percy, and it wasn't not involuntary."

"I'm sure he'd be impressed if he wasn't inventing swear words on the spot," Nico smirked.

'See, this is why the Titan's failed,' Will was very hard pressed to keep to himself as he smiled. 'The crooked one was in a box! They were going for all brute force, and no Son of Hades to bring a rousing tidal wave of victory.'

The weight of the sky dropped onto Atlas's back, almost smashing him flat until he managed to get to his knees, struggling to get out from under the crushing weight of the sky.

"And we were this close to a Titan pancake," Percy sighed.

"And, you know, everything else," Nico added.

"Yeah, yeah, eggs and bacon and all that, the universe scrambled and only having the fat of a few million extra pounds," Percy nodded. He was tapping his pen against his stomach again.

Thalia couldn't help but laugh in surprise, of course Percy would be getting hungry now that the worst of the problems were out of the way. Nico found it very Percy he would equate all this to food without the same kind of amusement and a little more exasperation.

But it was too late.

"Noooooo!" He bellowed so hard it shook the mountain. "Not again!"

Atlas was trapped under his old burden.

"Where he stays," Thalia said viciously. This Titan had taken a Hunter on this quest and the goddess herself to start it all. If anyone was ever foolish enough to release him again, she'd stick an arrow where they couldn't pull it out, and then deal with the Titan.

I tried to stand and fell back again, dazed from pain. My body felt like it was burning up.

Will's hands twitched. Percy needed fluids to start, and while there wasn't enough ambrosia and nectar on Olympus to heal Percy's idiocy of taking this on in the first place, it was still a good place to start helping him get his strength back.

He gave himself a mental smack quick enough. Once again, this had long since happened, and all he could have done was point out the obvious. He probably couldn't have done anything for Zoe either but point out it was to late.

Thalia backed Luke to the edge of a cliff, but still they fought on, next to the golden coffin. Thalia had tears in her eyes. Luke had a bloody slash across his chest and his pale face glistened with sweat.

He lunged at Thalia and she slammed him with her shield. Luke's sword spun out of his hands and clattered to the rocks. Thalia put her spear point to his throat.

For a moment, there was silence.

Percy took an uneasy breath. He didn't mean to, he really wasn't trying to draw out the pain on Thalia's face or the uneasy question on the others if Thalia was about to murder someone. He just needed to catch his dang breath as he stretched his legs and spine around to convince himself he wasn't a pretzel after remembering that trauma. Now onto the next one.

"Well?" Luke asked. He tried to hide it, but I could hear fear in his voice.

Thalia trembled with fury.

Behind her, Annabeth came scrambling, finally free from her bonds. Her face was bruised and streaked with dirt. "Don't kill him!"

"Not the words I expected to come out of her mouth," Alex admitted.

"I don't know what I expected her to say, but it wasn't that," Magnus agreed. Anything from running over and tackling Percy or running past Thalia and kicking Luke in the sack would have made more sense than that.

"He's a traitor," Thalia said. "A traitor!"

The way she'd screamed that had made her whole chest hurt, like the very air had fought her going in and out to say it, and yet some piece of her had finally felt at peace for admitting it to herself. Saying it out loud.

The ugly scowl on Jason's face promised Luke would be lucky if he just got a spear in the guts for all he'd done. The pain in Thalia alone would have guided him to a non-peaceful answer no matter what Rey- the thought stopped short like his brain hit the breaks on him and flung his mind into his skull full force. He shook his head to clear the annoying buzz, but the lingering pain and awful taste in his mouth like he'd been so close only amplified his urge to do something now.

Alex looked interested in what the outcome was, while Magnus was clearly bracing himself for this book to hit blood and gore levels.

Will brushed at his own beaded necklace for solace. Luke had hurt their home again and again. Luke had always let anybody who asked hold his necklace with so many beads on them, it felt heavy to all. The mark he'd left still made Will hopeful, even posthumously, that not everybody would look on Luke's death with such acceptance of inevitability.

In my daze, I realized that Artemis was no longer with me. She had run off toward the black rocks where Zoe had fallen.

"That's fair, I accept that," Percy muttered as he flipped the page.

Nico shook his head without surprise. Any other person would have been mildly offended he'd just tried to save both of their keisters and Artemis hadn't even tried to heal him in thanks first before running off. Surely she could sense the life draining out of her Lieutenant. Percy wasn't resenting Artemis a moment of every second she'd have left with Zoe.

"We'll bring Luke back," Annabeth pleaded. "To Olympus. He... he'll be useful."

Thalia still winced upon hearing that. It's exactly what Luke had said to keep Annabeth alive for his own selfish reasons of hoping they'd change their mind and understand him. What other choice did that leave Thalia? She'd had an opportunity to end it, and she'd let it pass.

"Is that what you want, Thalia?" Luke sneered. "To go back to Olympus in triumph? To please your dad?"

"Is he trying to get stabbed?" Alex asked, almost grudgingly impressed he had the moxie to say that to her in that position.

"He taunts enough people, I almost assume it's a life goal," Jason sounded like he was agreeing even if he was just as confused at this guy pushing his luck.

Thalia hesitated, and Luke made a desperate grab for her spear.

Thalia could still see it perfectly clear in her mind. Like a glitch in the universe.

"No!" Annabeth shouted. But it was too late. Without thinking, Thalia kicked Luke away. He lost his balance, terror on his face, and then he fell.

There was no Hollywood effect for her. No slow motion for her to deliberate. One moment he was there, the next her battle hardened reflexes they'd learned together on the streets had sent him spiraling. There was no fracture of time fast enough to cover that moment.

"Luke!" Annabeth screamed.

We rushed to the cliff's edge. Below us, the army from the Princess Andromeda had stopped in amazement. They were staring at Luke's broken form on the rocks.

Thalia still saw him like that when she closed her eyes. Alone in her tent.

She had set out on this quest to save him and Annabeth. Fighting him up there, seeing the state Annabeth had been in under his care, had sent her into a frenzy of spear thrusts. She had done this to him, caused his death.

It hadn't stuck, whatever piece of soul Kronos had lodged in him still resurrected him to another day, but as far as she was concerned, this had been the last bit of Luke to exist. Her Luke. Her first everything.

The scrawny little boy who stole a bag of jerky from right under a cops nose, and then sensed her watching. Grinned at her as he casually walked off without anyone noticing.

Who had come to her rescue when she'd found herself cornered the next block over by a hellhound by sacrificing the jerky, a distraction that lasted long enough for her to summon a bolt of electricity to finish the job and pass out.

He'd been sitting casually next to her in the rain while she was rolled into a stinky, dripping box when she'd woken up like nothing had happened and offered her some more jerky while introducing himself.

That's who she killed on her sixteenth birthday.

Percy put his arm cautiously around her, expecting her to brush him off and tell him to keep reading. Instead, she leaned into his arm and exhaled sharply, throwing her arm around him too with her eyes still gently closed like she was trying to preserve something in stone by concentration alone.

Despite how much I hated him, I couldn't stand to see it. I wanted to believe he was still alive, but that was impossible. The fall was fifty feet at least, and he wasn't moving.

No matter how much time passed or what she ultimately felt he deserved which she still wrestled with, she didn't want to remember him like that! It was everything wrong with the world the gods would not fix. A lonely halfblooded. So she kept her eyes closed and pretend it was just the salty water that made a tear escape.

One of the giants looked up and growled, "Kill them!"

Thalia was stiff with grief, tears streaming down her cheeks. I pulled her back as a wave of javelins sailed over our heads. We ran for the rocks, ignoring the curses and threats of Atlas as we passed.

"Yes, ignore the Titan who's been a threat half this trip and was vanquished in half a page," Magnus muttered. It felt good he was getting more used to this.

"Artemis!" I yelled.

The goddess looked up, her face almost as grief-stricken as Thalia's. Zoe lay in the goddess's arms. She was breathing. Her eyes were open. But still...

"The wound is poisoned," Artemis said.

"Atlas poisoned her?" I asked.

"No," the goddess said. "Not Atlas."

She showed us the wound in Zoe's side. I'd almost forgotten her scrape with Ladon the dragon.

It was really saying something about the calamity of Percy's life that the dragon attack of last chapter had quickly been climaxed over by all that had just happened.

The bite was much worse than Zoe had let on. I could barely look at the wound. She had charged into battle against her father with a horrible cut already sapping her strength.

"The stars," Zoe murmured. "I cannot see them."

"Nectar and ambrosia," I said. "Come on! We have to get her some."

No one moved. Grief hung in air. The army of Kronos was just below the rise. Even Artemis was too shocked to stir. We might've met our doom right there, but then I heard a strange buzzing noise.

Will made a sharp noise as he repressed a whistle. A warning. Hearing even Thalia, the queen of escaping her problems freeze up gave him a kick with no where to go.

The amount of times he'd lost a patient and been forced to move onto the next one with no time to process until much later gave him an edge he wouldn't have expected in that moment.

Just as the army of monsters came over the hill, a Sopwith Camel swooped down out of the sky.

"Somebody dropped a camel out of the sky?" Percy looked blearily down at the words like he might need glasses.

"No, way." Jason's brain was sagging under the weight of what he might have just heard as Percy shook his head to finish. Was it actually possible...a mortal had found their way up there?!

"Get away from my daughter!" Dr. Chase called down, and his machine guns burst to life, peppering the ground with bullet holes and startling the whole group of monsters into scattering.

"And Annabeth's been saying she has no family resemblance with her dad," Magnus's grin made him look drunk. "Look at Uncle Fredrick swooping over the cliff to save the day too!"

"That, is so cool!" Alex cheered. "You think he'd let me drive!"

Magnus's heart did a little loop-d-loop in his chest at the idea of Alex behind the wheel of that thing instead.

"Dad?" yelled Annabeth in disbelief.

"Run!" he called back, his voice growing fainter as the biplane swooped by.

This shook Artemis out of her grief. She stared up at the antique plane, which was now banking around for another strafe.

"A brave man," Artemis said with grudging approval.

Percy did look just the tiniest bit miffed he couldn't have gotten that compliment. He'd call it a life goal and something to work towards. Maybe if he and Annabeth ever got married someday Artemis would consider it. Oh crap, wait, then he'd have to talk to this guy first and get his approval- no wait, what?!

Nobody really understood the weird blush in Percy's face as he hastily kept reading, and mutually decided they didn't want to know.

"Come, We must get Zoe away from here."

She raised her hunting horn to her lips, and its clear sound echoed down the valleys of Marin. Zoe's eyes were fluttering.

"Hang in there!" I told her. "It'll be all right!"

The Sopwith Camel swooped down again. A few giants threw javelins, and one flew straight between the wings of the plane, but the machine guns blazed. I realized with amazement that somehow Dr. Chase must've gotten hold of celestial bronze to fashion his bullets. The first row of snake women wailed as the machine gun's volley blew them into sulfurous yellow powder.

"I'm now over here wondering if Annabeth might have another future halfsibling," Will started snickering. "If this didn't get some gods attention, I don't know what will!" Then he finished with an even louder laugh for punning his own name.

"Any daughters of his would be welcomed into the hunt without question," Thalia agreed with amusement for how impressed Annabeth had looked at her dad, let alone Artemis. A very rare thing in itself, and even more still on a mortal man. This had truly been a day of note.

"That's... my dad!" Annabeth said in amazement.

Magnus was leaning so far forward in his seat it looked like he was preparing for launch. He didn't know if Annabeth and her dad would work out their differences, but here was a proof beyond compare this mortal half of his family cared enough not to just sit at home and hope everything worked out. Maybe it really wouldn't be the worst idea to go check in on them when he got out of here...

We didn't have time to admire his flying.

"There's the tragedy of this book," Nico muttered darkly for himself. He still liked watching mortal things fly through the sky, it was a strange fascination of his he connected to before his time in the Hotel, a part of his mind that somehow connected to a memory he no longer had he often assumed.

The giants and snake women were already recovering from their surprise. Dr. Chase would be in trouble soon.

Just then, the moonlight brightened, and a silver chariot appeared from the sky, drawn by the most beautiful deer I had ever seen. It landed right next to us.

"Was the deer silver too?" Magnus asked in surprise. This was getting hilariously uncanny if it was a stag.

"Yeah, she was," Percy might have been out of his mind with pain and hobbling like all his bones were fused together to get there, but he still smiled in delight at the breathtaking animal.

Magnus's smile was a touch bitter now. Only Alex could guess how the metaphor came full circle, like a symbol of Percy's mom in the motherly Goddess had come around to drive him back down the mountain this time.

"Get in," Artemis said.

Annabeth helped me get Thalia on board. Then I helped Artemis with Zoe. We wrapped Zoe in a blanket as Artemis pulled the reins and the chariot sped away from the mountain, straight into the air.

"Like Santa Claus's sleigh," I murmured, still dazed with pain.

"She insists she named her Prancer before that song became popular, but I have my doubts," Thalia relaxed back into her seat again, falling into a more casual lean back as she touched her nose and gave a smirk for the room again.

Artemis took time to look back at me. "Indeed, young half-blood. And where do you think that legend came from?"

"Artemis inspired Santa, yeah sure, after Percy wrestled with his evil twin I refuse to be surprised about this anymore," Magnus sighed, back to rubbing at his forehead again as yet another insane part of these stories was drilled into his brain.

"Talk about getting lost in translation," Alex snorted in surprise. She much preferred the Norse depiction of Skadi still, but she wasn't here to cause trouble debating who stole what from whom in the different depictions.

Seeing us safely away, Dr. Chase turned his biplane and followed us like an honor guard. It must have been one of the strangest sights ever, even for the Bay Area: a silver flying chariot pulled by deer, escorted by a Sopwith Camel.

Jason brushed his hair down in agitation, swearing it was standing on end as static filled as his brain felt. There was no way possible he should ever have caught a glimpse of that in any memory he didn't have. His brain was short circuiting.

Behind us, the army of Kronos roared in anger as they gathered on the summit of Mount Tamalpais, but the loudest sound was the voice of Atlas, bellowing curses against the gods as he struggled under the weight of the sky.

Percy let out a great sigh as he finished. Annabeth was safe.

But not everything was as it should be.

Zoe had but a few breaths left in her. If Artemis was going to save her, she would have already...and Bianca. Gods, it was no wonder if Hunters hated him for generations. He still had no clue how Nico wasn't trying to actively hack his head off yet...

Annabeth was safe...

But was she going to join the Hunters?

PJOPJOPJOPJO

And just as a promise of all of these hints of Jason's past the last few chapters, those are all going to get more fleshed out with actual memories...later. I will not tell when, but it is coming.

#pjo #Percy Jackson #Thalia Grace #Jason Grace #nico di angelo #will solace #solangelo #percabeth #fierrochase #alex fierro #Magnus Chase #Titan's Curse #hoo

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