#hoo analysis

[ilovewillsolace]

I think a lot about the fact that despite all Rick's attempts to ridicule and humiliate Octavian for his femininity, he was trained in the wolf house, absolutely not the place where money or connections could help, which Rick often uses to show Octavian's "weakness" or "dishonesty". in addition, Lupa selects not only strong, but also worthy of being legionnaires, so Octavian simply cannot be as bad as Rick is trying to expose him.

[stormfirebeauty]

Still thinking about how Leo is the only one of the seven who doesn’t really have ties outside of the quest.

Hear me out. Percy and Piper both still have a solid human life to go back too. Annabeth too although I’d say she’s more tied to camp half blood.

Frank and and Hazel both really care about camp Jupiter despite not having been there long. Jason actually feels very closely tied to both camps which causes him conflict. He seems to think he doesn’t know where he belongs but he DOES feel connected to both places.

Leo though… he’s a BIT attached to camp half blood. Not as much as the others tho. I don’t have my copy of MoA rn so I can’t find text support but I’m pretty sure there’s a part in his POV where he talks about it too. He was at Bunker 9 significantly more than the camp. It’s actually so so impressive he manages to pull his irresponsible goofball act off as much as he does. Cause like this dude WORKED. He built an impossible magic ship in like six months. I’m pretty sure there’s a part where it’s mentioned even HE doesn’t totally understand the magic power my the ship. Bonkers.

So anyway he isn’t that connected to his human life (because it burned in a dumpster fire) and he’s not that connected to camp half blood. But WAY more than the rest of the 7 he is connected to this quest. He’s literally been dreaming about this ship since he was a kid that he would one day build for there people. I think the bonds between the seven could’ve been more built up in general but I gotta say Leo has some STRONG connections compared to the rest. Jason and piper are obvious that’s literally what I made this blog about years ago.

But the rest too. He doesn’t talk with Annabeth much but they do have this interesting relationship of ship builder/commander and quest leader also both being absolute geniuses. Like the only ones who can even Kind of keep up with each other there’s a lot of mutual respect (and fear he is a bit scared of her but that’s just smart). Percy and Leo are interesting bc in theory they have so much in common but one of the only deeepish conversations the have is about Calypso?? BUT his extreme guilt when Percy and Annabeth are in Tarturus bc he thinks he traded them for Frank and Hazel??

Yeah let’s talk about Frank and Hazel. I’m ignoring the love triangle bc I don’t care for it and it’s irrelevant to what I’m talking about. Hazel and Leo have the obvious connection of Leo grandfather being Sammy but ALSO the thing we don’t talk about enough is how both of the childhoods were defined by this quest more than anyone else. Gae interfered with both of them HEAVILY and they both suffered for it, AND carry huge amounts of guilt for what she manipulated them into doing.

And then one of the most underrated friendships that is Leo and Frank. Because Frank’s one weakness is fire and Leo IS FIRE. Like they are each others worst god damn fear. Leo REALLY fears the consequences of his destructive powers which is something he has to learn to work past and Frank really fears his mortality BECAUSE HE HAS TO CARRY IT AROUKD WITH HIM SO VALID. Trusting each other is like confronting those fears… (ok so maybe it wasn’t done that well in canon but that’s not the point).

ANYWAY what’s crazy is I don’t think anyone else really realizes this. Like Leo’s whole woo is me I’m the seventh wheel thing seems really self pitying but… you could argue that everyone on the ship was more invested in someone else on board and on their lives outside of the quest. Like, this is Leo’s life. And he’s their side character (i don’t think this is actually true at all for Jason and Piper but he doesn’t know that ugh). His character is so crazy to me.

[zazzander]

do you think Octavian is queer coded?and if yes can you explain why?I read a post from another person that wrote that he is because of his description in the books (sorry I can’t remember the user or the details),what do you think about that?

I've wanted to talk about something along these lines for a little while, so thanks for the ask! I think I read that post as well, and I generally agreed with it.

While I’m not sure if I’d call it queer-coded, I’d definitely argue he’s got plenty of feminine traits. And a guy being effeminate is often used in queer-coding.

“Don’t you have… I don’t know,” Percy said, “an oracle or something?” [Son of Neptune]

One of the first things we learn about Octavian is that he has the gift of prophecy.

In the Riordanverse, seeing into the future is feminine. While there are male seers, they are usually coupled with a female character, almost as a counterbalance.

The most famous of the seers, the Oracle of Delphi, is always a woman. Rachel, the oracle in the attic, and May Castellan are the sources of prophecy in the original series. Yes, Percy does have prophetic dreams but these aren’t viewed in the same way as a gift of prophecy. They are just your standard "demigod dreams" and not something he can control.

No, the first male seer we have in the main series is Octavian. It takes until The Dark Prophecy for another male to join the ranks: Trophonius.

Halcyon Green does appear in The Demigod Diaries, but I’m inclined to set that to the side. While canon, Halcyon’s character is not featured in the main series. He's not even mentioned in The Trials of Apollo.

However, Trophonius is a bit different to Octavian. He is paired with another: Georgina. They are both tied to the Dark Oracle.

And this trend is not just seen with Trophonius. There is the Arrow of Dodona as well, which speaks in a masculine voice. The Arrow is a branch from a grove associated with Rhea, a goddess.

Prophecy isn’t exclusive to female characters but it is feminine. And when we do have a masculine seer, there is usually a feminine counterpart (Arrow & Rhea, Trophonius & Georgina).

But Octavian has no feminine counterpart.

Yes, Ella is introduced in the same book, but their powers are not linked. Nor is their story. In fact, I would argue that Octavian’s desire to possess the Sibylline book works to counter this pairing.

No, Octavian holds his power independently. And, as if the bridge that disconnect, Riordan makes him more effeminate (often portraying this in a negative light but I wouldn't be going into that much here).

A pretty impressive trick, considering the kid didn’t look like much. [Son of Neptune]

Octavian is repeatedly said to look harmless or unintimidating. Despite warnings, Percy doesn’t believe Octavian could be a force to be reckoned with. This is done to show that Octavian’s power is not physical.

“You’re a warrior. Octavian is a talker. Put him in front of the senate, and suddenly he becomes the powerful one.”

Now, being a good politician isn’t necessarily feminine - it's gender neutral, especially in the "underhanded" portrayal of Octavian's politics.

However, I want to point out Octavian’s favoured weapon. We know that Octavian would be well versed in all the weapons of Rome, and since he’s part of the most prestigious cohort, he should have access to any weapon he wants. But Octavian is almost always using a knife – whether it be his augur’s knife, the iron knife of a pontifex, or something unspecified (I’m assuming a pugio). No other male main character uses a knife as their favoured weapon, but there are two female characters who fight with knives: Annabeth and Piper. Like Octavian, they fight don’t fight with their physical strength. But in the case of Octavian, who is male, this is viewed in a negative light.

Now these things should be seen in the context of Octavian's character as a whole. These could be easily dismissed when we consider that everything Riordan does with Octavian is done to 'other’ him. Octavian often described as a scarecrow. At once point he’s called ‘ghoulish’. So Octavian’s character isn’t just made to see effeminate. All of this is simply done to make him different, regardless of how that need be achieved. That’s why Octavian is often said to be coded as disabled, or coded as autistic, etc. Riordan hit a lot of check boxes when he was creating this character.

Yes, he has the power of prophecy. Yes, his favoured weapon is a knife. If that was it, I think we could all pack up and go home. No coding happening here. But that’s not where it stops.

Let's get into Octavian's voice.

Octavian screamed in a shrill voice – maybe ordering the First Cohort to stand their ground, maybe trying to sing soprano – but Percy put a stop to it. [SON]

Soprano is the highest vocal range and of course ‘shrill’ itself means high-pitched and piercing. If this was a one off thing, we could probably ignore it, but Octavian often showed to have a high-pitched voice.

Time for the shrieking speed-run! (btw, definition of ‘shriek’ is a high-pitched piercing sound or words)

“I was just there!” Octavian shrieked. “I saw it with my own eyes!”

“Surrender to Rome!” Octavian shrieked.

Over by the docks, a familiar voice shrieked over the wind: “Kill them! Kill them all!”

‘You will be destroyed!’ Octavian shrieked.

Bonus:

Octavian made a squeaking sound. “What as that for?”

“Reyna!” Octavian cried. “You can’t seriously be considering this!

Now, this might just be because Octavian yells constantly. He’s almost always yelling or shouting, or in this case, shrieking. But it’s still a very consistent thing that happens with his character.

I want to point out, as well, that Octavian’s voice only goes higher when he lacks control over a situation. In Son of Neptune, he’s fully capable of shouting without his voice being high-pitched:

“Silence!” Octavian’s voice sounded a lot more commanding than it had the previous night on the battlefield.

This comes back to Octavian's feminine traits being considered negative. I'm not expert, but I wouldn't be surprised is this was all part of the "queer-coded villain" stereotype.

Now, let's talk about Octavian and... men.

Reyna had always liked Mike Kahale. Unfortunately, Mike was very loyal to his sponsor. And his sponsor was Octavian. [BOO]

Please note the italics here – why are there italics, Rick? He already added the word "very", but then he put that modifier in italics. Is something more significant is being hinted at?

“That’s one of Octavian’s right-hand men, but he’s a good legionnaire. I may be able to reason with him.” [BOO]

From this line, we learn that Mike is not the only ‘right hand man’ Octavian has. Which is unusual because, by definition, you should really only have one. And it's not "right-hands" but "right-hand men". So we've gendered it. But we do know, from previous scenes, that Octavian is often followed around by more than one burly guy.

By himself, the skinny augur wouldn’t have bothered her, but the two other guys looked like seasoned warriors – a lot bigger and stronger than Annabeth wanted to deal with, especially since Piper and she were armed only with daggers. [MoA]

Two centurions leaned casually on their javelins, chatting with a tall skinny blond guy in a purple toga. Leo stumbled. It was that freak Octavian, the augur from Camp Jupiter, who was always screaming for war. [HoH]

For the second quote, we don’t know the gender of the centurions but, well, most of the centurions are male – so it wouldn’t be so shocking to learn these are men too.

We don't know Octavian's relationship with these people. However, it does feel like the cherry on top of a cake, you know?

Since I'm no expert on queer-coding in media, far from it, I wouldn't want to say "yes he's definitely queer-coded" but he does feel that way from where I'm standing.

[aroaceleovaldez]

i have suddenly become obsessed with a theme that HoO established but never proceeded to extrapolate on, which is:

You are Percy Jackson, and you have been swapped with a boy who was allegedly everyone's favorite person, but they have decided to replace him with you. They just met you. You stand next to his best friend and the people he's known his entire life. In his home. In his cloak. In his place. They stopped looking for him.

You are Jason Grace, and you have just found out you have a long lost sister who completely replaced you in her life with this girl you just met. Your lives and personalities are mirrors. She is you, living the life you were robbed of.

You are Annabeth Chase, and you have just become starkly aware that you have been inhabiting the void left behind by your best friend's long lost brother. You and Luke were just replacements for him. Now you have to look him in the eyes when he has nothing and know you took that life from him.

You are Piper McLean, and you have just found out your relationship is fake and built entirely on the memories of Annabeth Chase. You have been given a boyfriend when hers has been taken away. You have no idea how much of it is real or not but regardless you feel like if your relationship isn't exactly in their image that you have failed.

You are Leo Valdez, and you have just learned that you are the echo of your great-grandfather. You are not your own person. You just exist to be a mirror of him. A doppelganger. An actor and stunt double facing all the danger he never had to but wearing his face. To be there for his best friend decades later simply because he couldn't. You are playing a role. A seventh wheel and a pawn for a goddess who carefully sculpted your entire life for her own purposes.

You are Hazel Levesque, and the only reason you are alive is because your brother couldn't save your his sister. You are a consolation prize. An apology. Your existence here is misplaced in every way but you inhabit it anyways.

You are Frank Zhang, and you are a shapeshifter. Inhabiting your own body feels strange and clumsy when you could be literally anything at any time. You are anything and everything and live your life with the simple certainty of knowing exactly how you will die.

[aficionadoenthusiast]

yes yes annabeth has abandonment issues and she loves percy because he's the only one who stayed, but have you considered: she loves him because he has no ambition

(i'm tempted to just leave it at that, but i'm guessing most people will not get what i mean, and i like doing this stuff so let's go)

think about it. for her dad, it was the dream of having a normal family and a nice normal job where he could work on his projects without distractions. it was the desire to make helen happy because she could give him that life even if it hurt his daughter.

for thalia, it was the dream of not being the child of the prophecy. it was finding a family with the hunters, no strings attached. it was maybe even the desire of keeping annabeth and luke alive by sacrificing herself, at least a little bit.

for luke, it was the dream of being a hero. it was the dream of saving the demigods. it was the utter belief that he knew what was best and could achieve that goal, damn the consequences. it wasn't even pride. it was just good intentions marred by ambition and bad influences.

for grover, it was the dream finding pan.

the one thing all of these dreams have in common: they took annabeth's family away from her.

that's not to say percy didn't have desires or dreams or goals or anything, but the difference is that everything he wanted had her in it, and none of it was particularly ambitious.

he didn't want to be a hero. he just did what he had to do til his job was done. even his ambitions now have annabeth written all over them: going to college with her in new rome, trying to live as normal a life as possible, growing old with her, etc. there's nothing he wants that doesn't involve her, and you know what? they deserve that so much, that open-hearted devotion.

which introduces some fun irony: where percy's fatal flaw is loyalty, annabeth's fatal flaw is hubris, and one of the first real things she ever said about herself is that she wants to build something permanent. that is hardcore ambition right there, but it ties right back into her abandonment issues. she wants to build something that won't leave and disappoint her.

in that regard, percy's lack of ambition fulfills her excess ambition because his loyalty gave her something permanent. they love each other so much that they fill in the gaps of each other's fatal flaws, and their ambitions fit like puzzle pieces. they never have to doubt each other because there is nothing to doubt.

she loves him because he has no ambition.

[puzzled-pegasus]

Do you ever just think about how awful it is to be a demigod before you know about it?

I've been thinking about it a lot lately. How much demigod kids and teenagers don't fit in with mortal society. Their mortal parents don't know what to do with them, even if they do care for them immensely. They are labeled as troublemakers, as bad kids, as mentally ill, as freaks and monsters who see things they shouldn't see and have an aversion to authority that they shouldn't have and a strong sense of justice and an inability to sit still, read, play, act, feel normally. Percy got in trouble for getting into fights, for speaking impulsively, he was mocked and spoken down to and expelled from lots of schools who couldn't handle him and he didn't know why until he was twelve years old. Sally wasn't able to tell him why.

Annabeth was the product of her father's relationship with a goddess, and he loved her for a while, but she wasn't a normal kid. When he fell in love with a mortal and Annabeth didn't get along with her or her kids, he chose the mortal side. How could he understand Annabeth's side? She was just a badly behaved kid, while his new wife and children were the normal good ones.

Jason always knew he was a demigod, he was accepted and praised and tons of expectations were placed on him from a frighteningly young age. Part of the reason the others resent him and see him as a sort of golden child is because he was placed on a pedestal and he will never, ever know what it was like for all of his friends to be looked down on as children, to be scolded for things they didn't understand and told that the things they saw and experienced constantly were not real.

Piper was always loved by her father but I think he loved the idea of her, he loved that she reminded him of the beautiful woman he met years ago. He was always kind to her and usually gave her things she wanted, but he couldn't always spend time with her as his job got busier. Piper sensed that her father's attention was occupied by something else, and as he got busier, she felt less supported and stole things and got in fights and her dad didn't know what to do with her after the BMW so she was sent to a troubled teen program where she was bullied for her disabilities and her race.

Leo feared his power because it killed the person he loved the most, and after that, everything in his life was hell. He didn't feel safe anywhere, he didn't have anyone he could trust, and adults saw him as a troublemaker who would never amount to anything.

The books don't emphasize these things as much with any of the other demigods, or maybe Annabeth, Percy, Piper, and Leo are the best examples we have. I just. They're so tragic. They're all my children all of them. I love them and I feel so sad for them

[somewhereincairparavel]

my blog summary in a nutshell to save your time from scrolling through my posts to see if it's your vibe or not <3

[knightofthenewrepublic]

The Battle of Manhattan didn’t go the way the Fandom thinks it did; we need to address the “massacre” of the Titan Army!

The Battle of Manhattan is the most pivotal event of the first series. And we see the entire thing exclusively from Percy’s point of view. He takes us through the thickest of the fight from one end of Manhattan Island to the next, and shows us a desperate fight of good against evil.

But we have another point of view for the battle, one that comes from the demigods of the Titan army, and one that informs us of a far different, darker side to the conflict. One where an entire army of children is massacred by the victorious Olympians, without a thought or even a care. It’s a shocking, confronting side of the struggle that most fans don’t seem to be aware of. 

But it’s also completely inaccurate. 

Now I love Alabaster; he’s one of my favorite characters, and I want nothing but the best for him. But he’s a demonstrably unreliable narrator. I don’t even mean that he’s intentionally dishonest; but he’s very badly misinformed about what actually happened. And that gives the fandom three major misconceptions that need to be cleared up. 

Alabaster gets the casualty ratio for the battle wrong (the Olympians had more than he thinks).

The Titan army has far fewer demigods than most fans think (not much more than 50 at the most).

Alabaster does say that there was a “massacre” at the end of the battle, but most of the TA demigods had deserted before that!

Part 1) The Olympians Have High Casualties

“It was a massacre. If I remember right, my mother told me that Camp Half-Blood and its allies had sixteen casualties total. We had hundreds.” (pg 219)

This is the only time we get a specific number for Olympian casualties, but it just doesn’t match up with what actually happens in the books. Looking back at all the deaths we do see:

Charlie Beckendorf -1

one [Hellhound] got hold of an Apollo camper and dragged him away. I didn’t see what happened to him next. I didn’t want to know. (pg 182) -1

Michael Yew -1

A young dragon had appeared in Harlem, and a dozen wood nymphs died before the monster was finally defeated. (pg 203) -12

“We lost twenty satyrs against some giants at Fort Washington,” [Grover] said, his voice trembling. (pg 203) -20 Giants smashed through trees, and naiads faded as their life sources were destroyed. (pg 243) -1< Enemy archers returned fire, and a Hunter fell from a high branch. (pg 244) -1  Too many of our friends lay wounded in the streets. Too many were missing. (pg 257) -1< The flagpoles were hung with horrible trophies –helmets and armor pieces from defeated campers. (pg 282) -1< The Drakon lashed out, swallowing three californian centaurs in one gulp before I could even get close. (pg 288) -3 Poison spewed everywhere, melting centaurs into dust along with quite a few monsters, (pg 288) -1< The Drakon snapped up one Ares camper in a gulp. (pg 291) -1

Silena Beauregard -1

Leneus -1

a body covered in the golden burial shroud of Apollo’s cabin. I didn’t know who was underneath. I don't want to find out. (pg 303) -1

Oddly enough, we actually miss the moment that was probably the worst for the Olympians, the final push by Kronos that breaks through their line. After Clarisse slays the drakon and the monsters are driven back again, Percy and co. take the opportunity to go up to Olympus. Percy gives Pandora’s Pithos to Hestia, and then contacts Poseidon via his throne. It’s just as he finishes that Thalia comes up and tells them that Kronos is coming again, but they miss the fighting.

By the time we got to the street, it was too late. Campers and Hunters lay wounded on the ground. Clarisse must have lost a fight with a Hyperborean giant, because she and her chariot were frozen in a block of ice. The centaurs were nowhere to be seen. Either they’d panicked and ran, or they’d been disintegrated. (pg 312) -<500

And finally, Kronos does kill some people on Olympus itself.

A few minor gods and nature spirits had tried to stop Kronos. What remained of them was strewn about the road: shattered armor, ripped clothing, swords and spears broken in half. (pg 322) -1<

The specific deaths we have mentioned during the battle amount to 48 at the very least; and that is an extremely conservative estimate that only includes the deaths Percy has the time and presence of mind to witness in all the carnage. Considering how many others must have happened, factoring the sudden disappearance of the 500 centaurs in particular, it was likely in the hundreds. And most of the centaurs probably ran at the end, but even that would have involved heavy casualties.

It’s true that actual demigods were a smaller fraction of Olympian forces, and so would have made up just a fraction of losses. The number 16 might actually make sense if it were just the number of campers lost, but that’s not what Hecate said, she said total.

It might be significant that Hecate is the actual source of this misinformation. Would she have reason to lie to her own son, or might she herself be out of the loop. Right now, we just can’t know. 

And she might be underestimating Titan Army losses too. Considering how many times a wave of several hundred monsters tear into Manhattan, and get thrown back by the Olympians only to return later with no discernable drop in numbers, until the army is finally routed entirely, it wouldn’t surprise me if the TA actually took a thousand or more casualties. But those would be overwhelmingly monsters, because:

Part 2) Less Than Fifty Demigods Were Even In The Titan Army

To prove that there could not possibly have been hundreds of TA demigods killed at Manhattan, we need look no farther than Alabaster's own account.

“There was a war between the gods and titans last summer and most half-bloods–demigods like me–fought for the Olympians.” (pg 218)

So the TA could not have had more demigods than the Olympians; and they had about a hundred. There are forty campers to start with, who are quickly joined by the Hunters, who now have thirty members. Then, in the last hours of the fight, they are finally joined by the Ares cabin, which brings another thirty (jeez Ares, you animal!). So Olympus has an even hundred demigods. (The Hunters aren’t necessarily all demigods by birth, but I don’t think Alabaster would make a distinction based on that.)

So the TA has less than a hundred demigods, significantly less. I would argue they probably had no more than fifty because that lines up with the only solid numbers we ever get for them. And every time the TA is described, demigods are a clear minority. First, look at the foes Percy encounters when he infiltrates the Princess Andromeda:

I saw monsters patrolling the upper decks of the ship–dracaenae snake-women, hellhounds, giants, and the humanoid seal-demons known as telkhines . . . . . “I don’t care what your nose says!” snarled a half-human half-dog voice—a telkhine. “The last time you smelled half-blood, it turned out to be a meatloaf sandwich!” “Meatloaf sandwiches are good!” a second voice snarled . . . . . a telkhine was hunched over a console . . . . . a half dozen telkhines were tromping down the stairs . . . . . past another telkhine . . . . . And in the fountain squatted a giant crab . . . . . a couple of dracaenae slithered across my path . . . . . As I was running up the stairwell, a kid charged down . . . . . Laistrygonian giants filed in on either side of the swimming pool . . . . . demigod archers appeared on the roof . . . . . two hellhounds leapt down . . . . . The crowed of monsters parted . . . . . Giants jeered. Dracaenae hissed with laughter . . . . . throwing monsters off their feet . . . . .I knew him, of course: Ethan Nakamura . . . . . two giants lumbered forward . . . . . Panicked monsters surged backward . . . . . one of the dracaenae hissed . . . . . I pushed through a crowd of monsters . . . . . Monsters yelled at me from  above.

That was a quick summary of all the enemies Percy and Charlie encounter on the Princess Andromeda, I’m not crazy enough to try and write the whole chapter. But it’s pretty clear there are only a few demigods amid dozens of monsters. We hear the same thing from Poseidon later, that “there were only a few demigod warriors aboard that ship”; we might question whether or not Poseidon is a trustworthy source, but the evidence does back him up.

When we finally get to the battle, the disparity of demigod numbers in the TA is again evident:

The bronze image showed Long Island Sound near La Guardia. A fleet of a dozen speed boats raced through the dark water toward Manhattan. Each boat was packed with demigods in full Greek armor. At the back of the lead boat, a purple banner emblazoned with a black scythe flapped in the night wind. I’d never seen that design before, but it wasn’t hard to figure out: the battle flag of Kronos. “Scan the perimeter of the island,” I said. “Quick.” Annabeth shifted the scene south to the harbor. A Staten Island Ferry was plowing through the waves near Ellis Island. The deck was crowded with dracaenae and a whole pack of hellhounds. Swimming in front of the ship was a pod of marine mammals. At first I thought they were dolphins. Then I saw their doglike faces and swords strapped to their waists, and I realized they were telkhines—sea demons. The scene shifted again: the Jersey shore, right at the entrance of the Lincoln Tunnel. A hundred assorted monsters were marching past the lanes of stopped traffic: giants with clubs, rogue Cyclopes, a few fire-spitting dragons, and just to rub it in, a World War II-era Sherman tank, pushing cars out of the way as it rumbled into the tunnel. (pg 167)

Here we see the first wave of the Titan Army as a three pronged attack (which Percy says on the next page collectively numbered at least 300) and only one of the units has demigods. It’s the one that Kronos leads, so it’s probably meant to be a more elite unit, at least at first. 

We don’t know for sure how many there are. Speedboats are usually made to carry 4-6 people so a dozen would be possible 48 to 72. Considering Alabaster says there were significantly less demigods in the TA than the Olympians, I would guess it’s on the lower end; and that does match another number we see in a moment.

This fleet never reaches Manhattan, since Percy bribes the East River to swamp their boats. Those who say many TA demigods were killed in the battle might point to this as Percy causing a bunch of kids to drown; but Alabaster never mentions a mass drowning in his narrative of the battle, and he would have been on one of those boats, so it’s safe to say they just went for a swim.

(And Kronos was with them, which means that a very angry titan lord was suddenly pitched into the river and had to swim with the rest of them. That’s not really relevant, I just want everyone to know that.)

Percy is then immediately told that “Another army is marching over the Williamsburg bridge.” This fourth prong of the attack, led by the Minotaur, also has no demigods in it.

An entire phalanx of dracaenae marched in the lead . . . About a hundred more monsters marched behind them. (pg 182) More monsters surged forward —snakes and giants and telkines—but the Minotaur roared at them, and they backed off. (pg 186)

But more monsters keep advancing because by the time Percy kills the minotaur and the demigods charge and rout the whole group, it had grown to 200

Finally, the monsters turned and fled—about twenty left alive out of two hundred. (pg 188)

So the grand total for the first TA attack was 500 soldiers or more, with only 40-70 of them demigods. And after the monsters on the Williamsburg bridge retreat, those demigods show back up.

Then I saw the crowd at the base of the bridge. The retreating monsters were running straight toward their reinforcements. It was a small group, maybe thirty or forty demigods in battle armor, mounted on skeletal horses. One of them held a purple banner with the black scythe design.  The lead horseman trotted forward. He took off his helm, and I recognized Kronos himself, his eyes like molten gold. (pg1 188)

This is the only time we get anywhere close to a specific number when TA demigods are concerned. It would have been the same group that was sunk in the East River, who then had to swim for Brooklynn; which is where they are now trying to take the Williamsburg bridge. This reinforces the idea that the number of demigods in the boats was only a little more than forty, since they would not have suffered more than a few injuries in the sinkings.

I’m going to come back to this moment later to demonstrate how Percy refrains from killing other demigods, even in his Achilles state, but the other important thing to note is that this is the last time Kronos organizes his demigods into a unit that he leads personally. After they fail to break through here, Kronos just has them take on a secondary role, and puts his faith in bigger and bigger monsters to lead the charge instead.

The Titan Army units on Long Island then spend the evening marching the long way around Manhattan (for some reason) because they make camp for the night in New Jersey, at Medusa’s old lair. Percy again describes demigods as the small minority.

Hundreds of tents and fires surrounded the property. Mostly I saw monsters, but there were some human mercenaries in combat fatigues and demigods in armor too. A purple-and-black banner hung outside the emporium, guarded by two huge blue Hyperboreans.

And this is only part of the Titan army, because there are more troops north of Manhattan. 

“Tell my brother Hyperion to move our main force south into Central Park. The halfbloods will be in such disarray they will not be able to defend themselves.” (pg 237)

The army that marches into central park is bigger than the one camped in New Jersey. And it is made up exclusively of monsters. 

At the north end of the reservoir, the enemy vanguard broke through the woods—a warrior in golden armor leading a battalion of Laistrygonian giants with huge bronze axes. Hundreds of other monsters poured out behind them. (pg 243)

There is not a single mention of a demigod. However they’re already joining the fight in other places. 

When it flew above the rooftops, I could see fires here and there around the city. It looked like my friends were having a rough time. Kronos was attacking on several fronts. (pg 251)  

After Percy kills the Clazmonian Sow, the momentum of the battle shifts. With his main force failing to deliver a knockout punch, Kronos has his remaining armies spread out to put equal pressure on the entire defensive line, and catch it in a massive envelopment.

Midtown was a war zone. We flew over little skirmishes everywhere. A giant was ripping up trees in Bryant Park while dryads pelted him with nuts. Outside the Waldorf Astoria, a bronze statue of Benjamin Franklin was whacking a hellhound with a rolled-up newspaper. A trio of Hephaestus campers fought a squad of dracaenae in the middle of Rockefeller Center . . . . . The hunters had set up a defensive line on 37th, just three blocks north of Olympus. To the east on Park Avenue, Jake Mason and some other Hephaestus campers were leading an army of statues against the enemy. To the west, the Demeter cabin and Grover’s nature spirits had turned Sixth Avenue into a jungle that was hampering a  squadron of Kronos’s demigods . . . . . I spotted a familiar silver owl banner in the southeast corner of the fight, 33rd at the Park Avenue tunnel. Annabeth and two of her siblings were holding back a Hyperborean giant . . . . . The next hour was a blur. I fought like I’d never fought before—wading into legions of dracaenae, taking out dozens of telkines with every strike, destroying empousai and knocking out enemy demigods . . . . . At one point Grover was next to me, bonking snake women over the head with his cudgel. Then he disappeared in the crowd, and it was Thalia at my side, driving monsters back with the power of her magic shield. Mrs. O’Leary bounded out of nowhere, picked up a Laistrygonian giant in her mouth and flung him like a Frisbee. Annabeth used her invisibility cap to sneak behind enemy lines. Whenever a monster disintegrated for no apparent reason with a surprised look on his face, I knew Annabeth had been there . . . . . Kronos was riding towards us on a golden chariot. A dozen Laistrygonian giants bore torches before him. Two Hyperboreans carried his black-and-purple banners . . .

“THEN THE WINGED HUSSAARSSS AARRRIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIVVVVVVED” SABATON BLASTS ON ELECTRIC GUITAR

 Sorry, sorry, I mean then Chiron and the 500 centaurs arrived!

Kronos’s forces looked as confused as we were. Giants lowered their clubs. Dracaenae hissed. Even Kronos’s honor guard looked uneasy. Then, to our left, a hundred monsters cried out at once. Kronos’s entire northern flank surged forward. I thought we were doomed, but they didn’t attack. They ran straight past us and crashed into their southern allies . . . a shower of arrows arced over our heads and slammed into the enemy, vaporizing hundreds of demons. (pg 258)

This is how the second phase of the battle ends. And during the entire night, out of a sea of monsters (hehe) we only see one unit of TA demigods. And it’s the last time we get any reference to them participating in the battle.

After being driven south, the TA apparently did another long march, because they make camp northeast of Manhattan.

The Titan army had set up camp all around the U.N. complex. The flagpoles were hung with horrible trophies—helmets and armor from defeated campers. All along First Avenue, giants sharpened their axes. Telkines repaired armor at makeshift forges. (pg 282)

Ethan is the only demigod mentioned this time. And he doesn’t appear to take part in the next attack, aside from releasing the drakon. We get less of a description of the enemy army this time, but it’s all monsters.

The rest of the battle wasn’t going well. The centaurs had panicked under the onslaught of giants and demons. An occasional orange camp T-shirt appeared in the sea of fighting, but quickly disappeared.  (pg 289)

Of course the Ares cabin arrives, the drakon kills Silena, and Clarisse kills it. It’s another rout for the TA.

The monsters retreated toward 35th Street. (pg 298) There was no answer from the enemy. Slowly, they began to fall back behind a dracaenae shield wall, while Clarisse drove in circles around Fifth Avenue, daring anyone to cross her path. (pg 299)

After that we have the final phase of the battle, when the Titan Army finally breaks through the Olympian lines. But once again, we have no reference to demigods other than Ethan.

The Titan Army ringed the building, standing maybe twenty feet from the doors. Kronos’s vanguard was in the lead: Ethan Nakamura, the dracaenae queen in her green armor, and two Hyperboreans. I didn’t see Prometheus. (pg 312) “ROWWF!” Mrs. O’Leary bounded toward me, ignoring the growling monsters on either side. (pg 315) There were thousands of [skeletan soldiers], and as they emerged, the titan’s monsters got jumpy and started to back up. (pg 315)     The armies of the dead clashed with the Titan’s monsters. Fifth Avenue exploded into absolute chaos. Mortals screamed and ran for cover. Demeter waved her hand and an entire column of giants turned into a wheat field. Persephone changed the dracaenae spears into sunflowers. Nico slashed and hacked his way through the enemy, trying to protect pedestrians as best as he could. My parents ran toward me , dodging monsters and zombies, but there was nothing I could do to help them. (pg 318).

The fight continues like this, until Typhon is destroyed, and the defenders are joined by the gods, and Poseidon’s army of cyclopes. It’s then that the Titan army is “massacred.” Most of the fandom thinks that the demigods were killed too, but that’s not the case.

PART 3: The TA Demigods Deserted Before The Final Battle

As Alabaster remembers it:

the war didn’t go our way. I fought on the battlefield against the enemy, but most of our allies ran. Kronos himself marched on Olympus, only to be killed by a son of Poseidon. After Kronos’s death, the Olympian gods smashed any remaining resistance. It was a massacre. “We weren’t all destroyed,” Alabaster said. “Most of the remaining half-bloods fled or were captured. They were so demoralized they joined the enemy. (pg 219)

When you look at this narrative, and compare it to The Last Olympian, it’s actually more complicated than the TA demigods simply getting massacred.

Al says that while he was fighting, most of his allies ran. That’s odd, because we don’t see the relative numbers of monsters go down at any point. What we do see, is the number of demigods go down.

As I illustrated in Part 2, the Battle of Manhattan has four distinct phases. Phase one, that ends when the Williamsburg Bridge is destroyed. The second phase, that starts when Hyperion attacks Central Park, and ends when the Party Ponies arrive. The third phase, which is all about the attack of the drakon. And the final phase, when Kronos breaks through.

We only see TA demigods in the first two phases; they attack the Williamsburg Bridge in the first phase as part of the Kronos’s main force, then in the second phase they’re relegated to a supporting role by hitting the defenders western flank. And that’s the last we see of them. After that, Etahn is the only demigod left standing in the TA. Alabaster must be somewhere in the background, as a retcon, but there’s no one beyond the two of them.

You might think that they’ve just already been killed by this point. After all, Percy blows up the Princess Andromeda, then goes into an Achilles Curse fueled berserker mode several times in the first two phases of the battle. Surely he must have killed hundreds of kids, right?

No, not even close.

Maybe not any at all.

On the Princess Andromeda Percy finds lots of monsters, but the number of demigods he finds could be counted on one hand. And the first one he meets; Percy spares him and tells him to get his friends and evacuate. We can’t prove whether or not any demigods were killed in the blast; we just know that the two we can confirm were still on board, Ethan and Alabaster, both survived. And when Alabaster recounts it, he doesn’t mention any bad losses at this point.

As for the Curse of Achilles, it doesn’t send Percy into anything like the berserker state some people think of it as. It might seem like that when Percy lets loose on the Williamsburg Bridge:

You’re going to ask how the whole “invincible” thing worked: if I magically dodged every weapon, or if the weapon hit me and just didn’t harm me. Honestly, I don’t remember. All I knew was that I wasn’t going to let these monsters invade my hometown. I sliced through armor like it was made of paper. Snake women exploded. Hellhounds melted to shadow. I slashed and stabbed and whirled, and I might have even laughed once or twice—a crazy laugh that scared me as much as it did my enemies. (pg 188)

But when push comes to shove, Percy can control the Curse, and what he does during it. That last moment was when he was fighting nothing but monsters. But when the TA demigods arrived, Percy pulled his punches like he always does.

I tried to wound his men, not kill. That slowed me down, but these weren’t monsters. They were demigods who’d fallen under Kronos’s spell. I couldn’t see faces under their helmets, but some of them had probably been my friends. I slashed the legs off their horses and made the skeletal mounts disintegrate. After the first few demigods took a spill, the rest figured out they’d better dismount and fight me on foot. (pg 189)

Percy is still in complete control of what he’s doing; even when the worst happens.

“Annabeth!” I turned in time to see her fall, clutching her arm. A demigod with a bloody knife stood over her . . . . . I locked eyes with the enemy demigod. He wore an eye patch under his helmet: Ethan Nakamura, the son of Nemesis. Somehow he’d survived the explosion on the Princess Andromeda. I slammed him in the face with my sword hilt so hard I dented his helm. (pg 190)

Percy really has all the reason to hate Ethan at this point; after Percy spared his life in Antaeus’ arena, Ethan still joined the side that had been ready to write off his death, and deliberately helped Kronos achieve his physical resurrection. Because of that Percy’s friends and even-Riordan-doesn’t-know how many mortals are going to die in the next few days; and on top of all that, Ethan just stabbed the love of his life.

And all Percy does is knock him out, maybe a little harder than necessary. He makes no effort to kill him. Those aren’t the actions of a berserker with no control.

In fact, the knife turns out to be poisonsed. And Ethan now has an idea where Percy’s Achilles Spot is, and might tell Kronos. And even after all of that, Percy doesn’t seriously think about killing him as an option.

“I’ll bonk him on the head harder next time.” (pg 241)

But more on topic, there is no reason to think the TA demigods have particularly high casualties in this phase of the battle, though they have a few:

Our archers shot a volley, bringing down several of the enemy, but they just kept riding. (pg 189)

Though it’s vague if they are hitting the riders or the horses. In fact, it might actually be Kronos who’s responsible for more of their losses.

[Kronos] struck the bridge with the butt of his scythe, and a wave of pure force blasted me backward. Cars went careening. Demigods—even Luke’s own men—were blown off the edge of the bridge. (pg 192)

I will die on the hill that between this, Ethan, and other implied moments, Kronos killed more of his own demigods than Percy did.

In the second phase of the battle, when we see the TA demigods attack again, they’re in a very different situation.

To the west, the Demeter cabin and Grover’s nature spirits had turned Sixth Avenue into a jungle that was hampering a  squadron of Kronos’s demigods. (pg 255)

This is the only thing we see the TA demigods do as a group in this phase; and they’re fighting people who are using very defensive tactics, more hampering than harmful. They’re not likely to lose many fighters. A few of them do cross Percy’s path in the chaos, but even at his most Achilles fueled chaos he never loses control.

The next hour was a blur. I fought like I’d never fought before—wading into legions of dracaenae, taking out dozens of telkines with every strike, destroying empousai and knocking out enemy demigods. (pg 257)

He talks about killing monsters, but always “knocking out” demigods. Finally, that phase of the battle ends when the centaurs show up. Did the centaurs kill any demigods? After all, Percy said they “trampled everything in their path.”

Well the only report we get on the TA demigods puts them to the west. When the centaurs attack, they come out of the north east and drive the enemy south, and start off a wave of panic that ripples down the enemy lines ahead of them. The demigods were probably running before any centaur reached them, and might have had better chances of being trampled by their own monsters.

So if the TA demigods aren’t taking many losses, where do they all go in the third and fourth phases, when we don’t see any except Ethan?

They desert. 

Alabaster: “I fought on the battlefield against the enemy, but most of our allies ran.”

I think the demigods of the TA signed up with no real idea of what would happen when they fought the Olympians. They thought they were going to have a sure victory. 

Chris Rodriguez said it in SOM:

“I hear they got two more [drakon] coming,” [Chris] said. “They keep arriving at this rate, oh, man—no contest!” (pg 122)

Alabaster C. Torrington said it in SOM:

“Kronos wasn’t supposed to lose! You said the odds of winning were in the Titan’s favor! You told me Camp Half-Blood would be destroyed!” (pg 196)

And they probably weren’t well prepared for the war either. At one point Luke says they will fight well because he has been training the army. But most of them join because they are the children of minor gods who swear for Kronos, and that doesn’t happen until the end of BOTL, after Luke has been possessed. Most of the TA demigods never got training from him; including their two highest ranking members, Ethan and Alabaster. It’s no wonder most of them weren’t prepared.

As I was running up the stairwell, a kid charged down. He looked like he had just woken up from a nap. His armor was half on. He drew his sword and yelled, “Kronos!” but he sounded more scared than angry . . . . No way was I going to hurt him. I didn’t need a weapon for this. I stepped inside his strike and grabbed his wrist, slamming it against the wall. His sword clattered out of his hand. (pg 18)

And the demigods might not hold much loyalty to Kronos, a violent and temperamental eldritch horror!

Ethan moistened his lips. “He’s still fighting you, isn’t he? Luke—” “Nonesense,” Kronos spat. “Repeat that lie, and I will cut out your tongue. The boy’s soul has been crushed.” (pg 236) “But, my lord,” Ethan said. “Your regeneration.” Kronos pointed at Ethan, and the demigod froze. “Does it seem,” Kronos hissed. “that I need to regenerate?” Ethan didn’t respond. Kind of hard to do when you’re immobilized in time. Kronos snapped his fingers and Ethan collapsed. (pg 284)

And the demigods might have witnessed a darker side to his army that we didn’t.

Back on my first visit to the Princess Andromeda, my old enemy Luke had kept dazed tourists on board for show, shrouded in Mist so they didn’t realize they were on a monster infested ship. Now i didn’t see any sign of tourists. I hated to think what had happened to them, but I kind of doubted they’d been allowed to go home with their bingo winnings. (pg 15)

So, the demigods deserted. After the second phase of the battle we don’t see any at the Titan camp at the U.N., or taking any part in the last phases of the battle. They had been fed false promises, were treated badly, and were being sent against enemies out of their league.

“Most of the remaining half-bloods fled or were captured. They were so demoralized they joined the enemy.”

All except two, Alabaster and Ethan. The son of Nemesis, who has already given so much and is so desperate to see something good and fair come out of it; and the son of Hecate, who was promised victory, and is desperate to avenge the death of his siblings. Ironically, the two demigods who stayed loyal to Kronos the longest, did so because they had faith in their godly parents.

So if there was no “massacre” of TA demigods at the end of the Battle of Manhattan, why is Alabaster so insistent that there was one? 

“Yes,” Alabaster said bitterly. “Camp Half-Blood decided that they would accept any children of the minor gods. They would build us cabins at camp and pretend that they didn’t just blindly massacre us for resisting. (pg 220) “But I’ll never bow to the Olympian gods after the atrocities they committed. Their followers are blind. I’d never set foot in their camp, and if I did, it would only be to give that son of Poseidon what he deserves.” (pg 221)

Well, it’s because the children of Hecate suffered the most in the war. She didn’t have as many children as other gods, and Alabaster was the only one to fight in it and survive. He claims he convinced “most” of his siblings to join; but if Hecate does not have many children, and he is the only survivor of the battle, how are there still enough of his siblings to decently fill a cabin, it’s likely “most” was only slightly more than half. The sad irony is that the fact that the smaller group of demigods had more casualties than the larger ones (and it sounds like not just more proportionately, but more in actual numbers), also kind of disproves that there could have been a large massacre that affected them all.

Alabaster was a scared, frustrated, exhausted kid; who convinced his siblings to fight in a destructive war, and was the only one of them to survive. To him, that is probably always going to feel like a brutal massacre.

[gaygirldoodles]

No matter what you do, don't think about Percy's trauma with Gabe.

Don't think about all the stuff that Gabe did to Percy that we know

Don't think about how much we don't know because Percy is an unreliable narrator and probably thought it was normal and not worth mentioning

Don't think about how Percy would flinch whenever an older man raised his hand to him

Or anyone really

Because it reminds him of Gabe

Don't think about how Tartarus smells like what you fear the most

And how is smealt like Gabe for him

Because even after fighting so many monsters and overcoming so many things, he was always defenseless against Gabe

But you might want to think about Paul eventually finding out about some of the stuff Gabe did to Percy whether on accident or not

And about him trying to make sure he was never like that in any way and making sure Percy felt safe

Making sure he felt loved

Because he never had a loving father figure in his life growing up

But Paul will sure as Hades do everything in his power to try and make up for that as best he can

[inkyrainstorms]

Leo Valdez wants to be loved

Jason Grace wants to find a place to belong

Piper Mclean wants to know she she is, craves an identity all her own

And they all found each other, pushed together by fate and outside strings, but they made it work and found what they needed most in each other.

A home. A family.

[anotherpjofan]

I hate the way the Greek campers were viewed in hoo like these literal kids who made up a grand total of 40 (maybe 100 max with hunters + party ponies + satyrs) defeated an army that consisted of hundreds possibly thousands of monsters on their own including a couple of rouge titans and Kronos who was their leader. And won. Don’t get me wrong the Romans destroyed the Palace and all which was probably filled with their remaining resources but there were hundreds of them including adults who had retired after a decade of experience. And the army they fought was probably smaller cause everyone was off at New York in the main fight so give the Greek campers their due respect cause not only did they win, they pulled off the impossible

[ilovewillsolace]

people who hate Octavian only for "killing" panda pillow are absolutely crazy to me. it was an object, a fucking object, Octavian refused sacrifice animals for making prophecies. he showed his empathetical, capable for compassion to living creatures side and people hate him just because it was some Percy's crap about which he forgot on the next page? it even sounds crazyly. you just want to hate him, but use the most finished up, twisted reason to do so

[twistmusings]

Character Analysis of the Twisted Wonderland Dorm Rooms - Heartslabyul

Not my usual content, exactly, but I thought this was interesting while I was researching for one of my upcoming posts!

Though the characters are in dormitories, they actually show really great characterization in the way they organize and lay out their rooms.

Long and with lots of images, so they are put under a cut.

Dorm Room Character Analysis Series

Heartslabyul | Savanaclaw | Octavinelle | Scarabia | Pomefiore | Ignihyde | Diasomnia

Riddle Rosehearts

Riddle has a lot of books. As in, so many that they aren't able to be contained to the larger bookshelf provided to the Dorm Leader. They have been stacked on top, as well as used to fill the smaller bookshelf to the left and stacked on top of that as well, and then also throughout the rest of the room. Little man is the highest ranking member of the library's readers club.

It is of note that Riddle's dorm is not as organized as you might think at first glance. I know a lot of people look at Riddle and oftentimes peg him as being the hyper-organized person with seems to be impossibly able to maintain how many tasks he has to balance. While that's not entirely untrue, and his room is far from messy, he does have books left open on his ottoman and stacked up on his nightstand that he was, most likely, reading in bed. His single framed art in his room is hung crookedly - and this is not a stylistic choice for the Heartslabyul dorm as some of the strange furniture. Both Deuce and Cater have similar wall decorations, but they are not hung crookedly.

Riddle is the only character to have a repeated motif of a broken heart in his decorations in Heartslabyul. Given what all we know about him and his history with his mother, this is fitting, if a little sad. Little details like this make me love to look at these rooms because you can see so much of how the designers considered the characters and their stories when designing their rooms.

Riddle also has a bouquet in a vase of Roses and White Lillies. While Red roses are a rather obvious motif throughout Heartslabyul, White Lillies are thought to symbolize purity, commitment, and rebirth. These are all strong character themes in Riddle's story.

Ace Trappola

We know that Ace likes card trick, as he learned them from his older brother, but I feel like it gets a little lost on a lot of the fandom that he likes magic tricks in general unless you pay close attention to his room card. He's got a magic wand, magic cups, and magic balls.

He likes basketball enough that he has an entire book dedicated to basketball and a hoop installed in his room.

He either has a spare dorm uniform jacket, or when he's in his room he takes off his uniform jacket and just walks around in the patterned vest and t-shirt. It's also possible, given that his brother was also assigned to Heartslabyul, that it's a hand-me-down jacket from his elder brother.

Ace has a card motif throughout his room, which is a cute touch considering he's based on one of the card soldiers. More than likely, it's because he does like card tricks and games. Of note, he also has a little callback to Deuce being his friend in his spade side table and the rest of his dorm as his rug features the Ace of Hearts, Spades, Diamonds, and Clubs.

Ace's desk doesn't seem to see a lot of use, considering that he has a tower of cards on it, which are notorious for being fragile and falling apart with too much movement. Given that we know in canon he doesn't like to study all that much, it makes sense - more than likely he built it while avoiding studying and then it hasn't been jostled because he hasn't really used his desk since.

Both Ace and Deuce (coming up) have not added personalized bedsheets to their bed as opposed to the rest of their dorm, and they're both freshmen,

As has been pointed out before, Deuce shares a room with Ace.

Deuce, of course, has magic wheel posters on his wall.

Deuce's desk is well used, and he has additional bookshelves hung on his wall. Deuce has notes sticking out of some of his books. He also seems to have a book on ducks and either cats/grim (it could be a book on magical beasts, but it's an interesting detail to add). - see addendum!

Deuce has a framed photo on his desk. I would guess this is probably a family photo of him and his mom, though I cannot confirm this.

Deuce has a jacket hanging on his wall, and while at first glance it might be easy to assume it's a PE Jacket or a Track Jacket, it doesn't match the NRC track uniform or PE uniform. This, actually, based on the cut, seems to be a motorcycle jacket, likely for riding magic wheels. It could also be something leftover from his delinquent days.

Cater's room is actually full of characterization, there are so many little details in his room it isn't funny.

To begin with, it seems like Cater's favorite color might be Orange, given that he's the only one in his dorm so far who has a noticable amount of it that breaks away from the normal Heartslabyul colors. This, of course, could be a design choice because Cater's hair is ginger, but consider that across the board it seems like quite a bit of thought was put into what goes into a character's room. Ace, for example, doesn't feature orange in the same way, and Deuce only features a small bit of blue in his rug. If someone was decorating a room, the likely reason to have so much of one color is because you really like that color, or because it matches the theme of a room. Since we know the latter isn't true, it's likely the former. Orange, symbolically, is often used to portray enthusiasm, agreeableness, and excitement when talking about color symbolism, and that tracks as that's the sort of image that Cater tends to display toward other people even if his own emotions are complex in canon.

Cater has a lot of hobbies in his room - which makes sense because canonically he does a lot of various hobbies. Cater is the sort of person who seems to be deeply into experimenting with who he is and who he wants to be.

Though Cater takes a lot of photos with his phone camera in the story, he also has what appears to be a DSLR camera.

He, of course, shows his love of music by having a small stereo, his guitar, and a pair of headphones next to his computer.

Speaking of Cater's computer, it takes up the majority of his desk, which is fitting for someone who wants to be an influencer.

Cater has a sweater at the ready on the back of his chair, leading me to believe he probably gets cold easily.

Cater also has a skateboard. I don't recall Cater ever talking about skateboarding in canon, but it's possible I missed it. Regardless, he has one - whether or not he can use it is a different story entirely.

Faces on everything. Similar to Ace, Cater's rug is a callback to all of his dormmates, though he also has a couple of emoji-like pillows/plushies. Emojis, of course, are a hallmark of digital communications so it fits with his character, though they are notably cheery and cute. I have to wonder how Cater's decor might be different if he was more honest about how he feels as opposed to playing a character most of the time.

Trey's room, similar to Cater, keeps in with having a notable color scheme with the color green. Again, this is the same color as his hair, however as was the reasoning was explained with Cater, this likely means that Green is Trey's favorite color. Green is a color associated with harmony, focus, efficiency and security.

Trey's room is notably more sparsely decorated than the other students. Most of the Heartslabyul cast have something - a photo hanging up, a unique piece of furniture, etc, however Trey really only has his hat stand. If you were to consider Cater one end of a spectrum that leans maximalist, Trey is the opposite, leaning much more minimalist.

It's also of note that Trey is probably the most organized person we've seen so far, even surpassing Riddle. His books are all kept in vertical rows, he has a pen holder on his desk, and he has a hat-stand to keep his hats. Everything in his room has a place, and there is no notable clutter.

Given that we know that Trey likes to bake, he probably doesn't spend much of his free time in his room, which is likely part of why it's so sparsely decorated outside the bed.

Similar to how Ace has a callback to Deuce, and how Deuce has a callback to Grim, Trey's rug is a clover that is divided into the shape of hearts, which is Riddle's motif, and a cute callback to them being childhood friends.

Addendums:

Several people have pointed things out in the comments, so I figured that I would go ahead and add them to this main post as well as they come in.

@margorako has pointed out that the jacket in Decue's room is indeed his jacket he wore during his delinquent days. As was featured in the Twisted Wonderland Manga. I thought it looked familiar, but this confirms that a) it's a magic wheel jacket, and b) that it is embroidered on the back. Great eye!

@eternalsnowfan02 mentioned that Cater does indeed skateboard, as is confirmed in his Union Jacket Birthday card when Jamil purchases him stickers for his skateboard. This means he is, in fact, a Skater Boy.

@xhazmia Pointed out that the book that features a head that appears to be Grim's Head is actually likely the hidden mickey for Deuce's room. Good eye! My vision is bad™ so I'm not usually the best for picking these out in the bedrooms in TWST. I managed to spot a few in the other rooms where they were pretty obvious though:

I have not managed to spot the one for Trey's room, but in looking closer I did notice something else.

This object on Trey's bookshelf is a glasses container, lending further to the notion that he's the most organized of the characters in Heartslabyul.

[sugar-r-rush]

I'm going insane I cannot express how well you write, like I get so intrigued It's crazy

Who supported Octavian?

Looking for more? Here's my master list of Octavian analysis.

We know that Octavian had enough support in the legion concievably get elected praetor. Then, enough support to force Reyna's hand and pursue the Seven.

But it's never state who those people are (except Michael). So I've decided to go through and see if I can work out some possible supporters.

Let's start with minor characters:

Likely Supporters

Lynda, legionary, Second Cohort; chatterbox

Carl, legionary, 2nd or 3rd

Reza, legionary, 2nd or 3rd

Marcus, legionary, unknown; possibly a spy for Nero, old friend of Jason

Ida, senator & centurion, Second Cohort; kinda haughty, isn't impressed by Apollo showing up in Camp Jupiter

Likely Against Octavian

Bobby, legionary, likely Fifth Cohort

Thomas, legionary, Fifth Cohort

Gwen, centurion, Fifth Cohort; can be assumed to not support Octavian

Colum, legionary, unknown, seems to be loyal to Frank

Jacob, standard bearer, Fifth Cohort; may or may not support Octavian, since he's a member of the Fifth, I say "not"

Leila, centurion, Fourth Cohort; very anti-Octavian

Michael Kahale - Supporter

Duh.

Michael is an easy one. He's introduced in Blood of Olympus but he's probably one of Octavian's "bodyguards" prior to that. He's centurion of the First and Reyna describes him as "very loyal". Octavian is also his sponsor (a translation of "patron" I'm assuming).

Larry & Hank - Supporters

Larry: Second Cohort, Senator & Centurion | Later: Third Cohort, Senator

Hank: Third Cohort, Senator & Centurion

I'll mention these two together. In Son of Neptune, they are seated next each other at the Senate meeting. Hank raises an objection about the Fifth Cohort taking on the quest.

Larry then seconds the comment. It's possible, even likely, that Octavian prepped them both beforehand. They are acting in accordance to Octavian's agenda. See my theory regarding that.

We see nothing of Hank post this point, and it's possible he died at Camp Half Blood. Or against the zombie army.

As for Larry, his position is interesting. When we see him again in Tyrant's Tomb, he's still a Senator, but he's now a member of the Third Cohort.

A different senator raised his hand. 'Uh, Senator Larry here, Third Cohort, son of Mercury. [...]"

It’s possible Reyna redistributed Octavian’s supporters into the various Cohorts to reduce their strength and allegiance. Legionaries still listen to his commands. This either means that he's now centurion of the Third Cohort or, possibly, he simply still has their loyalty.

Meg stumbled to my side, breathing hard, her swords glistening with monster goo. “Hey, Larry. How’s it going?”

“Terrible!” Larry sounded delighted. “Carl, Reza—escort these two to Praetor Zhang immediately.”

“YESSIR!” Our escorts hustled us off toward the Caldecott Tunnel, while behind us, Larry called his troops back to action: “Come on, legionnaires! We’ve drilled for this. We’ve got this!” [The Tyrant’s Tomb]

He calls himself "Senator Larry", not "centurion". And while he can be striped of his centurion position during the transfer. He can't be stripe of his position of Senator, since it's an elected post. And senators hold the role for a year.

[side note: he seems to be pretty gleeful when it comes to battle - so he wouldn't be against the war]

There's another point:

[Larry speaking] "So, when you say help, do you mean like ... battalions of gods charging down here in their chariots, or more like the gods just giving us their blessing, like, Hey, good luck with that, legion!?' [The Tyrant’s Tomb]

I’m going to take the word ‘blessing’ and run with it. Octavian was given Apollo’s ‘blessing’ and ended up dying. So Larry is very hesitant to support Apollo here. He's been there, done that.

[Remember Frank also got a blessing, from Mars, but Larry's doubt aligns more with Octavian's failure]

Dakota - Neutral

Dakota is an interesting one. I think he's ultimately neutral and has loyal to both Octavian and Reyna. Note, just because he might support Octavian doesn't mean they necessarily he didn't support Reyna. The two of them are ostensibly working together, and its only right at the end of Blood of Olympus when the legionaries have to choose one or the other. (Obviously Dakota chooses Reyna)

“I was just lucky to find Hazel… in New Orleans, I mean.”

Dakota grunted. “Unless you believe the rumours. Not saying that I do.”

“Rumours?” Percy asked. [Son of Neptune]

Here: Dakota has heard the rumours, the same ones related to Octavian’s blackmail. He even brings them up.

Dakota is then seen fighting against the Seven in Mark of Athena. He is mentioned by name - which is important. It means he's an active participant in this scenario, rather than a by-stander. He's dispatched rather easily.

Jason stood about fifty yards away, sword-fighting with a stocky centurion whoe lips were stained cherry red, like blood. A wannabe vampire, or maybe a KoolAid freak?

As Annabeth watched, Jason yelled, "Sorry about this, Dakota!"

Onto Blood of Olympus,

“We are at war,” Michael said. “We have to pull together. Dakota and Leila have not been the most enthusiastic supporters. Octavian have them this one last chance to prove themselves. If they help me bring you in – preferably alive, but dead if necessary – then they keep their rank and prove their loyalty.” [BOO]

This reasoning seems odd to me. Octavian might have sent them because he believed Reyna would respond to them to best. Reyna seems to have a good opinion of all three emissaries. But he also had to be under the belief that at least 2 out of 3 of them would be loyal enough to bring Reyna back to the legion. To actually try and sway her. Octavian knows Reyna's influence.

And while Leila is firmly in the anti-Octavian camp. I don't think Dakota necessarily was.

“Yeah.” Dakota nodded vigorously. “The legion’s not nearly as united as Michael claimed. We don’t trust all the auxilia forces Octavian has gathered.” [Blood of Olympus]

From the perspective of Dakota, he needs to show his loyalty to Reyna. He has just betrayed Octavian, who he has been supporting on the front lines previously (Mark of Athena). He must convince Reyna that he has been "on her side" since the beginning.

But, we can see that Dakota isn’t actually fully onboard a little later...

“We’ll need a distraction,” Reyna said. “Something to delay the attack on Camp Half-Blood and preferably put those weapons out of commission. Dakota, Leila, will your cohorts follow you?”

“I – I think so, yes,” Dakota said. “But if we ask them to commit treason–”

“It isn’t treason,” Leila said. “Not if we’re acting on direct orders from our praetor. And Reyna is still praetor.” [Blood of Olympus]

Dakota is still thinking in a way that shows he’s loyal to both sides. He’s chosen to follow Reyna, but unlike Leila, he’s not all in.

“Alright, but I’m not hurting any of my fellow legionnaires.”

“No one’s asking you to,” Nico growled. “But if we don’t stop this war the entire legion will be wiped out. You said the monster tribes take insult easily?” [Blood of Olympus]

Dakota and Nico are actually arguing over this. I believe Dakota includes Octavian in this ‘fellow legionnaires’.

But also, Dakota and Leila’s actions directly result in the deaths of several members of their cohorts. Recall, Octavian’s plans involved no Roman deaths. And we know that the monsters aren’t actually that bad.

So I can’t help but think, post the battle, Dakota felt guilty about his actions yet couldn’t air that. Not that he wanted the Greeks to die, but did he do the right thing? Could he have avoided those deaths somehow?

I believe Dakota didn’t intend for Octavian to die in the battle. He included Octavian in his "my fellow legionnaires". But Octavian ended up dying. And Nico was there. The person Dakota trusted with the other side of the plan.

Finally, Dakota, long-time centurion of the Fifth Legion, had died overnight from wounds he received fighting in the city.

Dakota served a long time as centurion. He likely remembered a time when Jason, Reyna and Octavian worked together as allies and friends.

So, for me, Dakota is a character who was suddenly thrust into a messy divorce between Reyna and Octavian, not knowing which side to take. Feeling guilty regardless. And later succumbing to an addiction as a coping mechanism.

Summary

Anyway, outside of the "neutral" Dakota. Octavian seems to have had the First, Second, and Third Cohorts in his pocket. Our main characters hail from the Fifth, so we get their perspective, which is one of hatred and distrust. But for at least half the legion, Octavian is someone they are willing to back.

[We obviously don't know their motivations for doing this]

[Editted: Turns out in the UK it's "fruit punch" and the US it's "Kool-Aid". Apparently the Son of Neptune version I have uses the American version, while my library's copy of Tyrant's Tomb is for the UK. The curse of being Australian lol]

[decaffeinatedpartymuggoop]

People love talking about Annabeth and her being blonde and how it’s representation and important when it literally doesn’t matter.

Her being blonde is NOT as big as the fandom claims it is. ESPECIALLY in the first series!! She mentions it’s ONCE in HEROES OF OLYMPUS and NEVER brings its up again! And it’s all within the same book!!

She has many other character attributes and flaws and plot points that are ACTUALLY important!! Feeling abandoned, growing up neglected, having her family broken TWICE. Going to war, being a run away, having to fight monsters for as long as she can remember. Her complications with family and how that’s shaped her to who she is. ALL things that can be touched upon and expanded on in the show with Leah.

But you all want to focus on an arguably minuscule detail that’s mentioned in one page. Alright. Okay.

[aroaceleovaldez]

i know a lot of people talk about the Cupid Scene as not being great as Nico's coming out story (which i think is a complex matter but that's a rant for another day), but I personally find it way more compelling if it's just not Nico's coming out story at all - it's the beginning of Jason's.

Because it doesn't really work or make sense to be Nico's, right? It's not Nico's pov. Nico doesn't have a POV at all in this book. And in House of Hades, the Cupid Scene is one of the first major things Nico gets to do right out of the box jar. Why introduce a character, have him be outed as gay, lead the crew around, and then leave to go travel with someone else all in one book where he's not even a POV? It's also contrary to the way Nico generally functions as a character - he's either exposition, dues ex machina, or damsel in distress. He's kind of a damsel here, but ultimately he doesn't need anyone else to save him - or even be there. He handles it on his own. Jason is mostly just a witness.

But, if you view the Cupid Scene as being about Jason, it narratively fits a lot more; Jason at this point is dating Piper, and they're three books deep into their relationship. TLH they start dating and are relatively happy with it and where they are. SoN is a skip but we know they're happily dating during that time, and then Mark of Athena we get a slight shift. Jason and Piper see Percy and Annabeth and go "Oh! They're perfect. Their relationship is perfect. We could be happier if we were more like them." Piper and Jason are also both characters who go through an identity turmoil in general - particularly about how both of them want to be perceived by others and who they are as people. The things they identify with - their parents, their heritages, etc etc. Their orientations. Piper's get more focus earlier in HoO, and Jason gets more later.

The Cupid Scene is from Jason's POV, in a book where he is beginning to struggle with his identity and what people expect from him - particularly him not feeling like he perfectly fits with "either camp." He's too "Greek" to be "Roman" but too "Roman" to be "Greek." He's not quite one or the other. He doesn't meet the expectations either has for him. (This is bi-coding, if you couldn't tell. Just replace "Greek" and "Roman" with "Straight" and "Gay.") It starts with Cupid addressing Jason first, before Nico, very directly - asking him if he's so sure he's happy in his relationship? Does he really think it's perfect? Even Favonius very pointedly asks him if he really forget that guys can date guys? Do you have some internalized bias around that, Jason? Hm? Heck, they're both specifically in their Roman forms, not Greek. Why would they appear in their Roman forms if they're there for a Greek demigod? And very notably, they have this exchange:

(remember what I said about the bi-coding with Jason's Greek/Roman identity crisis? I don't think it's coincidence that this so pointedly comes up during the Cupid scene.)

Favonius' introduction to the Cupid scene sets up Nico's portion of it, but Cupid almost exclusively speaks to Jason for the first half of it. Then Nico steps in. He diverts the conversation away from Jason and focuses the attention onto him. Nico's the one Cupid wants, he insists, not Jason. He's the target, not Jason. This is very in line with Nico's character - practically one of his core character traits is he trusts and starts caring about people very quickly, probably quicker than he should or even wants to, and will put himself in harm's way to prevent others from being hurt. The Cupid Scene isn't the start of Nico's coming out story - Nico already knows he's gay. He has no internal doubts about that. He's known it for awhile. He's just in the closet. And he starts coming out of his own free will in the next book, first to Reyna and Coach. The Cupid Scene is Nico recognizing that Favonius and Cupid are pushing Jason for something he's not ready for and hasn't figured out yet, but something Nico has and just hasn't said out loud yet. The Cupid Scene is Nico taking the proverbial bullet/literal arrow for Jason (Jason consistently describes the arrows as whizzing by him before striking near Nico, interestingly) and being outed so Jason isn't. And that presents Jason with the path to begin questioning his identity further. (Jason also then directly compares Cupid to Aphrodite, specifically her Greek form, which also ties into Jason's greek/roman stuff.)

And I don't think it's coincidence that Jason and Nico mirror each other so much, and that their arcs in HoH are so intertwined. The Cupid Scene functionally, on a meta level, establishes an explicitly queer character to parallel Jason and for him to bounce off of during his own arc. (And, also on a meta level, establishes to the audience to be sympathetic to queer struggles, with Jason's arc then proceeding to be a queer-coded struggle.) Jason is presented as having this strange level of isolation from how others perceive him in a positive way/the expectations people have of him that wraps around to something akin to Nico's ostracization as being an outsider and atypical demigod in general. Nico is a rouge - he explicitly expresses how he feels like he doesn't fit in at either camp (something he expresses explicitly during the Cupid Scene, mirroring Jason's simultaneous questioning his own place at Camp Jupiter) and a core part of his character is that he does function outside the rules and expectations of both camps. He operates on an entirely different realm to them. If the camps are an expectation of normative concepts of acceptable relationships, Nico is outside of that. And he recognizes that he operates outside of that and will never fully fit into the mold either expect of him, and he recognizes he doesn't need to fit in, even if he theoretically could force himself to fit that mold. Jason, meanwhile, is still locked within those boundaries, and grappling with this idea of how he can exist between them.

Nico hands Jason a goblet of poison and says "how much do you trust me?" and it's Nico challenging Jason to take his own advice about trusting others about their identities, and almost immediately after that Jason gives up his praetor title to Frank. Jason's Greek/Roman arc is directly tied to Nico and the Cupid scene. BoO ends with Jason asking Nico to stay at CHB so they can hang out that summer. By TOA, we learn that Nico has started dating and is staying at CHB (is exploring the niche of expected and socially accepted relationships) while Jason has broken up with Piper and is living away from both camps (rejecting hetero/allonormative expectations), still struggling with his own identity. They functionally swap places. And that's fascinating.

Anyways i think about Jason's bi-coding a lot.