Yes, I am a lying liar McLie pants, I'm so sure you're all so disappointed in me for breaking my promise and posting early because I can't stop working on this in excitement!

HOOPJOHOOPJOHOOPJO

"I know what this chapter should be called," Jason said snidely before Thalia could get started. "This won't change anything because apparently Jason's pissed off every god better than Percy ever did and he'll never get his own mind back!"

There was awkward silence for a moment, his frustration at the situation completely understandable, but none of them quite sure of what to do to help him through it.

Alex offered, "well, that's kind of wordy, maybe tighten it up a bit. This Change's Nothing!" He put all the pizzazz and emphasis into that last word he could, with jazz hands, to indicate just how much 'nothing' should encompass.

"Fair enough," Jason couldn't help a little smile just for Alex's antics, even if the frustration hadn't gone anywhere.

... Funnel clouds like the tendrils of a monster jellyfish.

"Darn it Percy," Thalia would have elbowed him if Annabeth wasn't in the way. Alas, she had to emphasize sarcastic disdain through tone alone. "Can't you stop dragging your problems into other people's messes for five minutes!"

"Flying jellyfish would be terrifying though, I'm glad my dad didn't think up that." Percy didn't seem to be listening, his eyes glazed over. "Awesome horror movie idea, but like, can you imagine seeing a cloud coming towards you and then realizing it's alive!"

"A movie that might actually give us chills," Annabeth chuckled. She and Percy loved to get their hands on whatever scary movies they could and laugh at how fake it all was.

... wind snatched up notebooks, jackets, hats, and backpacks.

"Well at least if it snatches up you, you'll have plenty of material to take notes with and plenty of accessory options," Alex said as if this were a matter of grave importance.

"I don't think the best hat and backpack combo is going to help me in this situation," Jason said deadpan.

"Hasn't done me wrong yet," Alex insisted.

Thalia decided to keep going before the two actually started debating the merits of the right outfight being of use, she had a feeling Alex would win.

...Leo almost toppled off, but Jason grabbed his jacket.

Alex did in fact seem to consider this a winning point and smirked clear enough for half the ocean to feel his smugness. Jason still wasn't letting this guy pick out his accessories.

...Piper and Dylan were herding the other kids inside.

"Well, that's far better than wetting himself and shoving kids aside to flee first," Nico said, which had been his presumption of this jerk.

...she looked calm encouraging them to keep moving.

"Not the first crazy situation she's been in I take it," Will nodded without surprise. He'd been seven and the corner of a bar his mom had been singing in caught fire. Faulty wiring, people insisted later, but looking back now he couldn't help but wonder if it wasn't partially his fault as someone had jostled his table with half their beer, ruining his picture. He'd sat at his usual table alone with his coloring book watching people flee and scream advice at each other through the fizz of the lightbulb bursting with a detached sense of calm until his mom hugged him in relief after it was all done as he patted her back and wondered why. The heat of the flames hadn't scared him.

...The wind seemed to fight them, pushing them back.

Magnus shivered, knowing that feeling all too well. Running through snow was just like that, impossible, and usually only done when you needed to escape asap.

..."Sorry, Piper," he said. "I'm done helping."

"I really wish he meant he was going to call 911 and let the professionals handle this now," Magnus groaned.

"Pretty sure Hedge is the closest thing they have to a professional there," Percy sighed.

"That wasn't comforting in the slightest," Thalia huffed.

...Piper flew back, slamming into the doors and sliding to the skywalk deck.

"I bet Piper's not enjoying the treatment any better than I ever did," Percy winced in sympathy. He still really hated it when these guys did that!

... stay back," coach ordered. "I should've known that was our monster."

"Aww," Annabeth couldn't help but smile at this brave satyr, her mind flashing to Grover and Thalia and Luke doing the same for her, then wincing at how this could turn out. Percy was the exception to the rule to her that heroics just got people killed, but she wasn't there, so perhaps Jason's luck would go better.

... A rogue worksheet slapped Leo in the face, but he swatted it away.

"Well now we know this situation is desperate," Nico chuckled, "he didn't even check to see if that had the correct answers on it."

"He would have copied them down wrong," Percy said a little too knowledgeably.

... like knots cartoon characters get when they're bonked on the head.

At least everybody got a laugh out of Jason's poor description of horns. It was a nice moment in the sea of frustration still boiling around him, then and now.

... You're losing your nose, grandpa."

Thalia grimaced in disgust. "We now have some mild confirmation that monsters must smell at least partially close to 'football team's worth of sweat.'"

"A body spray I hope never catches on," Annabeth said, waving her hand under her nose at just the idea of how much that must reek to the poor satyr to cover up a monster so long.

..."That's it, cupcake. You're going down."

"There you go Percy, his cupcakes are storm flavored," Thalia told him.

"I can't wait to try one," Percy chuckled.

... a funnel cloud materialized around Leo... flew off like he'd been tossed.

The tension in the room was starting to ratchet up a little more with every word Thalia said. The not knowing of all this really getting to them, after Percy's life had been a series of dark tunnels with vague torches to their own understanding.

Who was this attacking? Was Leo the target and Jason just stumbled across this? They didn't even have the slimmest bit of comfort that anyone was going to make it out of this alive! For all they knew, this was just a cruel joke by the gods to deliver them a book where every few chapters demigods died on repeat to humble them after Percy's retinue of wins.

...grabbed a thin ledge and hung there by his fingertips.

Jason's hand snatched out on instinct again, wanting to grab his jacket rather than just swishing through sea water. He wasn't afraid of falling. He could reach as far over as he needed to, or even jump down after Leo and still grab him, he knew he could...

... "Fauns are Roman. But we'll talk about that later."

"Yes please," Jason sighed, rubbing his temple, but only wishing he had a headache. Nothing of this was still giving him a single moment of experience, understanding, not a glimpse into this situation attaching itself to his memory rather than the other way around of somehow himself being attached to this madness outside of his control. He wanted to just sit around a warm fire and talk about the insane differences with an expert between fauns and satyrs.

But right now Leo was in trouble. The guy seemed like a good friend to the amnesiac plus one, he didn't deserve to die because some monster was messing with them, so that would all have to wait.

... Dylan turned toward Jason. "Now it's your turn, boy."

Thalia was extremely glad she was the one reading about her little brother about to be tossed into the grand canyon head first. It gave her a grounded sense to read the words herself, help her mind focus on the letters rather than the sickening vision of all that empty space under his feet.

If she was a little green around the edges and taking deep breaths every few sentences, nobody was going to say otherwise.

Jason threw the club. With the winds so strong, it seemed pointless, but the club flew right to Dylan and even followed as he dodged, smacking him in the center of his head and bringing him to his knees.

Jason's righteous laughter was loudest of all. He was lost and alone and miserable and probably about to get a bunch of random people killed and be on the run for his life, but at least he could manipulate the wind into him having perfect aim!

...Dylan rose. Blood—golden blood—trickled from his forehead.*

Well this somehow got worse by the moment. He wasn't even fighting a monster, but a god! Minor or otherwise, it seemed pretty obvious his domain was even going to overlap with Zeus's! Jupiter's?! Whatever!

Thalia tried to take a few reassuring breaths that were being less helpful every time. She couldn't even convince herself this was one of the Anemoi who might have beef with their father and was taking it out on Jason because that really would only go mildly better than if Zeus had sent them himself.

"Nice try, boy." He glared at Jason. "But you'll have to do better."

"I would if I could," Jason snapped at no one.

Annabeth found it interesting enough to offer, "he's only calling you boy though. Not your name, let alone your full name like monsters love to do to us, to taunt us."

"Okay, but if he is there for Leo or Piper then, that doesn't make any of this less weird," Thalia sighed.

... fractures appeared. Inside, the kids stopped banging on the doors.

"Smart kids," Magnus nodded, hoping somebody from that Wilderness school gave them extra credit for this assignment at the very least when all this was done.

..."You're a ventus," Jason said, no idea how he knew that. "A storm spirit."

"That's a thing?" Percy asked blankly.

"We call them anemoi thuellai," Annabeth offered.

"That's a thing?" Percy asked again in the exact same tone.

Annabeth rolled her eyes in a 'he's hopeless' gesture, but patiently reminded, "Hermes mentioned them, remember."

"Oh yeah," he finally nodded, "they helped keep Kronos from invading by air with their cool laser tricks." Then his face clouded with disappointment why they'd turned evil now, finally on the same track as the others, though Magnus at least gave him a sympathetic nod he was flailing just as much to keep up.

...She'll reward me greatly for your death!"

"None of the wind spirits are usually depicted as female though," Will said with interest. "Hopefully this is just a rogue spirit, doing some favor for Hera in revenge against Jason now that he's surfaced?"

It was far better than the previous scenario, though not by much.

...ghostly dudes with smoky wings and eyes that flickered with lightning.

There went that hope it was just the one, but Thalia tried to keep some resilience in her voice that everything would turn out fine. These wind pests were fighting a child of the god of storms, Jason would get out of this on instinct alone and then travel to find his home. She believed it so fervently Jason was smiling at the peril to his life growing by the word.

... Keep their attention. She'll brain them from behind.

"I hope she's a daughter of Ares," Alex said with a fond laugh. "Clarisse is going to get along with this girl great!"

"Whoever her godly parent is, I'm sure they'd be proud," Annabeth agreed, knowing Piper probably wasn't one of her half-sisters, but approving of this plan all the same.

Cute, smart, violent. Jason wished he remembered her as a girlfriend.

"That just means you might actually act on it faster than I ever bothered," Percy told him bracingly.

Jason gave a noncommittal shrug. He really didn't have much interest in dating as of right now. Getting to know someone else's life had only been a side amusement down Percy's path while his own remained shrouded in mist. Kissing someone on top of that had no appeal to him as of right now, no matter how pretty the potential girl who might be willing.

... electricity ran between Dylan's fingers...blasted Jason in the chest.

All eight of them winced. In their heads, they knew Jason should be fine. Thalia tossed that around with ease, she'd once struck Percy and he'd shrugged it off. Jason was obviously on their same level.

...but that didn't stop them wincing in fear all the same. Just because he'd survive the blast didn't mean it was going to feel great.

... His toes were black with soot.

"Hey Thalia-"

"No Percy!" She groaned. She would not be telling him which or even if parts of her body were coated with soot just to soothe his curiosity.

...Coach was still climbing up with Leo, Piper was swinging her club that was going right through the others and Dylan was advancing on Jason.

This was not going well! The obvious statement was on the tip of all their tongues, felt in the growing tension of Thalia's voice. Jason was basically fighting three against one right now with no clue what he was doing, and Hedge probably wasn't going to throw him a magical sword to fix all this any time soon!

Jason started rubbing his tattoo in growing frustration. He just knew if he knew what he was doing he could probably snap his fingers and fix this problem with ease. Yet he'd been caught unaware, helpless as a babe, and somebody might die because of it. It would be his fault.

The weight of it didn't feel new, more like a jacket he'd shrugged on and felt the familiar warmth of its presence, but he exchanged a look with Percy all the same. The kind of responsibility even your average demi-god never really had to stress about.

..."That was enough lightning to kill twenty men!"

"So if he'd thrown enough to kill fifty men, would you have lost both shoes?" Alex asked shrewdly.

"A hundred men, and the poor guy probably would have lost his pants next," Nico agreed.

"I save the world without pants, that's a banger of a chapter title," Magnus laughed.

"You're lucky you guys don't have the pleasure to know what it would feel like," Jason smiled along. It would hurt like a cramp at worst, he knew somehow, but it wasn't something he'd want done to himself regularly.

... he was holding a gold sword...hilt, handle, and blade.

"Oh!" Jason blurted like someone had changed their mind and actually had thrown that hundred volts of electricity. He jumped to his feet without further ado and took his coin out of his pocket. He gave it a flip.

Instead, he found himself holding a rod of gold seven feet long, with a spear tip at one end crackling with energy at the ready.

"How many weapons can that thing turn into?" Percy sounded as impressed as he was vaguely offended at this range of attacks being presented.

"I, have no idea," Jason was twirling the spear in his hand with ease, a long arc with the end trailing sparks like a fairy wand, the widest smile on his face any of them had ever seen. He finally felt like something was going right! He gave a few more practice spins, switching it between hands and then thrusting it about with ease, before he gave it a more purposeful flip. It landed back in his palm as a coin.

Then he did it again, and it came out the exact same spear. His smile was still there, but a tad confused as he only shifted its weight around for a moment before repeating the motion. On the third try he did get the mentioned sword and his delighted smile was shared by all.

Yet no matter how many times he flipped it, he either got one or the other.

The motion to flick it about was a natural ease. Somehow, he knew that if he'd ever had need of it in here, if he ever had found himself in danger, he could have done this all along like he was in that stupid useless book. It was just a nice feeling uninterrupted with thousands of questions for a moment to live in that he did have the same skill with this as Percy had shown from the start. Maybe there was hope for him after all.

"Can I see?" Annabeth asked politely.

He only hesitated a moment before handing it over, but there was a hunger for knowledge in those eyes she knew well as she took it and examined it. She wished she had a better answer for him as she weighed it curiously. She gave it a flip.

It came up sword and she held it with ease, though the balance wasn't right for her, the length longer than she'd casually seen about, it was much heavier than Jason had made it seem, but she examined it all the same. She twisted it this way and that in the faint light. The solid gold was, something else. A sheen of iridescence she swore she'd seen in the attic, once, but when she'd brought the helmet to Chiron he told her that belonged somewhere else and gently taken it away.

A tingling sensation began traveling up her arm from where her fingers were grasping the hilt. It felt insane, but a part of her mind wanted to drop this, fling it away, it didn't belong to her. She gave it a flip and felt the weight of the coin landing back in her hand, but the sensation didn't fade until she put it back in Jason's hand. "It's not Celestial bronze," she announced with all the confidence she had. Which was a lot.

"What else is there?" Thalia asked, the same hunger in her brother's eyes, for a new way to kill monsters if anything.

Annabeth shrugged. She really hated not knowing the answer to that.

"That's pretty cool," Percy agreed, eyes shifting between Nico and Jason. "Maybe you found a way to forge your own blade somewhere like Nico."

Jason was studying the coin, wishing he'd carved all the secrets of his life into the rough edges. Percy's suggestion didn't feel like the right answer at any rate.

Thalia finally kept reading and he forced himself to pocket it and retake his seat beside her, but he was on the edge now, practically leaning over her shoulder with excitement. It was finally just a piece of himself that he'd gotten back, that nobody had to hold his hand and explain to him.

...He looked at his two comrades and yelled, "Well? Kill him!"

There was a cruel, mocking laugh shared by them all next for Dylan probaby wetting himself as he might realize who he was messing with. Of course he'd send his stupid minions to fumble through it and test Jason, wear him out before trying him like a coward.

... Jason stepped in. One quick thrust, and the second storm spirit dissolved into gold powder.*

Jason didn't preen, as Percy had done a few times when he showed off his battle prowess. Instead his face grew more focused, the child like delight slipping off to a stern smile, a warning that someone should try that again at their own peril. Thalia was smiling with pride for her brother more every word. Her fears weren't gone, but it was a good feeling to be carried away by the wind that this Roman camp he should have been at hadn't been slacking on their training him at minimum.

..."Impossible! Who are you, half-blood?"

"His mistress didn't even warn him who he'd be fighting?" Annabeth scoffed without surprise at this lapse.

"All the better for Jason," Will reminded sadly, considering anything that was told to Dylan would probably be more than Jason knew himself right now. It would basically just be mocking their poor friend.

... Coach Hedge leaped up and dumped Leo like a sack of flour.

"That's gentler than a sack of potatoes at least," Magnus offered. "Flour could burst out, potatoes can just have the bruised bits cut off."

"I'm sure Leo appreciates the distinction," Percy agreed.

...I just fell down the freaking Grand Canyon! Stop asking for challenges!"

"This isn't about him," Nico said as if Leo were there in mock reproach.

"I think Jason should throw Hedge at Dylan next, sounds like everybody would get what they wanted out of that," Percy chuckled.

... My mistress will destroy all demigods. This war you cannot win."

"Oh there's another war now is there!" Percy sounded far more irate than Jason thought he had a right to considering this wasn't threatened at him. "Someone please tell me Krono's roman version is just female, please!" He clearly knew it was a vain hope before he turned to Annabeth.

She looked at those green eyes and wished she could give him another answer. "He's called Saturn."

Percy groaned and flopped back in his seat like a sack of potatoes. They didn't think the reaction would have been better had he gotten his answer, Kronos wouldn't exactly have been easier to beat in his Roman form!

Nico pressed his lips tight together to stop himself blurting out who it could have been. Gaea stirs, the ghosts kept whispering, Tartarus itself kept hissing whenever he got too close to the edge. He tried to tell himself he was being ridiculous, some old earth goddess would have no dominion over some wind spirits...but he wasn't that naive to believe it. All this time he'd been watching Jason and Percy trade silly barbs about being stuck in the same situation had never really been funny to Nico. The truth of why had always been there if he cared to look to long.

... Piper tackled the monster from behind. Both of them went sprawling.

"If you don't want to date her, I know some people who will be happy to have her around," Thalia told him with pride. Piper was seriously proving herself to be a formidable fighter without a single weapon in this short span of time, an amazing Hunter if she wished for sure would hone that ability to the finest deadly point.

Jason was smiling just for the fact that anybody had done that for him, but it was tinged with sadness too. Piper thought she knew him, obviously thought she was falling in love with him as she tried to save him, and yet he couldn't return the feeling one bit. He would have done the same for her, to stop that monster taking any of them, but it didn't mean the same, and he was worried when all this settled down if she'd live to regret it.

...Jason's sword skidded across the glass.

There was a horribly painful moment as they all realized, that wasn't Riptide. If that sword went over the edge, Jason wasn't getting it back by magic. He might be able to call it back to his hand with the winds, but it wasn't something Thalia had ever practiced at, so she had not a clue how accurate Jason could be with such a skill. One moment with a club might not work the same with a magic sword...

...Dylan grabbed Leo and began pulling them up like a vacuum cleaner.

'To storm or fire, the world must fall,' Annabeth started twisting her fingers painfully in her lap at this. Her ideas, her expectations, her fear for people she barely knew as the next great prophecy rang in her ears. Monsters usually only brought tasty treats along with them when they retreated for a snack. She had a feeling that wasn't what was happening here.

"Help!" Piper yelled. Then she slipped, screaming as she fell.

Thalia's heart gave a sad little thump of surprise, but she'd heard and seen to many girls die to truly be shocked at another. It was depressing to be sure, the girl might have even earned herself a confusing trip to Elysium alone for her heroic deed of sacrificing herself to save Jason. For the first time she, unlike her brother, was abstractly hoping this was a glimpse into his future. Maybe they could save Piper this time if she staked a few hunters on the Grand Canyon to keep an eye on this museum and stop this from happening.

"Jason, go!" Hedge yelled. "Save her!"

"By, chucking himself after her?" Nico sounded personally affronted and very much like he'd hit Hedge if he were present. Jason shouldn't have to die because the satyr hadn't managed to go after her too!

"I would have," Percy said quietly. He would have brought the water up to meet them to try and cushion the fall. He'd have stabbed Riptide into the cliff face and held them there until rescue arrived. He would not have just stared at the empty space of where she'd been and not look over. Not again.

But he said it quietly enough that he didn't mean it towards anyone, just an errant thought from his mouth. It was his fatal flaw, and he couldn't throw in Jason's face what that made him if he couldn't do the same.

... serious goat fu— knocking him free. Leo dropped safely to the floor,

"He is going to need some strong ambrosia to heal a concussion at this rate," Will said in general concern how many times this poor guy had been dropped in the past few minutes.

"I think his curly hair is thick enough to cushion his fall," Nico rolled his eyes.

...Then the satyr and the storm spirit disappeared.

"Well, crud." Alex said in a blank kind of horror. He knew that a satyr being taken wasn't a good thing, and Percy going off to save Grover had seemed a rare spectacle in the world where they so regularly vanished.

On the other hand, depending on when this took place, if it was after Grover was spreading word about Pan's passing on, there was a good chance his being kidnapped wouldn't be taken lightly at least when the Camper's arrived. They'd at least know Hedge wasn't on some crazy Pan quest at any rate.

Jason would have been fully prepared to launch himself after Hedge right now to stop it going that far if he didn't feel the pull, the need to save Piper too. They'd both thrown themselves at Dylan to stop himself being taken away. At least Piper he still had a slim chance of saving...if she was still falling.

... He ran to the railing, thinking, I'm a lunatic, and jumped over the side.

"The best kind of lunatic though!" Percy beamed, reaching behind Thalia to slap him on the back.

"The best kind of praise coming from you," Jason chuckled peacefully, clearly unconcerned for his impending death. Percy was a hero of the ages, it was a warm sense of pride he hadn't expected to feel but was delighted to have bestowed upon him to get such a glowing compliment from him.

Thalia wasn't so pleased. She'd never dream of pulling a stunt like this, and the one time she had, it had been Percy shoving her off that cliff, and only snow and a spur-of-the-moment board had saved them. There was no firm knowledge anywhere that Jason would come out of this alive, and that made her heart truly stutter in fear and anger. She wanted to whirl around and lock Jason into a chokehold he couldn't escape and make him swear to never do this again...but knew she couldn't. He was his own person first, and her little brother second. He only had instinct to rely on during all this. Hera had seen to that already when the goddess had seen fit to whisk the toddler away from her, and there was nothing she could do to stop it but live through whatever this was.

Jason wasn't scared of heights.

Jason put a hand on his sister's shoulder, hating the way her voice shook during that. It was a grounding feeling they both needed for a moment.

Just because he didn't share in his sister's fear didn't make him think he would be immune to being splattered upon impact, his silent reassurance told her.

She nodded her thanks and took another good long breath before forcing herself to read the outcome.

He was scared of being smashed five hundred feet below.

"We all knew he was the reasonable one of the two of them," Percy shrugged.

"I'll show you unreasonable brine breath," Thalia said without looking up.

Percy mock clutched his throat in fear and stuck his tongue out grotesquely for a moment before laughing, a noise she was so used to laughing along with she didn't bother to fight it off. It helped too.

...In a heartbeat, he caught up with Piper, who was flailing wildly.

"Best roller coaster ever, and I brought my own buddy," Jason remarked to Percy.

"I'll allow it, more popcorn to go around," Percy chuckled.

...He wondered what dying would feel like. Probably not so good.

"Let's make an effort going forward to not find out!" Will tried to say in his best reasonable tone of voice.

"I wouldn't hold my breath," Nico shook his head. They'd been dealing with Jason's life for barely twenty minutes and already it was going as well as Percy's would.

... They were floating in midair, a hundred feet above the river.

"That is so cool!" Percy yelped, pure envy in his voice. "You think I can do that? I can summon hurricanes, maybe with enough wind-"

"Don't even think about it," Thalia and Annabeth said at once.

Alex gave Percy a wink, as if promising to push him off of whatever cliff he liked to help him figure it out, but that wasn't much more encouraging really.

Jason however gave him a friendly smile and nodded it wouldn't surprise him if Percy could, so at least he had some supportive friends around here while Will, Nico, and Magnus were clearly expecting him to live about five minutes after getting out of here already.

..."The air is supporting us," he said.

Thalia still felt her entire skin crawl with stress and disgust from toes to scalp at the idea of this. She was proud of him, immensely so, but it was not something she intended to practice at any time soon.

..."Let's see." Jason thought Up, and instantly they shot skyward.

"You can fly!" Percy was clearly torn between distress and happiness for himself and Jason here. "Like, you can move through air like I can water!"

"Yeah, sorry Perce, I don't think enough ocean wind can get you all that," Jason agreed.

Percy threw his hands up and for all the world looked like someone was trying to drain the godly blood from him one drop at a time in outrage, but it wouldn't hold as he kept shaking his head and smiling at Jason too for how cool that was for him.

...might've been cool, but he was too much in shock.

"That's fair," Alex agreed casually. Percy had the same reaction when he first realized he could breathe underwater, he'd felt much the same when he'd started sprouting random animal body parts without understanding why at first. There was just something natural about it to get too worked up over it.

..."Stupid, ugly, goat," he muttered.

"What did Hedge do to deserve that?" Percy asked indignantly.

"Used much more goat fu than Leo could I presume," Alex shrugged.

... I hit my head. That's it, right? I'm hallucinating?"

"Not if he saw all that he wasn't," Magnus said in pure sympathy. He still half-wished some days this was all his brain playing tricks on him and he'd wake up in the loony-hospital, but those days were long behind him too.

"Besides, Jason would have noticed if Leo was hitting the cactus juice and not sharing," Percy grinned for a joke the others got in context if not what the heck he was referencing, but at least Annabeth laughed with him and that's all that seemed to matter to him for the moment.

..."That's what I've been trying to tell you. I don't know."

"Hopefully Leo will believe you now at least," Will offered.

"Yeah, getting him to stop trying to convince me I do his chores wasn't the goal of today, but I'll take it," Jason sighed. It was something he hadn't had at the start at least, which was far more than he could say for any other part of his life. Maybe Piper and Leo actually would decide to be friends with him now that the Mist had been taken away? It would be a nice place to start in this strange world.

..."protecting three people," Jason remembered. "I think he meant us."

"Nah," Alex scoffed in delight. "Hedge obviously meant Dylan, Isabel, and some other unmentioned kid who wasn't nearly killed just now! Keep up Jason!"

"I'm trying my best Alex," Jason chuckled.

...Leo lay on his back, staring at the sky. He didn't seem anxious to get up.

"Mood," Percy nodded. The amount of times he'd wished he could just lay on the floor and not be forced up were uncountable. He'd rarely gotten them.

"Don't know what demi means," he said.

"It means half," Annabeth offered kindly, to anyone who might have been thinking otherwise.

"Well that's a relief, all this time I was thinking we were part Demi Lovato,"** Percy smirked.

"Who?" Jason asked blankly.

"Nothing man, an actress," Percy shrugged.

...At first Jason thought Leo had hit his head too hard.

"Really? It was the flying horses that made you finally think that?" Nico asked in surprise.

"Well it couldn't be the centaur again, then I'd just have an uncanny resemblance to Percy's life, and a vague one's more than enough for me," Jason sighed.

..."Extraction squad?" Leo struggled to his feet. "That sounds painful."

"Depends on what they're extracting," Thalia frowned with uneasy reproach. She was weary of what kind of welcome her brother would receive from Campers. She would not be pleased if he was glorified as the next savior, or ostracized for being a child of the Big Three. She'd heard more than enough of that happening to Percy and would come in arrow's flying if it happened to Jason next.

"And where are they extracting us to?" Piper asked.

"She's the one asking the important questions," Annabeth approved.

"Glad I saved her life more and more," Jason agreed.

... cantered nervously, as if they sensed it was near breaking.

"So who's bright idea was it to land there?" Annabeth said reproachfully, clearly planning a lecture for future rescuers on safe landing pads.

"I'm sure they'll take the time to introduce themselves calmly to the scared newbies," Will said gently.

A girl pulled a knife and ran toward Jason. Her gray eyes were fierce.

"Ummmm," was the resounding response to that as everybody looked at
Annabeth blankly.

She did not get shy. But it took a lot of willpower not to lean nervously into her seat and swallow her own confusion.

This, was not starting out, well. There was the vainest hope it could have been one of her sisters, but only Elia was around her age and never so intense as she was. It didn't fit.

"Where's who?" ...She frowned like his answer was unacceptable.

"Yep, that's Annabeth," Percy confirmed all doubts, but his sense of doom only rose.

He could think of only two people she'd be asking about this intensely, and one of them was dead.

...had his dad stopped that from being his fate next by pulling him in here?

... first name was Gleeson? ...might've laughed if this hadn't been so weird.

"I don't see why," Magnus said drolly. "He seemed plenty gleeful to me, I'm sure his dad was just as happy."

"Hardy har," Jason rolled his eyes.

...He had a tattoo of a rainbow, which seemed a little unusual.

Alex's face brightened with interest, and Magnus immediately looked a little more pouty for that reaction, instantly hoping this guy wasn't going to be around in these adventures much.

Will saw that face and decided against telling Magnus who this was, it probably wouldn't make him any happier if he was going to be jealous about Butch, child of Iris. He'd arrived at the beginning of the month and Alex hadn't been the only one with instant interest, though Will hadn't seen the appeal. He found guys with too much muscle and that much height over him more intimidating than sexy personaly.

... She told me if I came here, I'd find the answer."

Her dreams, her constant nightmares...Annabeth felt a cold chill that went so deep, ever Percy wrapping his arms around her barely chased it away. They'd been plaguing her every night that Percy was missing. Hera's vision, her mother's demands, Percy never shaking her awake to prove it all could be okay...she would have gone mad soon enough she was sure.

But Percy was here now, and she wrapped her arms tight around him back, forcing her breaths to keep coming in and out, feel the warmth of him against her in this dark ocean floor of a prison she'd allowed herself to be trapped in.

"Annabeth," the bald guy grunted.

Thalia sighed, though nobody was quite surprised, they'd believed Percy's sense of spotting Annabeth in any situation.

It was just, very disconcerting, and very very fear inducing to have her rushing into this...well like she had when Thalia had last seen her. Desperate, angry at the world. A haunted feel to every motion she made interrogating these guys.

Thalia now had a very good idea what was happening here, and it only angered her more with every word.

Their guess had been wrong. Jason would not be getting his past returned to him like Percy had.

Instead, they were in fact working through what should have happened before Posideon made all this possible.

Gods help them all when they did find out who had taken Percy...but that only left her all the more uneasy of who'd been trying to take Jason just now.

With his memory wiped and someone immediately dipping in to try and abduct him, it seemed reasonable to assume Jason would have been taken to the same place Percy should have been.

Which meant Annabeth had only been a few moments to late, and she was clearly not taking it well as her nails began digging deep into Percy's hands holding hers.

..."He can't be. I was tricked."

"Um," Jason scratched awkwardly at the back of his neck. "Sorry."

"It's not your fault," Annabeth hated how weak her voice sounded, so she cleared her throat and leaned towards him, meeting his eyes now with a kinder, gentler gray than he'd been picturing moments ago glaring at him. "I know it's not, you're not responsible for any of this Jason. Don't apologize, we will figure out the truth of this and someone will pay for it," if Percy's skin hadn't been impenetrable her nails would have dug up blood by now, "but it won't be your fault."

If Thalia or anybody else had tried to convince him of that, he would have just waved it off as them being nice and still guilt tripping for standing there when Percy wasn't.

But Annabeth would not let him off the hook like that if she didn't mean it. He nodded his thanks and turned back to the book with a sense of peace he hadn't been convinced he'd feel again since he realized he wasn't getting his past back.

... "What have you done with him?"

Percy held her tighter, wanting to be her sky and promise to fix all this, but he might as well have wished his mom would appear with a plate of cookies those fridges just couldn't fake. For once none of them knew how this was going to end, only that it was going to be a very bumpy ride as the raw pain in her for being abandoned yet again was clear as that blue expanse had been on her face, with no gods to step in and help her this time.

It made her anger, her frustration at herself for having to have help from before finally feel mildly more contemptuous. Better to be weak and get help and have Percy back to have some balance back in her life than, this.

... "Fine." She fixed Jason with a resentful look. "We'll settle this later."

"She's never settled for anything less than what she wants," Percy agreed cheerfully.

"Hopefully that thing isn't my death right now," Jason sighed.

Percy opened, this closed his mouth, which was of no comfort.

... Jason gestured toward the blonde. "She looks like she wants to kill me."

"Most likely she'd just stab you and heal the wound when you prove you don't know anything," Nico offered oh so helpfully. "At worst she'd just throw you out of the chariot if she thought you were lying, and we know that wouldn't do any harm."

"Thanks Nico," Annabeth sighed, not bothering to deny any of it, which Jason couldn't help but be even more uneasy about.

"She's looking for someone, he's been missing three days," Butch said.

"Three days!" Annabeth yelped in protest. "You were gone seven when Artemis stepped in!"

"Three days," Jason echoed in fascination, a joke he'd picked up on and noticed from the very start of Percy's adventures. Surely not a coincidence...

"So, if Jason should be at Camp by now, then," Percy shivered. He was well aware he shouldn't have been in here all this time, this was not Posideon's court. Oceanus had made it clear this was not his doing, but his grudging help.

So where the hell was he supposed to be while Jason was being carted off to his home!

..."Her boyfriend," Butch said. "A guy named Percy Jackson."

Jason was not happy to see that the others now shared his miserable feeling of betrayal that this book even existed right now. The promise of the future had been gifted to Rachel! What the heck were they doing hearing all this, when Jason deserved to have his own story told instead of whatever the gods wanted them to hear!? Why was he being punished and deprived by this sick joke rather than given his own answers?

But these were questions without answers, they all knew. Nobody had ever figured out what the gods did, and were rarely lucky to piece together their why's that existed on whims.

So Thalia handed the book over to Nico for this to continue, because there was nothing else they could do.

PJOHOOPJOHOO

I know Jason's not a particularly popular character in this fandom, but I wish to illustrate for a brief moment why this boy was my immediate cup of tea.

Amnesia- I'm an entire sucker for this plotline. Yes, strip a character down to their basic self and let them flounder in a strange world putting themselves back together from instinct with brief gaps of memories, I'll take a million variations please and thank you.

The Swap- I immediately understood the plot, and I Loved It. There's more Demigods?! Percy got carted off to that place while we get to follow this strange boy in a familiar place!? Next page!!

Son of Zeus- It was pretty dang obvious from the flying Superman thing we were getting Poseidon's joke a little off kilter about more Big Three kids running around. I was immediately confident Jason was going to run into Percy at the end of this book as some huge reveal and then the next book would be Percy's adventure leading up to the same moment with said other campers. I did not guess the Thalia's lost brother reveal, but the noise I made when that was shown later was probably concerning to someone. My Favorite Character from the original series now has a brother?! More Thalia incoming?!?!

His companions just sweetened the deal. Tomboy who turned out to be a child of Aphrodite. Thank you RR for still having my sense of humor.

Leo? Hilarious, dragon, SOLD!

Now, sadly, the books...don't actually do much with, any of Jason. The amnesia plot is basically dropped after this book!? He never really ruminates on it after this because he got some vague memories back at the end that are never properly addressed!

Rome is used more as a background looming threat and Percy really doesn't get to spend much time there! It's about as realized as CHB, which really isn't much when you get down to the day to day of it all much to my ever disappointment.

The Big Three Kids having to all save the world together is utilized all right...minus Thalia! How dare you set me up and break my heart!

Ahem, anyways. I wish there had been more in-fighting considering how much opposites they were built up to be. No offense to Leo, Piper, Hazel, and Frank, but I truly wish these first two book's had just been solo POV's too, and then I can understand wanting to branch out on the others, but that's all besides the point.

I was under utilizing Jason during Percy's story, but all this blather is just here to tell you we are shifting focus and I'm so thrilled about it!

*The first of many head scratching moments to come where details like this can and will make someone do a double take if you pay attention. Up to this point, only Ares and his brood bled golden blood! Even Antaues, a child of Poseidon and Gaea, had dirt coming out of his wounds! Why did Dylan the Random Wind Spirit bleed golden blood?! And the other's didn't?!

I left it in because I have to rationalize Dylan may at least be some Minor wind god who derives his power from Aeolus, and those are his minions? Not a perfect answer and leaves much mystery in the hierarchy of who bleeds and who gets dusty wounds, but I am kind of holding this plot together by the seat of my pants as is.

**I need you all to know how stupidly funny this joke was to me, because Demi Lavato translates to half-wolf. Percy was almost not wrong about Jason there!