Heart Pierced - Kayla Knowles (1)

VIII. My Sister Has To Watch Me Duel Tantalus

Tantalus released and shoved Mr.D aside, bringing up his blade as Colton brought his blade down on it. The sparks that flew off of both of their blades were so numerous, that Clarisse thought that they would set the camp on fire eventually. Fortunately for everyone, no such thing happened.

Colton landed on his feet, and the two of them stood there, snarling at each other, neither able to push the other back. Luke slashed his sword to end the IM, but no one was watching. Their attention was fully on the fight playing out between Tantalus and one of their own.

"Figured you were working for Luke and Kronos.." Colton hissed at him, causing Tantalus to snarl even more.

"Yeah, so what? They offered me a lot to make sure this camp fell, depriving the Gods of a safe haven for their children.." Tantalus snapped back at him.

"Fuck you" Colton responds.

The two traded blows with each other then for a while, and Colton had to admit that as they fought, moving away from the pavilion, that Clarisse's lessons on how to use a sword were definitely paying off because while Tantalus had been trained with it as well, he was very rusty and not at his prime. As such, Colton seemed to have a bit of an advantage.

That being said, his opponent knew how to use a sword, so it wasn't like Colton was fighting a weakling. The amount of clangs from their swords colliding was so rapid and numerous that Sherman put his hands over his ears, trying not to go insane from the noise.

"COME ON COLTON, POUND HIM INTO THE GROUND!" Travis hollered from behind him, as some of the campers cheered him on.

"THAT'S IT COLTON, NO MERCY!" Lee shouted.

Clarisse wanted to cheer him on too, but looking at her younger brother's appearance, it simply stopped her from doing so. Because it was not normal at all.

His eyes completely blood red.. blood dripping down his face, cheeks, arms, and legs.. it was weird and horrifying. Like, really weird and horrifying. She had never seen anything like it before.

That being said, it somehow was not stopping Colton from taking all the lessons she had given him about using a sword and showing that he understood them completely. Every strike, every parry, every blow.. exactly as she had taught him.

Still, the blood was.. very concerning to her. She turned to Kayla. "You have any idea about why he's like that?" she asked. The other girl could only shrug her head no in response.

The fight only grew more physical and bloody as Colton landed a kick to Tantalus' leg, causing Tantalus to then attempt to head-butt Colton, which only gained him a slash across his forehead, causing blood to drip down Tantalus' face.

Sherman could tell that all of that anger and rage simmering in Colton for the past week and a half was now unleashing itself tonight as the man slashed Tantalus' thigh, causing more blood to come out.

"AAHHHHH!" Tantalus screamed. "You.. you bitch!"

"More where that came from, Motherfucker.." Colton responded, as he continued to duel Tantalus.

Tantalus apparently took that as an insult, since he then charged Colton, which proved to be the biggest mistake of his time at Camp Half Blood.

With one swing, Colton disarmed Tantalus before he roundhouse kicked him in the chest to stun him and then a right hook to the face sent Tantalus flying over the Pavilion - literally over it, in the air - before landing on his ass nearly two hundred yards from it. Colton, meanwhile, didn't even have a single scratch on himself. His fight had been that flawless.

Tantalus was done. He knew he had failed. Kronos was definitely going to murder him now.

Everyone gazed back at Colton after staring in shock and awe at what he had done, and noticed to their complete shock that the blood was gone from his body and his eyes were back to normal.

Silence reigned for a moment, before Kayla burst forward and hugged him with tears of joy, followed by Clarisse a few seconds later.

The pavilion exploded into cries of joy, shouts of awe and excitement, and campers jumping up from their seats and wandering over to Colton to congratulate him on his victory.

(A/N: I imagine they are going berserk like this below:

Because to be fair, I don't think I have seen any other fanfic writer actually do a version of Sea Of Monsters where Tantalus actually fights a camper. So, at least for this chapter and for more meme-ing, I see no god up here.. other than me. And now back to the chapter!)

"Holy shit! That was awesome, Colton!" Lee shouted, no one even bothering to correct him on language because honestly, even the young ones were outright amazed that Colton had won.

"Man of the hour!" Travis said, joining in on the pile of hugs on the guy. His brother, Connor, added on, "Dude, that was sick and wild as hell! Pure genius!"

Kayla cried into his chest out of joy, and Clarisse simply wailed in relief on his shoulder, crying out, "Y..Y..You idiot! Please stop scaring the shit out of me like that!"

Sherman walked up to his brother, and simply just said to him, "You sir.. have to be the second most fearless insane man in the camp after Percy."

At this point, Colton wasn't even mad that Sherman had compared him to Percy. He himself was trying to understand what the fuck had just happened. The minute he saw Tantalus holding Mr.D at sword point, he was literally seeing red. Something had taken hold of him, something that called out to fight. What it was, even he was at a loss to figure out.

But then, he thought about his prophecy. Could it just so be that Tantalus was the "one" it referred to that he to fight to save camp the first time?

It definitely was possible, but still, compared to this, he suspected the other two fights were going to be even more harder. But that still didn't really explain his rage, his behavior, why Kayla seemed to be the only one who could keep him from making a bad choice like Luke did because of his fatal flaw. Unless, of course, it may be a part of the prophecy too.

Which left him at a crossroads, even as everyone continued hugging him. What was he going to do now? Would he tell everyone or would he keep it to himself?

A voice at the back of his brain said at that moment, you keep it to yourself, you're going to end up like Luke.

No, no. I don't want to end up like that traitor.

Then tell everyone.

I don't want them to be mad at me for hiding it from them, even Kayla.

People are going to die eventually, either way. Might as well get it over with now.

Yeah, you're right.

By this point, everyone had stopped hugging and had stepped back, concerned with his lack of response.

"You.. okay, Colton?" Lee asked.

Colton turned his head upward, having been staring down at the ground, and gave Lee a grim look.

"Meet me at the campfire everyone. I think its time I'd come clean on the secret I've been hiding since last summer. My prophecy.." he said, turning around and heading towards first the Ares Cabin and then the armory, leaving everyone confused as to what he meant.

Prophecy?

Colton got a prophecy last summer?

They couldn't believe it, but they wondered what the hell he had meant by what he said, and believe me, they were all about to find out.

(A/N: Shorter chapter than usual, since like I said, I have yet to see a good Tantalus vs. camper fight scene in a fanfic to base this off of, so.. although you probably would have liked for a longer fight scene, that is what I can do. Hope you enjoy!)