Those Dam Headcanons (Percy Jackson One-Shots)

Independence Day

I meant to post this on the fourth, but I had some tech problems. Whoops!

Jason had never really celebrated the Fourth of July at Camp Jupiter. He always identified more with Rome than with America. Everyone who had been at the camp from a young age did. And, if he were to be truthful, he didn't know who Thomas Jefferson or Benjamin Franklin or George Washington were, though their names seemed vaguely familiar from an American History lecture he had heard years ago. One of them was the first Praetor of the United States, or something like that. Nonetheless, the demigods at Camp Half-Blood went all out for the festival.

He woke up this morning to The Star-Spangled Banner blaring all throughout the camp. Of course he'd heard the national anthem before, but he didn't have the words or tune committed to memory. Pulling on his customary orange tee shirt and cargo shorts, he walked outside to find that the Dining Pavilion had been covered in red, white, and blue streamers, and every booth had an American flag table cloth spread over its surface. Chiron was wearing a tee shirt with a bald eagle on it, and had even gone so fair as to tie ribbons and miniature flags into his tail. Most campers had forgone their normal orange tee shirts for patriotic ones, or even just red, white, and blue tops. The Stoll brothers had gone so far as to be shirtless, their chests painted to look like American flags, and they donned masks of some man Jason had never seen before. After asking Annabeth, he learned the disguises were supposed to resemble some person named Obama. Even Mr. D had swapped his normal Hawaiian shirt for a red and white striped one, making him look more like he belonged on the cover of a "Where's Waldo?" book than a patriotic citizen.

Instead of lessons and classes, the things they normally had throughout the day, the campers had free time. Leo had managed to set up a boom box, blaring songs Jason had never heard before. One that seemed to recur often was called "Party in the U.S.A.," which Jason wasn't familiar with, but had learned most of the words after hearing it for the eighth time in an hour. The campers swam in the lake or steered little boats through the still waters.

When night fell, the campers laid out blankets on the shore. Percy and Annabeth had to lay out two side by side. Tyson tried to lay on one, his feet and his head hanging off onto the ground. On the other, Percy and Annabeth sat shoulder to shoulder, Annabeth laughing as Percy bit into a-- was that a blue hotdog? Frank and Hazel lounged on a separate blanket, Jason chuckling quietly as he watched Frank timidly place an arm around Hazel's shoulder. He nearly jumped out of his skin as Hazel leaned into him. Leo sat, amiably talking to a child of Hermes as they fiddled with the fireworks.

Jason felt a tap on his shoulder and turned to see Piper, an old blanket tucked under her arm and a smile on her lips.

Piper and Jason laid on the blanket, staring at the firework spectacle above them. The fireworks changed shape and color every shot, but usually stuck to a patriotic theme. One appeared as an American flag waving, and another was an eagle, soaring through the sky before dissipating and falling to the ground. Jason looked at the campers, some snuggled together romantically, some just staring at the sky in awe. Jason could smell smoke and lake water and he heard each deafening crack of the fireworks.

It was the most beautiful thing he'd ever witnessed.