Aurora only cracked a smile once Percy slammed straight into a tree.
She felt bad for the big oak, because Percy's head was pretty huge, sympathizing only with the plant as the son of Poseidon rubbed the red knot on his head. After watching Percy trip and curse and generally feel pretty miserable, Aurora finally let a small snicker slip out of her lips.
"Are you laughing at me?" Percy's voice was incredulous as his eyes narrowed at the stony faced girl, who was hiding her ridiculous grin behind her finally-still hands.
"No," she drew out the syllable, but couldn't contain the teasing that was slipping into her cold intonation. She glanced away, a tantalizing smell prickling the senses in her nostril. Her nose twitched as she took a deep whiff of luxurious, fried, greasy, unhealthy food: the best kind. It smelled like home, like Connor Stoll shoving his face with his cheeseburger and fries while Aurora sat and giggled at his idiocy across the dining pavilion.
She looked away fast enough to not catch Percy's aquamarine gaze softening as she giggled, melting into a pool of understanding.
They kept walking until they saw a deserted two-lane road through the trees. On the other side was a closed-down gas station, a tattered billboard for a super old 1990s movie, and one open business, which was the source of the neon light and good smell.
It wasn't the fast food restaurant that Percy would've hoped for, from the looks of his fallen face and lip jutting out slightly in a hopeless pout.
"Yeah, I can't read that." Percy sighed dejectedly, crossing his arms over his grumbling stomach. Aurora stayed quiet, although to her it looked like ATYNU MES GDERAN GOMEN MEPROUIM. "What the fuck does that say?"
"I don't know," Annabeth conceded before Grover, the only non-dyslexic person there, translated it into "Aunty Em's Garden Gnome Emporium."
Percy started forward, but Grover grabbed his arm with wild eyes. "Are you crazy? This place is weird."
Percy glanced at Aurora, as if he was looking for approval. Annabeth's eyes had glazed over, hunger overtaking her brain power, but as sea green met hazel, Aurora's fatigue hit. She was really hungry, and tired, and—
"I don't know," she blew out a slow huff, her breath brushing a loose strand of strawberry-blonde colored hair out of her eyes. She felt self-conscious, their previous interactions with monsters putting a crack in her armor of confidence. "I don't know. I don't want to do anything wrong."
Percy waited for a moment before nodding to Annabeth. The two seized both of her elbows, her feet nearly tripping over themselves as they dragged her forward. The three completely ignored Grover's nervous bleats as their stomachs chased food.
Then, the door creaked open, and standing in front of them was a beautiful, tall woman with a long gray gown that covered everything but her hands. On her head sat a petite hat, like one of the ones that the British women wore to tea parties. It had a veil, so no tendrils of her hair could be seen. She was enticingly gorgeous, the type of woman that could lure a god to her with a single glance.
"Children, it is too late to be out all alone," she said, sympathy lacing her strong voice. "Where are your parents?"
"They're... um..." Annabeth started to say.
"We're orphans," Percy quipped quickly, a coy smirk playing onto his lips as he supported his sentence with full confidence. Aurora wanted to kick him in the gut. "Separated from our caravan. Circus caravan, that is."
Percy didn't know how close to a reality being an "orphan" was to some people.
(Some people meaning Aurora.)
The woman's lips twisted into a smile nearly identical to Percy's—maybe a little more mocking, because, really? A circus caravan?—and looked at Percy. Her eyes were striking and light, a color that Aurora couldn't quite place.
She felt the room get cold as a poison arrow vine crept at her feet, it's leaves itching right above her ankle. Aurora frowned at the flower's growth.
Percy seemed to shrink under her unmoving gaze as she smiled wide. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Percy Jackson. I'm Medusa."
You could cut the silence with Annabeth's celestial bronze dagger. Percy was still, until he lifted his foot to take a step closer.
"Percy, don't." Annabeth hissed with livid eyes, gray threatening to tear the sea spawn limb from limb. "She's a monster."
Medusa bristled at the comment. "We all choose who we make our monsters, daughter of Athena. I heard about your encounter with the Furies. Those are monsters. You can either go out there and face more of those evil beings, or accept my lunch offer. The choice is yours."
She turned and walked away, her footsteps echoing in the stillness. Percy took a deep breath. "I think we can trust her."
"What?" Annabeth snapped as Grover simultaneously let out a harsh "Dude!"
Percy shook his head, a steady look of determination on his face. When Aurora told him to be stubborn—gods, training with him felt like ions ago—that was not what she meant. "I can't explain it, I just... My mom used to tell me her story. And the point was always that she isn't what people think. And I definitely trust my mom, so I'm going in. You guys do what you want."
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Aurora admired Annabeth's loyalty to her mother and hatred for Percy Jackson, because as soon as she saw a hamburger in front of her, she dove in. Percy and Grover did the same, their stomachs soon becoming full of the most delicious food they'd ever eaten. It was easy to forget that Medusa was the one who was serving them.
"I think there's a snake in my hamburger," Aurora mumbled, but nevertheless munching despite the single glistening green scale that littered the table.
The son of Poseidon glanced over and recoiled at the snake scale on the table. He shrugged and shoveled another fry into his mouth, as if to say, whatever.
"Try eating something, Annabeth." Percy suggested, oblivious to the girl's anger. "Maybe you will stop scowling."
Annabeth's hand clenched into a fist as she reached for the butter knife on her untouched plate. "This isn't the same for me as it is for you." She said through gritted teeth.
"Why?" Percy asked, slightly jumping as Medusa swung the door open.
"You're concerned I would hold a grudge against you simply because you are a daughter of Athena? You shouldn't be. We're not our parents after all."
If you told Aurora three days ago that she would end up agreeing with Medusa of all people, she would've flipped you off (she loved doing it to Luke, especially after he lectures her about him being 19 and much older and wiser than her and Annabeth. She missed her older brother, and thinking about what Medusa said reminded her of the small acts of rebellion against the gods that he would do).
But... Aurora wasn't the one who cheated on Hades. Aurora wasn't horny and created a child with a random florist who she thought was hot. That was her mother. That was Persephone.
Aurora picked at a pomegranate seed on her plate, resenting that she had chosen a fruit that was so closely correlated to Hades and the Underworld. Where she was going.
"You and I might have more in common than you think. Please, Annabeth Chase, sit and eat."
While Annabeth didn't listen, Percy certainly ate up every bit of information Medusa gave them even more than he ate his burger. He literally had zero crumbs left on his plate.
"So, you're not a monster. What are you then?"
"A survivor." Medusa answered, her crystal eyes glazing over as she smoothed her hands on her dress.
"You must be a little more than that." Percy's words were innocent and fully well-intentioned as they slipped out of his mouth almost automatically. He didn't even bat an eye at his words as he reached across the table and grabbed one of Annabeth's uneaten fries.
He truly believed his mother when she said that Medusa's story was deeper than her reputation. He took Sally Jackson's words and ran with them.
Aurora loathed him and wanted to hug him at the same time. The one thing that pissed her off the most about Percy was just how good he was. He was raised so well. His mother did an excellent job. And it was infuriating, because he got a childhood and a caring mother and was just this amazing person, and she... well, didn't. It was hard to cling onto her irrational hate—because, really, that was the most beautiful thing Aurora had ever heard—but Percy's stupid face was too cute and his stupid personality was too caring and his stupid brain was too funnily witty. Aurora hated Percy Jackson.
"The gods gave me a gift. I cannot be bullied anymore." Medusa bristled slightly, her voice sharpening in a way that Aurora recognized all too well. It was when someone saw through her a little too well.
"What my mother did to you wasn't a gift, it was a curse." The only thing more dangerous than her knife was Annabeth's attitude. She glowered at Medusa, her jaw clenched.
"You are loyal to your mother." Medusa asked slowly, staring at the four like they were children.
"Yes," Annabeth responded curtly, seething under her annoyed front.
"You stand by her?"
"Always."
"You love her?"
"Of course I do."
Medusa inhaled sharply, her words coming out slow and emphatically. "And so did I. So did I." Annabeth exhaled, shaking with frustration. "Do you know the story of how I came to be this way?"
Grover piped up through his third helping of paper plates. "I do."
"Do you?" Medusa countered.
"Do I?" Grover echoed with self doubt.
Medusa's glass eyes looked almost identical to Annabeth's at that point, shaking with repressed anger and resentment. "Athena was everything to me. I worshiped her, I prayed to her, I made offerings... She never answered. Not even an omen to suggest she appreciated my love. I wasn't like you, sweetheart. I was you. I would have worshiped her that way for a lifetime... in silence. But then, one day, another god came, and he broke that silence. Your father."
Percy straightened, glancing at Annabeth with terror, as if afraid she would pounce on him for Poseidon's mistakes. His brows furrowed with confusion. Then, his eyes turned to Medusa, and aquamarine filled with the same compassion it always held for anyone who suffered.
"The Sea God told me that he loved me," Medusa continued with a softer voice. Sadder. "I felt as though he saw me in a way I had never felt seen before. But then, Athena declared that I had embarrassed her and I needed to be punished. Not him. Me." Her voice shook at the last word, revealing a vulnerability Aurora didn't think to be possible.
"She decided I would never be seen again by anyone who would live to tell the tale." Her smile turned quickly into a grimace.
"That isn't what happened." Annabeth cut in with anger in the undertones of her stubborn voice, crossing her arms. If anyone were to be loyal to their parent, it would be Annabeth. Aurora had to admit that it sounded like something a goddess would do. "My mother is just, always."
Medusa sighed, like she was expressing sympathy for the young demigods. "The gods want you to believe that, that they are infallible. But they only want what all bullies want. They want to blame ourselves for their own shortcomings. You, Aurora Miller."
Aurora's eyes widened at the mention of her mother, and her head snapped up. She wasn't used to being the one being talked to.
"Blamed for your own birth because your mother refuses to take credit for her mistake? Abandoned, like me, by the one who claimed they loved you. Chased by a monster—the true monster. The gods." Medusa's words were like daggers in Aurora's brain, because the worst part was, it wasn't untrue.
"That is not what happened. You are a liar." Annabeth argued firmly, with the strength of only a hero could have.
"I wasn't a mistake." Aurora's voice was low and steady as she trained her hazel eyes on her ring, trying not to blink. Trying not to think, not to dwell on the truth behind Medusa's words. She was loyal to the gods. "And I wasn't abandoned."
She opened her mouth to say more, but she physically couldn't. Something in her mind, something in the look Percy was sending her, told her that Medusa wasn't trying to be mean, or hurt Aurora. She was simply a victim, and she was trying to... save them. As much as the girl didn't want to listen, she couldn't choke out any more.
Medusa sighed, as if she was disappointed in the reactions of the demigods, and stood up promptly. She fixated her crystalline gaze on Percy, who was attempting to make eye contact with Aurora.
"Something's burning," Medusa said with a trace of melancholy. She turned to the son of Poseidon. "Would you give me a hand in the kitchen? I think dessert is ready."
ೀ⋆｡🌷 notes ...
word count: 2294
date published: february 24, 2023
thoughts: i decided to do this scene the way in the show instead of the book because i really love how the show handled it! medusa's story is so sad but i love how she was portrayed
also, i was wondering if we lived the little (a) and (p) at the end of the chapters to show which perspective the chapter would be focused around bc idk if i want to keep it or get rid of it so you guys decide
references: a poison arrow vine flower is "medusa's flower"
have a wonderful day lovelies <3