chapter twelve!
「 one and three-quarters months before 」
❝ maybe I'm just going insane „
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"YOU'RE THE DAUGHTER OF APHRODITE, I'm sure it'll all work out for you," Alaska reassured with a smile.
"Thanks," Florence said, reciprocating the smile. Her orange aura—soft and warm like the sunset—radiated around her like a calm fireplace, warming everything around her. "I know I'm being overdramatic, but I just need someone to keep me from going insane thinking about all this stuff."
Florence was the counselor of the Aphrodite cabin during the summer and returned to college during the school year, but after this summer, she would be living in the mortal world year-round.
"Mortal boys are so difficult," she said with a heavy sigh. "Gods, why do I have to have a crush on him, of all people?"
"I hear you," Alaska said.
Florence nudged her on the shoulder. "You're lucky you've had a demigod boy in love with you since you were like fifteen."
"Who?" Alaska asked, her eyebrows furrowed as she looked at Florence in curiosity.
"Oh come on, don't be dumb," she said.
"Au contraire, I don't think I am being dumb."
"You are though," she said bluntly to which Alaska scoffed, feigning offense. "I mean, you guys have known each other since you were like fourteen, you were each other's first kisses, he always wants to train with you even though you suck ass at sword fighting; what else?"
"Oh," Alaska said dramatically. "You're talking about Luke."
Florence looked at her as if she were dumb—more so than she had been. "Yes, I'm obviously talking about Luke. Who else?"
"I dunno, you just said demigod boy. Half the camp is filled with those."
"Yeah, but you had to know exactly who I was talking about."
Alaska only shrugged with a small smile.
A rumble of thunder and flash of thunder passed by the otherwise clear sky, none of the campers reacting or finding it strange at all. The weather had been off recently, and although no one would say it aloud, it was because Zeus was being pissy. Not a surprise.
"How are you and Luke anyways?"
"I don't know," Alaska sighed. "It's been weird between us recently."
"You guys will figure it out," she said. "I remember when you guys were first becoming good friends; you two were so chaotic. It was like Castellan and Rhodes against the world."
"Yeah," Alaska said, a little somber. The "weird" thing between them as of recently was the fact that Luke was possessed and whoever possessed him also brought her back to life, but she couldn't tell anyone that.
"Aww, cheer up. What exactly happened?"
"I don't know," she said. "Nothing big or anything; I'm probably being overdramatic."
"Are you guys ever actually getting together? Or are you guys just gonna keep looking at each other like that?"
"Like what?"
Florence scoffed and fluffed up her short, black hair. "You know. Like you want to fuck each other or like you're in love; it varies, but I see how you two look at each other."
"What are you talking about? We don't—I don't—we look at each other how normal people look at each other!"
"Okay," Florence said doubtfully, laughing at Alaska's flustered tone. "But like you said, I am the daughter of Aphrodite; I know these kinds of things."
"I—I guess I do want something to happen, but I'm just—I don't know, scared. Gods, that sounds so dumb."
"Aww, that's not dumb. We all feel that way," Florence said. "It's normal to be scared of falling in love."
More like scared of falling into an endless pit, Alaska thought. Or having a sword at my throat being threatened to be killed again.
"Yeah," she sighed and cleared her throat. "We, uh, we kissed last summer."
"What?" Florence asked, turning her head to face Alaska to see if she was lying. "How come I didn't know about this?"
"We weren't that close."
Florence playfully scoffed and rolled her eyes. "We weren't that close," she mocked. "I vented to you and you were basically my free, unlicensed therapist and you didn't even feel compelled to tell me you kissed Luke Castellan?"
"First off, why the emphasis on his name?"
"I dunno," Florence said with a shrug. "Personally I don't see the hype, but have you seen the way some of the other campers look at him?"
"You are really analytical of the way people look at each other."
"I think my psych course really just amped up my attention to body language," she said. "I don't know; maybe I'm just going insane."
"Also, second, I'm, like, everyone's free, unlicensed therapist, but I'm not gonna go around telling everyone what I'm doing on a daily basis."
"True; I think my head would actually explode if I had that many people venting to me," she said.
"Aren't you studying to become a therapist?"
Florence nodded. "I would get paid for that though. In your case, I could never be that nice for free."
"I like hearing what other people have to say," she said.
"Right, I forgot you were super into learning people's characters and personalities or whatever," Florence said.
"It's not my choice that I can see people's emotions and moods," Alaska said.
"Yeah, but you're so interested in them," she said. "You're, like, one of those people that ask people what "their story" is when you meet them."
"What's wrong with that?"
"Nothing, it's just an observation."
"Everyone has something to say and I like hearing what different people have to say," Alaska said with a small shrug.
"How profound of you."
A small laugh escaped her lips. "I want everyone to feel like they have someone to talk to. You never know how people are truly feeling unless you listen."
Florence hummed in agreement and wrapped an arm around her shoulder, pulling her head onto her shoulder. She knew exactly what—or rather who—Alaska was talking about. Florence also knew how Alaska remained obstinately happy no matter the situation, always trying to make others feel better and always making sure they're happy.
The wind blew from behind them, causing both girls to sputter and brush their hair out of their faces. The grass underneath them tickled their legs, Alaska unconsciously tracing her fingertips over it, and the mixed smells of fire and earth came in with the wind.
Ethan and Lee sat down near them, forming a half-circle.
"Hey Ren," Ethan said, pulling up the grass with his hands and letting it blow away in the winds. The wood nymphs sometimes got upset if they caught him doing that, but he didn't really care.
"Nakamura; Fletcher," she greeted in response.
"Hey," Lee said, a bright smile on his face like always. "What're you guys doing?"
"Just talking," Alaska said. She sat back up straight again and adjusted her t-shirt. Even though she had multiple, it was annoying having to wear the same camp shirt every day.
Florence nodded in agreement. "Real existential type of stuff, you know?"
"Oh sure," Ethan said. He twisted and flopped onto his back with a dramatic sigh, throwing his hands behind his hair and playing with the grass.
Lee laughed and pulled up some grass, throwing it at Ethan's face that was now in the middle of their half-circle. He aggressively brushed the grass out of his face while Alaska proceeded with plucking random wildflowers out of the ground and placing them in his hair.
"What are we supposed to do with our lives?" Ethan said softly. "I mean Ren's in college and she'll probably get a stable job and live a happy, mortal life, but what about us? I mean, some of us ran away from home and never really got the education we need for college.
"Are we supposed to stay here forever? Gods, we've really been fucked over with the cards life has dealt us. Alaska literally got attacked by a Minotaur just by sneaking out of camp and—"
"You snuck out?" Florence asked, her mouth open but the corners pulled up into an amused expression.
Alaska threw the small flower at Ethan's face and turned to Florence with slightly widened eyes, blowing out air. "Yeah, that's how I ... you know, died," she said. "I snuck out—"
"With Luke," Ethan interrupted.
"—and we went to a party and I was attacked when I came back," she said, sprinkling grass on Ethan's face.
He brushed it off his face, but he still wore a smug smirk, knowing how much Florence wanted Alaska and Luke to become a thing.
"How come we never knew about this?" Lee asked, probably less concerned with her sneaking out than the fact that he never knew the full story.
Alaska shrugged casually. "I don't know what Luke said; I was pretty busy being dead."
"He said the Stolls dared him to summon a monster to prank you but then things went wrong," Florence said. "But he told Chiron that it was just him."
"Jeez," Alaska said, rubbing her forehead.
"Yeah, he got pretty bad punishment from it, but he's fine now."
"I feel bad though."
"You were dead, there's not much you could've done," Ethan said.
"Okay, but you never told us that you snuck out," Florence said.
"I didn't know you wanted to know that. It's been like a year now, I didn't think it was still important."
"So what's happening now?" she asked. "Are you just pretending to be dead? Because you were set for going to college and now you're staying here year-round."
Alaska shrugged. "I'm pretty sure my dad is disappointed that I'm not going to college, but I guess he would rather I stay alive than get educated, so he sent me back here. I don't really know what's going to happen though—we can't just stay here forever."
They sat in comfortable silence, contemplating their existences. As much as they liked to pretend it wasn't a burden, it really did screw you over in life. Their main purpose was to serve the gods even though the gods could care less about them.
Gods, life as a demigod was so much fun.
𐐪𐑂
HER DREAM THAT NIGHT STARTED OUT PLEASANT. She was being lowered to the ground in a kaleidoscope of butterflies—they were flying all around her, but she couldn't seem to touch them. She was wearing a long, midnight blue dress with flowy sleeves but was otherwise barefoot.
When her feet landed on the ground, the butterflies flew away to reveal that she was in a meadow—the long grass tickled her shins and the earth felt damp underneath her feet. A light breeze brought the light scent of flowers to her nose and blew her hair back a little.
In the distance she saw three people sitting in the grass; walking closer, she realized that it was Luke, Annabeth, and a girl she didn't recognize. From what Alaska could see, the unknown girl had spiky black hair and sharp eyes and she looked older than Annabeth but younger than Luke.
She tried to get their attention, but they never looked at her and when she tried to walk over to them, the scene moved away again, always keeping a distance from her so she stayed in place and watched the scene unfold.
They were all laughing and seemed to be talking happily when all of a sudden, a crack of lightning flashed in the sky. Rain started pouring heavily and storm clouds rolled in, quickly replacing the clear blue sky, but Alaska remained dry somehow.
Thunder boomed across the sky and the two took turns scaring the three people in front of Alaska. A cry escaped from the black-haired girl's lips as she fell back to the ground.
Alaska wanted to reach out and do something, but she couldn't—when she ran forward, everything moved farther away. The girl she didn't recognize kept screaming as plants grew over her limbs and tree roots started growing on top of her, burying her alive under her screams were muffled and eventually silenced by the earth.
Water streaked down Annabeth's face—a combination of her tears and the pouring rain. Luke was yelling at the sky, filled with anger, and cursing at the gods—Zeus especially. A lightning bolt came down and struck him, instantly striking him down.
Annabeth looked around, tears pouring down her face as she looked at her two dead friends, and Alaska wished she could go and comfort her, but this time, she couldn't even pick up her feet. She looked down to find that the ground around her was slowly pulling her in.
She was stuck in the same spot, not being able to move or talk, just watching as Annabeth was crying over Luke's lifeless body and the spot where the other girl had been taken by the earth. Alaska started sinking faster and she could feel the ground sucking her in and soon, the bottom of her dress was pooled all around her.
Suddenly, the ground started to shake.
Alaska was freed and stepped back onto the flat land and the scene in front of her moved closer to her. She immediately went over to Luke, assessing his dead body. Annabeth didn't seem to be able to see her, and Alaska couldn't touch Luke, but she saw that the lightning strike had burned through his clothes and left a burn mark near his left armpit.
When Alaska stood up, Annabeth stepped back in fear. At first, Alaska thought she could see her, but she realized Annabeth was looking through her and was frightened by whatever was behind her.
She turned to find that the earth was crumbling in front of them and the edge of the world was gradually getting closer and closer to them. Alaska stepped back in fear, her eyes focused on the world disappearing in front of her, and she stumbled over the unrecognizable girl's corpse.
"Sorry," Alaska mumbled, too in shock to realize that no one could hear her.
Something seemed to stir—either from Alaska speaking aloud or her tripping—but the ground shook harder, thunder clapped louder, and the wind blew hard. Annabeth had to squat down, clutching to the ground so as to not get blown away, and Alaska was about to do the same when everything stopped.
The ground stopped shaking, the sky was clear again, and the air was still.
Everything stopped except the world ending in front of them. They couldn't move as the edge of the world crept closer; Alaska felt stuck again and Annabeth must've felt the same because neither of them made a move to escape.
All of a sudden, Luke and the unrecognizable girl sat up, the roots snapping and crumbling to dust as if they were nothing.
"He's coming back," they both said simultaneously.
By the way they had said it in such a low voice, Alaska probably wouldn't have heard it if those words hadn't reverberated in her head—the words repeating over and over, bouncing around her head like the DVD logo.
"Who?" she asked.
Her attention was fixated on the two teens that had somehow come back to life (it was a dream, anything could happen) that she didn't notice the ground opening up underneath them and the edge of the world taking everything in its wake.
𐐪𐑂
SHE WOKE UP AND SAT UP WITH A STARTLED GASP—her hands frantically moving around to find that she was back in her sleeping bag at camp.
Alaska could remember everything from her head vividly, but one thought seemed to rise above the others in her mind.
"Thalia."
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author's note!
dream luke and thalia were kinda creepy, but like, I had to make it dramatic while adding foreshadowing or whatever; idek, it's wack I just ate a bunch of sugar; also sorry, the second part of this chapter felt very long paragraphy and lacked dialogue
anyways, I'm bumping up ethan's age about a year or so, so that he's closer in age to luke and alaska
I'm also not very sure how old lee is (canon), but he's gonna be around luke and alaska's (and now ethan's) age, maybe a little younger