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Chapter Text

Nine: Axel

Hot Women Need to Stop Sneaking Up on Me

            As Axel stuffed a spare shirt from the van’s compartments alongside his weapons, he couldn’t stop wondering whether he’d made the right decision[1]. Despite counting his breaths and working through several meditative mental exercises and mediating a play session between Baller the weasel and Harvey the chinchilla, his decision to leave and what he did to his brother eclipsed thoughts about Alabaster’s anger, helping Euna, or saving camp.

            Everything in here was a reminder.

            The shirts he picked up off the floor made Axel grit his teeth. They were all gifts from Pax with dorky, cocky sayings on them, like the quickest way to anyone’s heart is with my fist and Kronos waits for no man… except me. Even his weapon’s duffle bag was a present Pax gave him on National Sibling Day—a holiday he had to prove existed before Axel would accept—with an embroidered patch that read Schrodinger’s Laundry Bag: Clean or Dirty, None can Tell.

            These shirts were too arrogant for Axel, but Pax had needed someone to look up to as a hero and protector when he was growing up, and Axel had donned that persona with pride when it meant making Pax feel happy and safe.

            But during the counselor-praetor-Triple A Chimera meeting, Pax hadn’t been able to maintain eye contact. He flinched every time Axel made a full movement. Axel had only ever seen Pax look at one other person with so much fear: their father, Santiago.

            “You take longer to get ready than Grover.”

            Axel startled, snatched a sword off the wall, and made an already terrified Harvey whimper. He didn’t swing immediately—he recognized the scent: comfortingly earthy, with a hint of… ozone? Like the jungle before a storm.

            Instead, Axel pivoted defensively to face the van’s entrance.

            Thalia stood outside the van, leaning against the ajar door. Her arms were folded and puffed out with the silver parka. Between her pale skin and the eerie huntress glow, he almost couldn’t tell where the white fur lining began and ended.

            New van rule: no more sneaking up on him while he was handling deadly weapons.

            He winced to see that Alabaster must have handed off the Leonis Caput helm to her. The imperial gold glinted queerly against the silver of her backpack, where it was tethered.

            “Are we arming a small militia in Tartarus?” she asked, those shocking blue eyes examining the array of weapons he had strapped onto his chest, hips, and legs.

            “Hello, huntress.” Axel bowed his head slightly. “No, I—”

            Axel felt his eyes widen as his gaze sank down to the blade in his hands.

            “Yep,” Thalia confirmed. “That’s a sword.”

            When he shook his head and touched the hilts of his other weapons with his free hand, her expression shifted from metered to worried. She said, “Please don’t actually try to arm a small militia in Tartarus.[2] I have strict orders to electrocute you if you do.”

            Oddly specific orders.

            Axel stepped out of the van and hefted the sword to be level with her again. “Would you mind… attacking me?”

            Thalia stared. “You’re so weird.”

            “I need to test one of my blades before we leave.”[3]

            “Good thing you specified since I was talking about zapping you,” she said. She withdrew a canister of mace from her belt.

            Axel flinched, putting a hand up to cover as much as he could of his mouth, eyes, and nose. “That’s not—”

            One poke and the canister expanded into a spear.

            Axel relaxed, cleared his throat and straightened his posture.

            Thalia grinned at him. “Now I know how to keep you in line.”

            “I have a very strong sense of smell,” he said, shuddering to think of the last time he’d been pepper sprayed, when Dr. Thorn’s tail spike accidentally punctured Lucille’s pepper spray container and it exploded everywhere. And Axel had worked so hard to fund getting all the younger girls and boys special pepper spray in case of godly or demigodly creeps. All his soldiers could handle the mortal ones without assistance, but after what happened to Ethel, he wanted those in his troop to have the hope of defense if something should go wrong.

            “Even weirder.”

            Thalia lunged forward with her spear.

            Axel parried with his gladius.

            As he went to push her spear tip downward, Thalia moved the spear into the motion, letting the tip drop to the ground so she could spin the butt of the spear up to hit him.

            For that moment of watching the bottom of the spear swing towards him, Axel swallowed. If he forced himself to use the same blade, and that blade shattered, she’d hit him full force in the face with the added insult of shattered metal bits.

            But, if the blade stayed intact—

            Axel tightened his grip as he parried a second time.

            And the gladius didn’t shatter.

            A well of excitement energized him. When she jabbed a third time, and—yet again—his weapon survived another block, all of Axel’s self restraint went into disengaging from the fight. He withdrew and stepped back. His muscles screamed to attack Thalia full force, to have fun sparring without the waste of destroying each weapon he touched. He wanted to storm up to Reyna and demand a rematch and schedule a time block to take on Percy and Jason.

            Reyna might take a request for a rematch as… ill-timed flirting, and they were on a time crunch. Axel knew his celebration had to be kept short and private. 

            Despite that, Axel gave Thalia a huge grin. “Thank you, huntress,” he said and scrambled back into the van while stripping off the layers of weapons covering him. As he tossed them to the side, he fumbled to rapidly test which was the most balanced, sharpest, and best fit his fighting style.

            “Now, I won’t be trying to arm a militia in Tartarus,” he said with a laugh.

            “Glad I could convince you otherwise.” Thalia depressed her spear. She walked back over to the van and glanced over his shoulder to look inside, seeming confused by his sudden vehemence.

            Axel hardly noticed. How long had it been since he’d been able to fight without a handicap? Or have favorite swords? Maybe now he could finally name a sword. Axel remembered the day he’d surpassed Luke with a sword and secretly dreamed about becoming a sword fighter skilled enough that his blade would become legendary.

            Those dreams had shattered when Ares cursed all his weapons to break.

            “Good thing we tested the sword you’re not bringing,” Thalia grumbled. “You’re worse about packing than Apollo going to a beauty pageant, you know that? Euna is getting farther and farther away.”

            “I know. I’m almost done,” Axel said. He frowned at the Mist coated trunk behind the passenger seat. Any secrecy would be pointless with their identities revealed. He popped the trunk, making Thalia do a double take as the Mist twisted away. “I made it a habit to use the worse blades first, so I wouldn’t regret shattering them and I need to find—this!”

            Axel triumphantly lifted one hand from rummaging around the old photographs, fliers, scrolls, and armor to reveal one of the things he’d been looking for: a wrist watch with a sickle hour dial. “This will always point to the exact time at the Temple of Saturn in Rome.”

            Thalia was staring at a photograph that had slipped out of the trunk and landed on the van floor. She’d knelt down to pick it up. On the back, he could read San Pedro and a smeared date that only had July legible. That had a picture of Axel, Pax, Jack, Luke, and—forcibly—Alabaster walking along the beach, moments before the girls launched a surprise assault of balloons filled with food coloring.

            Axel paused, watching Thalia’s expression. He and Pax had several dozen pictures of their old Mount Othrys gang, many featuring Luke before he lost his mind. When Axel and Thalia returned from Tartarus, assuming they did return and the Romans didn’t immediately arrest him, he wondered if Thalia would want to look through them with him. Although Pax had frequently flipped through the photos, Axel had never been able to look at the faces of those that he couldn’t save. Now he’d seen them anyway on Ares’ ship.

            “Always the time in Rome…” she echoed. Thalia shook her head and shoved the picture at Axel, like it meant nothing and she’d just been practicing picking up pictures in the slowest fashion possible. “Oh!” Her gaze focused. “Right—I’ve heard time in Tartarus and the Labyrinth is stupid.”

            “Exactly. This way we know how much time is passing on the outside.”

            Axel stood up from crouching. Now he was only armed with a few weapons: a club with obsidian teeth, an imperial gold gladius, his hidden obsidian arm stilettos, a hunting knife, his mother’s boomerang, some bolas, and a sling with some ammunition. He opted out of bringing his trusted frying pan. Part of him felt too light and naked with so few weapons. Another felt liberated. He could move so much faster without carrying the extra weight.

            Thalia glanced down at the scars covering his chest. “So… you’re not going to wear a shirt the whole trip? While traveling with a huntress of Artemis?”

            Axel sighed. “Lou Ellen swears her spell will wear off within the next half-hour. I’m sorry to offend your eyes with the male form, huntress.”

            Thalia snorted, probably mistaking his comment for sarcasm. She took a step to exit the van, but paused. “If… Jason and I were closer, and I was leaving on a mission that I might not come back from, I would want to give him more than a wave to say goodbye.”

            All of his excitement deflated. Axel gritted his teeth as his thoughts returned to Pax flinching. “I can’t,” he said.

            “Fine. Be a coward,” she snapped and stormed out of the van. “I’ll be waiting at Zeus’ fist. Hurry up.”

            Axel blinked, wondering what he’d done to personally offend the Lieutenant of Artemis before they’d even started their trip.  He hopped out after Thalia, told Baller to protect the Paxmobile, Pax, Hunnie, Nietsche, and Harvey while he was gone, and locked up the van.[4] The magical weasel nodded gravely at his charge and showed his determination by nipping the terrified chinchilla’s ear.

            Pax or Chris could easily picklock their way into the van, so Axel could leave the keys under the front visor.[5]

            Before he could take off after Thalia, he heard the hum of smooth jazz coming from the barrier. A tall girl with a parka walked towards him.

            “Hey Mr. Stoic, you ready to get down for this shindig?” Merry asked. 

            This was the last person he expected to send him off.

            “Are they still arguing semantics?” Axel asked.

            “Like any good United Nations meeting.” She grinned.

            Axel thought over Hiro’s proposition for her. Only mortal transport… He glanced to the taxi van parked near his, where Sam Datta had reclined his seat and was using his biostats notes as a sleep mask. ”I suppose you’ll be riding with him back into New York.”

            “Good thing we kept him around. I think I’ll give him a soothing Merry wakeup call in a few.” She tapped her jacket and Axel remembered her parka could get loud enough to supply a night club. “I’d like to be in New York City ASAP. It’s not polite to roll in late just because we can’t get a parking spot.”

            Axel stared at the van. By now, Sam Datta must have missed his biostats test. “We really owe him a debt.”

            “I vote we give him a ransom note with a picture of you attached, since your father already made it sound like you’re prone to kidnapping people,” Merry suggested. “I feel like they’ll be more willing to forgive his absence if they suspect foul play.”

            She jammed her hands into her pockets. Her tone changed. “I’m worried about my teddy bear.”

            Axel understood her fear. While Calex was a medic and was used to helping at his mother’s clinic, he was a warrior, one who would bear arms if necessary, unlike Merry. He couldn’t join her on her quest; it would violate Eris’ rules.

            Although Axel suspected his reasons to be different from Percy’s and Annabeth’s, there was no way Axel would allow the son of Eros to accompany he and Thalia. The terrors didn’t worry Axel; Calex had proven to be tough. However, Axel didn’t know if the fastest route would lead them through the Underworld. How would Calex react if he ran into his brother and mother waiting in line for judgments?  While Calex might be able to handle the impersonal cruelty of Tartarus, he would shatter upon seeing the two people he felt he’d abandoned to die.

            “I’m sure he’ll do well protecting camp…” he said. Axel frowned. Calex wasn’t the main one Axel was worried about.  “Merry, my brother is very dangerous.”

            He had never agreed with Merry’s life philosophy of “do no harm”—he thought it naïve, idealistic, and occasionally maddening, but he trembled to think of losing another one of their group. Looking at her challenging, playful smile, he wondered how long it would take Hiro to break her.

            “Don’t worry. My plan isn’t to walk up and sing Kumbaya.” Her jaw jutted to one side, something she seemed to do when nervous.  “Besides, you watch yourself, Mr. Stoic. I’m going to corral a twelve year old. You’re going on a date with your girlfriend’s friend who has to shoot you if you look at her ankles funny.”

            Axel felt his face get hot. He opened his mouth to protest, but clamped it shut. Merry was very good at backing people into corners, and he didn’t want to give her more ammo.

            Merry’s gaze fell along with her smile. “I needed to ask you something about that to make all of this work.”

            He spoke before he could stop himself, “I’m not taking the Lieutenant of Artemis on a date to Hell.”

            “No, sweetie, I’m not one to judge who you romance in your personal time.” Merry put her hands up, then dropped them. “I need to ask you something about Hiro.”

            “Anything,” Axel said. For once, he meant it.

            Merry inhaled and exhaled, and Axel had a feeling this was about to get personal. “What kind of flora and fauna do you have in Belize? And how old was Hiro when he left there?”

            Axel blinked. “Excuse me?” If that was the kind of information Merry was asking to take out Axel’s little brother, Percy might need to get comfortable in his chair.

            The first time Axel had seen Zeus’ Fist was from the inside of the rock pile, when he and the other soldiers of Othrys followed Kampe through the Labyrinth to attack Camp Half-Blood. Between marching behind a bunch of smelly monsters down dark tunnels and strolling through a beautiful forest with friendly nymphs, Axel decided he liked this view of Zeus’ Fist more.

            Rumor was that the entrance had closed after the battle ended and Kampe died. A brief glance at the stones told Axel that the entrance had moved to the other side of the rock pile, as entrances to the Labyrinth were apt to do. That side shimmered with a dim blue symbol, likely the mark of Daedalus, the maze’s creator.

            There was something eerie beyond the glowing hue. Although the campers whispered that this place was cursed, Axel could distinctly see a flag pinned to the top of Zeus’ Fist: the capture the flag banner.

            Instead of gleaming with any of the typical cabin colors, it gleamed with wicked golden and black twists that swirled into a golden apple.

            Axel’s breath caught.

            A symbol of Eris.

            Axel ducked down and withdrew his gladius. Thalia should be around here somewhere. He could smell her scent, though it was difficult to distinguish with the rest of the forest. There weren’t any signs of struggle and this didn’t feel like an ambush… but…

            He crept forward.

            Something else colorful smattered the rocks. Somehow, he’d have to get closer without alerting any potential threats—

            “What are you doing?”

            Axel startled. He kept forgetting how silent the huntresses of Artemis could move amongst the trees. He now understood why Pax always threatened to get him a bell.

            Thalia stood a few yards ahead of him. Her arms were crossed and she tapped her jacket sleeve impatiently.

            Sheepishly, Axel rose from his crouch. He gestured towards Zeus’ Fist. “If the flag is flying with Eris’ colors, it might mean another trick of Eris’—”

            Thalia snorted. “Or it could mean your brother is less of a coward than you are. Come on.”

            Axel kept his gladius out as they approached the pile of rocks. When they got close enough, he felt the tip slowly lower in disbelief.

            The rocks and flag had been graffitied. Once he turned around the bend of the rock, he could see a quick and sloppy spray painting of a weasel climbing a pole to the banner. There was a haphazard combination of Mayan script, the ancient Greek alphabet, and Latin letters encircling it. A note was pinned to the rock with a dart.

            Axel numbly pulled it off to find a sloppily drawn weasel and jaguar surfing on a river of fire. A packet of gum slipped out from behind it. Around the note were the signatures of everyone at the counselor’s meeting. Down at the bottom was a block of text in the fancy font that Alabaster only used when writing orders for people. Alabaster’s personal script was illegible.

            Axel,

                        Pax claimed the solidarity of having everyone sign the same sheet of paper would combat Eris’ hold on the camp. Then he asked me to write, “Be safe on your date to Tartarus. Don’t get turned into a bear or become a Hunter. But, if you do become a bear, become a really COOL bear” and pretend it was a send off card from all of us. Your brother is an idiot.

                        But really, don’t become a bear. In light of the new things I’ve discovered about your tastes, I don’t trust your decision making and it would be most inconvenient to acquire a curse from Artemis as soon as you absolve a curse from Ares.

                                                                                                -Alabaster

            Axel’s eyes felt warm. He rubbed his face against the back of his hand. As soon as Axel and Thalia left, Pax must have run around, collecting the signatures, then sprinted—with one or two helpers—to Zeus’ Fist to paint it. They’d likely enlisted Merry to stall him. If Axel had to guess, Pax and his accomplices were still on top of this rock, holding their breaths.

            The note didn’t make Axel choke up. It made him want to tear Alabaster’s ear off, since his elaboration on Pax’s wish—claiming Axel would get in trouble with Artemis for something he’d do on this trip—was far worse than just acquiescing to writing Pax’s words verbatim. But… when he finally sounded out what Pax had tried to write in his jumbled, dyslexic mess of Greek, Mayan, and Spanish…[6] 

            Pax rarely wrote things down without prewriting it so he wouldn’t mix up the letters of his various alphabets. Axel understood what Pax wrote when he flipped two letters and recognized the writing as phonetically Mayan. And, Axel understood why Pax didn’t want anyone else writing it but him.

            Frasco, Nilley, and I still love you and still believe in you.

            Thalia touched Axel’s shoulder.

            Axel coughed. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I—”

            When he looked down at her, Thalia’s smile was surprisingly gentle. She nudged him and glanced up at the top of the rock, reaffirming Axel’s suspicion that his little brother was still there.

            Axel cleared his throat and spoke louder, “If Ajax were around, I would want him to know how much—“ Axel choked up again and switched tactics. “That, when I get back, I’ll do anything to atone for what I’ve done to him and do anything to make it better…”

            Nothing felt right, or enough to say, but he was glad he said something. Especially when he heard someone else say, “Dude, atone? Like, old school punishment and trial? He knows where he’s going, right?”

            “Good luck one-upping ‘atonement.’”

            Among the giggles in response, he could hear Pax’s shaky one.

            Thalia released his shoulder. “You’re such a drama king,”[7] she said as though they hadn’t heard the others. “You finally ready to show me the entrance?”

            “More ready than I thought I could be,” he said. Axel slipped his hand against the rock, finding the labyrinth entrance beside the weasel’s foot. He stuffed the note and gum into his pocket and paused. “You… didn’t read that note, did you?”

            “If you think the front is bad, wait until you see what’s on the back,” Thalia said. As she stepped past him, keeping her gaze forward, her eyes seemed to twinkle.

            And with the realization that Alabaster and Pax had given Thalia license to tease him for the whole trip, Axel and Thalia began their descent towards the pit of the damned, to save a friend that—Axel hoped—hadn’t completely lost herself to hatred yet.

Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed :D Tune in next week for a surprise guest star in the chapter I Play Trans-Mythological Messenger (or: I Crush a Commander with my Bum).

Footnotes:

[1] Mel Betanote: “Does he plan to be ripping through his shirts that often?!”

Jack’s response: Reyna’s not around, so he might be able to keep them on.

[2] Mel Betanote: “Someone later: ‘Why are the gremlins so well armed???’”

[3] Pax, “However, we all know Thalia is correct, as this happens to be the infrequent mating call of the Axel.”

[4] Mel Betacomment: “AWWWWW! I JUST IMAGINED AXEL SAYING THAT AND THEN BALLER SALUTING HIM!”

Jack’s response: Who is to say that Baller didn’t salute him?

[5] Mel Betacomment: “I was about to ask who was going to feed them.”

Jack’s response: Why do you think Axel left Harvey in the van?

[6] I spelled dyslexic wrong about five times without realizing for a solid few moments between each misspelling.

[7] Mel Betacomment: “Axel would be the main character to a shojo manga.”

Jack’s response: You mean he’s not?