Heart Pierced - Kayla Knowles (1)

I. I Didn't Ask To Pass Out After Gaining An Admirer

Colton Reynolds could just about say that he had seen everything. He had been at Camp Half Blood since he was ten, having come three years ago, and from monsters to saving Apollo kids from snakes to saving Athena kids from spiders to everything else, he had seen probably more than the average kid at camp had.

That being said, he had mixed feelings about how far he had come. On the one hand, he was rapidly becoming one of the most skilled demigods in his cabin, rapidly closing in on that of his older sister and head counselor Clarisse La Rue, who saw Colton, along with one of their other brothers Sherman Yang, as her favorite younger siblings. He had the respect of his own cabin and even rarer for kids of Ares, the fact that his older sister showed more emotion towards him than even Yang, which the latter thought was very impressive to be honest.

On the other hand, he still felt like he was lacking something. On top of the several problems he also faced when it came to getting any farther.

First problem was.. Percy Jackson.

Look, he didn't actually hate Percy Jackson all that much - if anything Colton considered him an inspiration to try harder given the exploits of the son of the earth shaker Poseidon himself, plus oddly enough he found what he did to Clarisse a bit amusing- but he was still a little annoyed at him for knocking him off the pedestal that he had taken years to get as being one of the most powerful demigods at camp. He had only just claimed the third place spot after barely defeating Yang in a friendly fire duel during Capture The Flag just days before Percy showed up at camp, and already, the news Percy had managed to stand up to his and his siblings' father, Ares, had knocked him down to fourth place.

The second problem was.. Kronos, and the Gods themselves.

Although Clarisse considered him one of her two favorite younger siblings, she knew full well that he wasn't a typical Ares kid. For one thing, he was one of those who took pity on the plight of the kids of minor gods and those that still hadn't been claimed. It bothered him to no end.

The problem had been exacerbated by Luke Castellan's betrayal last summer. Despite Clarisse and Yang's best efforts, Colton was conflicted. His fatal flaw, unusually for Ares kids, had been caring too much for others, and he was debating whether he should also leave camp and join Luke, or stay. He was still undecided on the issue, but seemed to lean towards the first option. No, he hadn't had Kronos appear to him in his dreams yet, but if the Titan Lord ever did, Colton was totally sure that he would tell him that he was on the fence on the whole issue, and that he would require some time to think over it carefully.

Plus, he probably would also like assurances and hold him to an oath that once Olympus was destroyed, he'd get a share of the rewards and not be backstabbed by the Titan Lord.

The third problem was.. his own heart. He had lost both of his parents in the monster attack that forced him to come to Camp Half Blood, meaning that he was essentially an orphan, part of why Clarisse showed him more affection than others, except of course, Chris Rodriguez. She was the one who convinced to turn his grief into rage and a motivation to train harder, so he might one day get his chance for revenge against the monsters that had killed his parents, which according to Chiron seemed to be a Lydian Drakon from the way Colton had described it. (A/N: Yeah.. if any of you know how TLO goes, it's a hint of what's to come.)

Even so, despite all the love of his older sister and his other siblings (begrudgingly for the most part except in the case of Yang, who was basically his closest friend aside from Clarisse), he still felt like there was something missing. The frustrating part about it all was, he had no clue exactly what he was missing.