A Son From Lands Unknown (PJO x Male Reader)

Escape from Miami

"One on one," Percy challenged. "What are you afraid of?"

Luke curled his lip. The soldiers who were about to kill (Y/N), Percy, and the others in the group hesitated, waiting for Luke's order.

Before he could say anything, Agrius, the bear-man, burst onto the deck leading a flying horse. It was the first pure-black pegasus that any of them had ever seen, with wings like a giant raven. The pegasus mare bucked and whinnied. Percy could understand her thoughts. She was calling Agrius and Luke names so bad Chiron would've washed her muzzle out with saddle soap.

"Sir!" Agrius called, dodging a pegasus hoof. "Your steed is ready!"

"Luke kept his eyes on Percy.

"I told you last summer, Percy," he said. "You can't bait me into a fight."

"Yet you keep avoiding one," Percy noticed. "Scared your warriors will see you get whipped?" (Y/N) questioned the sanity of this plan since Luke was the best swordsman Camp had seen in three hundred years, but he decided to be quiet.

Luke glanced at his men, and he saw that he was trapped. If he backed down now, he would look weak. If he fought, he'd lose valuable time chasing Clarisse. For his part, the best Percy could hope for was to distract him, giving the others a chance to escape. If anyone could think of a plan, it was Annabeth.

"I'll kill you quickly," Luke decided, and raised his weapon before turning his head toward the daughter of Hephaestus. "Adrianna, when I'm done, you're on cleanup. Understood?"

Adrianna whipped her head around to face him before nodding, but the angle still let (Y/N) see her remaining human eye. He could still see the emotion in there. Even though she was clearly trying to pass off her modifications as a personal choice, she almost seemed... scared. Scared of Luke, and what he might do to her.

Luke turned back to Percy and leveled Backbiter. It was a foot longer than Riptide, placing Percy at a distinct disadvantage. Its blade glittered with an evil gray-and-gold light where the human steel had melded with celestial bronze to create a weapon capable of killing anything, mortal and mythic alike. One could almost feel the blade fighting against itself, like two opposing magnets bound together. Percy didn't know how the blade had been made, but he sensed a tragedy. Someone had died in the process. Luke whistled to one of his men, who threw him a round leather-and-bronze shield. He grinned wickedly.

"Luke," Annabeth said, "at least give him a shield."

"Sorry, Annabeth," he said. "You bring your own equipment to this party."

The shield would be a problem. Fighting two-handed with just a sword gives more power, but fighting one-handed with a shield gives better defense and versatility. There are more moves, more options, more ways to kill. Percy thought back to Chiron, and to a lesser extent (Y/N),, who'd told him to stay at camp no matter what and learn to fight. Now he was going to pay the price for not listening.

Luke lunged and almost killed Percy on the first try. Backbiter went under Percy's arm, slashing through his shirt and grazing his ribs.

Percy jumped back and countered with Riptide, but Luke slammed the blade away with his shield.

"My, Percy, Luke chided. "You're out of practice."

Luke charged again, but (Y/N) saw where this was going. Not in terms of who would win, mind, but that it was going to be very repetitive. Instead, he turned his attention to Adrianna, who had made her way to standing above him.

"Why are you here, Adrianna?" (Y/N) asked her.

No response.

"You do know that he wants to kill us all, right?" he asked her. "He doesn't care."