My Backstory, I Suppose

Before Birth / Early Childhood

So, apparently my mortal parent was quite the character. I wouldn't know, because I because I hardly knew them, seeing as they died when I was a toddler, but everyone who ever knew them always tells me tells me I'm just like them.  

Anyways, my parents met in the German Military, somehow, about 17 years ago. Malin Pace, my mortal parent, was in charge of some elaborate plan that my aunt Marlene wasn't ever given much information about. Athena helped Malin perfect the plan, and they fell in love in the process, apparently. Everything went splendidly, and my mother was a hero in her rank. I may have forgotten to mention that Malin was a woman, not a man. The name means Army Councilor, which was pretty similar to what my mom was.

My mom's plan worked perfectly, and things kept getting better for her, it seemed. That is until Athena decided to bless my mom with.. well, me. My mom wanted kids eventually, but not when Athena gifted me to her. Not to mention that mom was completely unaware that Athena was a goddess until the little reveal.

My mom had to drop out of the military to raise me. 

Before it gets to the sad part, you're probably wondering how I have a mortal mom and an immortal mother. As some of you may know, my mother Athena gives birth to her demigod children the same way Zeus gave birth to her. That's right. Through the forehead. Anyway, the way demigod children of Athena are conceived is when her divine thoughts merge with the ingenuities of mortal men that she favors, or in this case, women. All children of Athena are literally brain children, so the whole man-woman thing doesn't really apply. But, in case you're wondering, yes I have a belly button. 

Back to the story at hand: when I was about 25 months old, my mom got in a car crash, caused by a drunk teenage girl. I wasn't in the car, luckily, but my mom was driving to pick me up from a babysitter that she left me with every weekday while she was at work. At you would expect, she never arrived to pick me up that day. I don't think the girl survived the crash, either. 

My aunt Marlene claims that it was an absolute mess to adopt me, but that she was happy that she did it. By the time I was three years old I was living with my aunt Marlene in Maine. One of my earliest memories in her old house by the coast was wading in the freezing waters and building an overly complicated sand castle with a cousin who was visiting us. We named the beach Pace Playground ( a bit of a stupid name, but Margrit was like six, and I was like three and a half, cut us some slack) and we entertained ourselves in the sand.

My aunt was the best person on earth, in my slightly biased opinion. She was pretty young, only twenty-six, when she took me in. Aunt Marlene had a thing for gardening, and she tried to get me to help her a few times, but it often went horribly wrong. She was possibly the best possible person to raise a child of Athena. She was patient and always answered my constant flow of questions. If she ever came across something that she couldn't answer, she placed a pause on everything else to help me find an answer.

One thing I noticed in my childhood is that she never had a relationship in the whole time I lived with her. Once I asked her why, thinking that it was somehow my fault. She gave me a hug and quickly assured me that her lack of a significant other had nothing to do with the fact that she was raising me, but that she simply had no desire to have a relationship with anybody. I just nodded thoughtfully, although I didn't really know what she was talking about. Chances are if I nod thoughtfully, I'm confused. (Admin: She's an asexual aromatic. Woo!) (LIV HERE! Yuvia, you sound like Jade. 😀)

Some of my worst childhood memories took place when I was gardening in my aunt's little plot that I mentioned earlier. I'm not much of an outdoorsy type, but I have nothing against plants (That is unless they're being thrown at me, cough Yuvia cough). What I did have a problem with was the horrifying spiders that often lurked in the flowerbeds. The first spider that I can ever remember encountering was an Argiope Aurantia, also known as a black and yellow garden spider, among other names. She was huge, and the second she noticed me, she targeted me and proceeded to bite me multiple times.

I found the spider both scarily interesting and equally terrifying, and quickly went inside. Black and yellow garden spider venom is seemingly harmless to humans, but the bites still hurt. I distinctly remember my aunt asking "Are you absolutely sure that you didn't provoke the spider, Malcolm?" I recall scowling before answering with a huff. "Of course I didn't, auntie!" in my exasperated five year old voice.

"It's like the creepy crawly death dealer had a grudge against me or something," I said tearfully. Apparently I was completely correct, because of Athena's old rivalry with Arachne. And yes, five year old me used the term 'creepy crawly death dealer' when referring to spiders, and so do I, when caught in the worst of moments. Spiders continued to harass me through my childhood, although apparently it was nothing compared to the grief that Annabeth got from the web spinning monsters. 

The monster attacks started earlier than with most demigods in my case. The first attack took place when I was in 2nd grade. It was the first day of school and I was the youngest kid in the class, barely meeting the school's cutoff date. The teacher seemed... off, and I was the only kid picking up on it. By the end of the first class, "Mr. Warner" seemed ready to destroy me. It turns out that Mr. Warner was a dog-headed-man (I found out a few years ago that they're called Cenocephalus) in disguise, and thought up the brilliant plan of eating my actual teacher and to try and get a nibble of me too. Mr. Warner stuck around for a few months, until one day he disappeared from the school, and seemingly everyone's memory, which resulted in an extremely confused 6 year old demigod that went by the name of Malcolm Pace. 

By the end of 2nd grade, I had experienced more than a few monster encounters, and I had grown accustomed to fearing and despising school, despite loving learning with a passion.  Luckily none of the attacks left me with more than a couple bruises, and a bloody nose that one time.

One fateful morning, I was finally discovered by a satyr who was posing as a 5th grader at my elementary school. Beck Pines explained the situation to my aunt, and expressed his opinion on taking me to camp half-blood earlier than most demigods. 

My aunt, who had no idea that her late older sister had a demigod son that she happened to be raising, immediately agreed for the sake of my safety. She made us a supply pack, despite Beck's protests, because he said that he already had all the supplies they could possibly need, before quickly adding "But I wouldn't mind a few aluminum cans if you have any to spare," making me laugh. 

I was barely seven years old, and I was off to Camp Half-Blood for the first time.