Apathy

Prologue

     A cloaked figure, an armored silhouette against the glow of the multiple moons circling the planet, sat on the edge of a cliff. Smoking a cigarette, sea-green eyes circled and flecked with gold that belongs to a broken soldier faintly glow as they gaze off into the distance. A silver nameplate informs anyone who reads it that this figure is 'Commander Omega'. In the blink of an eye, another silhouette is sitting beside the figure. Unlike the other human figure, this one is a cloaked wolf of an unbelievable, unnatural size, and would look like a German Shepherd stuffed toy because of all the scars, if it weren't for the jagged scars across his face. The silver nameplate informs anyone reading it that this wolfish figure is 'Commander Lone Wolf'.

     "It's time to let the past go. You can't go on like this forever, it's tearing you apart. Shattering your mind, and eventually, it'll break your soul. You'll have a personality disorder-" The wolf began to tell Commander Omega in a deep, rough, growling yet concerned voice when the masked figure interrupted him. "You're exaggerating. So what if I can't let the past go? They tossed me out for a filthy, lying coward, and if I forget, history will only repeat. I'll go on as I damn well please, and I don't see why insanity or a "personality disorder" will interfere with my work. Why the hell do you care anyway, Lone Wolf?" Omega snapped, his deep velvety voice turned rough with his anger and mistrust, and as he spoke, he stood, threw his cigarette on the ground and put it out by grinding his boot into it far too roughly.

    "I care because you're my son! I couldn't care less about your performance in this position, and you only need to learn from the past, not use it as an excuse to distance yourself from your troops! I care about you, so why can't you care about yourself?" Lone Wolf growled, his rough voice turning into a soft, sad murmur at the question, as he rose to his four paws, standing on all four paws, golden eyes flashing before turning from its smoldering, molten gold, to a softer, warmer yet almost sad gold. Golden laced sea-green eyes flashed dangerously, suspicion and lack of belief clearly showing, along with the tiniest hint of sadness that almost whispered 'I wish I could believe you.' Then they once became unreadable, blank and uncaring. Omega turned to face his fellow Commander.

     "I'm your adopted son only because you accidentally bit me and I survived. You don't care about me, you only feel a sense of responsibility when it comes to taking care of me. And how can I care about myself when I'm the reason why so many innocent people died? Why should I allow myself even the slightest chance of happiness when-" Omega growled out yet ended up sobbing at the end, interrupting himself, his emotions getting the best of him for once. Lone Wolf regarded him with deep sadness. "You're broken... and I can't fix you." The half-wolf with dragon wings whispered sadly and softly so Omega couldn't hear him, his ears drooping as he sat back down in defeat, bitterly wondering why he was regarded as the most powerful and the best fighter if he couldn't help someone he cared about very much fight against the worst opponent of all: depression.

     "We need to go. Chaos has another mission for us." Lone Wolf sighed, standing up again, unable to gaze at his adopted son who was broken. Not just emotionally, but also, loyally.

Percy Jackson was Commander Omega, and he suffered due to being betrayed and blamed for everything that happened during the wars. Now, he was suffering because of his Fatal Flaw. He was suffering all because of the fact that he was edging closer and closer to the Edge of Sanity. And the only thing keeping him sane was Apathy. 

That interaction between Percy and Spike was the last time Percy allowed himself to feel emotions, let alone show them.  

And maybe that's what could heal the cracks he had in his sanity.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I decided to try something a little different with this version of "Betrayed and Alone" without the soon-to-be sequel crossover, as you could all see even in this. This Percy or Omega is different because he's more insane, more unstable, more broken, and more apathetic. This is for a good reason. With BaA (Betrayed and Alone) I knew I wanted a sequel (though I might make a sequel for this too, but that isn't guaranteed), so I made him a bit more tolerable of the campers emotionally and whatnot, because he was going to be stuck with them longer. So, yeah. It isn't much, and since this Percy is more fragmented, I don't need to type chapters entirely based off of his past like I did for BaA Percy.

Because this Percy is closer to the edge, just looking at someone or something (or anything similar to the person, place, or thing) can send him into a flashback briefly, though in his mind he's replaying the entire thing unless he manages to pull himself out of the memory, leaving only a glimpse of what he tried so hard to ignore yet always makes itself known. 

Words typed, now it's time for me to say "WolfHowler1 out!"  

[UPDATE] I've changed the title to "Apathy" because I realized that Percy probably wouldn't be able to keep his sanity together, and his position as Commander, long enough for even 50 Chaos years considering how much I was planning on having his past affect him. So I changed things up a bit, making sure that while yes, this Percy will have questionable sanity, he'll lean a bit more on apathy, even more so than BaA Percy.