Heroes Know When to sacrifice

I'm Not Joking

Hey, this is my first story, but I'll try to do my best.

This takes place at the end of The Burning Maze.

So please, do yourself a favor and don't read this until you have read The Burning Maze.

Remember, this is Fanfiction, so only some of what happens are canon.

Disclaimer: I don't own any of these characters, Rick Riordan does.

Also, this chapter is basically like The Burning Maze chapter 31 and 32, but with my own little twists.

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Chapter #1

I'm not Joking

Apollo POV

I fixed my eyes on the twin cyclones, hoping that Jason and Meg had somehow escaped. They had not, but strangely as if by silent agreement, they seemed to have switched roles.

Rather than raging in response to Piper being struck, Jason now floated deathly still, his eyes closed, his face like stone. Meg, on the other hand, clawed at her ventus cage, screaming words I couldn't hear. Her clothes were in tatters. Her face was crosshatched with a dozen bleeding cuts, but she didn't seem to care. She kicked and punched and threw packets of seeds into the maelstrom, causing festive bursts of pansies and daffodils among the shrapnel.

By the imperial dais, Medea had turned pale and sweaty. Countering Piper's charmspeak must have taxed her, but that gave me no comfort. Reverb and his guards would soon be back, bearing the hearts of the emperor's enemies.

A cold thought flooded through me. The hearts of his enemies.

I felt like I had been backhanded. The emperor needed me alive, at least for the moment. Which meant my only leverage...

My expression must have been priceless. Caligula burst out laughing.

"Apollo, you look like someone stepped on your favorite lyre!" He tutted. "You think you've had it bad? I grew up as a hostage in my Uncle Tiberius's palace. Do you have any idea how evil that man was? I woke up every day expecting to be assassinated, just like the rest of my family. I became a consummate actor. Whatever Tiberius needed me to be, I was. And I survived. But you? Your life has been golden from start to finish. You don't have the stamina to be a mortal."

He turned to Medea. "Very well, sorceress! You may turn your little blenders up to puree and kill the two prisoners. Then we will deal with

Apollo."

Medea smiled. "Gladly."

"Wait!" I screamed, pulling an arrow from my quiver.

The emperor's remaining guards leveled their spears, but the emperor shouted, "HOLD!"

I didn't try to draw my bow. I didn't attack Caligula. Instead, I turned the arrow inward and pressed the point against my chest.

Caligula's smile evaporated. He examined me with thinly veiled contempt. "Lester...what are you doing?"

"Let my friends go," I said. "All of them. Then you can have me."

The emperor's eyes gleamed like a strix's. "And if I don't?"

I summoned my courage and issued a threat I never could have imagined in my previous four thousand years of life. "I'll kill myself."

(This is where chapter 31 ends and continues to chapter 32 for those of you who are still confused on where this is taking place)