Judgmental (a Percy Jackson AU)

Could've, Should've, Would've

     Jason could've left the Twelfth Legion when he twelve and was sent to the city to buy medical supplies for Leila. Jason definitely should've left the Twelfth Legion when he was sixteen and Lupa told him he had to survive a week in the forest alone to prove himself worthy of the gods. Jason would have left earlier if he had not been so scared of leaving behind all that he knew, but it wasn't until he was nineteen that he left the cult that had consumed his life and even that hadn't been his choice.

    Perhaps if Jason had had the courage to leave earlier, he would have a high school diploma. As it was, he did not and he had unwillingly traded a future of books and tests for a future of bricklaying. It was hard, back-breaking work and Jason went home to the apartment he shared with his roommate, Frank, sweaty and sore five times a week. It wasn't the best paying job, but there were few options for Jason. His mother had joined Lupa's cult when Jason was only a toddler. Jason's older sister, Thalia, had been only seven then, but she ran away rather than join her mother. After a few days, Jason's mother left him and Lupa decided to keep Jason.

    Jason had never been to public school and all of his education came from Lupa. She taught the kids in the Twelfth Legion Latin, sword fighting, and how to worship the ancient Roman gods. Anything modern was shunned and Lupa treated the members of the Twelfth Legion like they were actually in a legion. They spent their days training, building temporary camps, and even building walls in the last few months when paranoia took over Lupa.

    As Jason laid down another brick on the wall of the house he was building with his coworkers, he thought of how Lupa had died. Jason appreciated how his job left his muscles sore; it made the pain he felt inside feel more legitimate ⁠— as if pain had to be physical for it to be real. Jason had been nineteen when the authorities finally arrived. Reyna told Jason that they must have learned that Lupa was having them fight in gladiatorial contests to the death.

    Jason hadn't seen Reyna in nearly a month. Though she was his only friend aside from Frank, it was too painful to spend time with her. They had lived together for years, but now Jason felt like a stranger around her. Lupa had arranged for them to married together and they would've if the authorities hadn't arrived.

     Lupa had told them to fight to their deaths, but after she was shot, most of them were too surprised and were easily overpowered. Jason and the rest of the younger members of the Twelfth Legion were sent to a psychiatric hospital for a couple weeks before they were released into a world they knew very little about.

    When the workday ended, Jason walked to his apartment. He didn't have a driver's license yet ⁠— only a permit ⁠— and he knew that even when he got his license, he wouldn't have the money for a car. Still, he dreamed that one day he could have a car, a home, and a wife. 

    He was nearly to his apartment when he bumped into a woman. Jason apologized an realized that the woman was crying. She was wearing tight jeans and a blue blouse. Her hair was braided and she was wearing makeup. She was seriously beautiful ⁠— like an actress of the goddess Venus whom Lupa told them to pray to for love, but she looked like she was trapped in an ugly world.

    "Are you okay?" Jason asked.

    "I'm sorry," the woman said. "I normally don't cry like this. I'm just stressed out from work."

  "Would you want to go out for dinner?" Jason asked, surprising himself.

  The woman smiled and said. "Alright, but just something light. My name's Piper."