When Things Fall Apart

Chapter Seventeen

Luckily, Percy was given a clue of where to look for the Fates by Chaos. When she told him, "You can find the Fates if you know where to look," the image immediately popped into his mind.

Percy was just outside of New York. He remembered this place from all of his rides to Yancy Academy, as well as the one on the way back, where the bus crashed with him and Grover. In fact, this was the first place he met the Fates. Where they cut the lifeline of someone's yarn, which he later realized symbolized Luke's death.

He didn't know if they would be there, but he decided to take a look. Beyond that, he really had no clue what to do. Was it supposed to be hard to merely take all of their things? She said he could also kill them, but he didn't want to have to do that if possible.

He walked through the forest for a while, and heard a large snip noise. He remembered hearing that sound years ago. In front of him sat the Fates. They didn't seem to notice he was there. He devised a quick plan for taking all of their stuff. He would will some water from a nearby pond to encapsulate their feet and then pin them in place when frozen. Then, he would simply grab their things.

He turned on his Ring of Gyges and moved from tree to tree without a sound. He willed the water from a pond and froze them in place.

They noticed their situation and started yelling.

"Who dares to defy the Fates," one of them shrieked.

"No one can pull tricks on us. We control your destiny," another one said.

Then the one on the right had a moment of understanding. "Unless it's Percy Jackson," she wailed.

All of them started to scream and shout his name. "We know it's you," they told him. He decided to turn off his ring since they couldn't move.

"There he is," they hissed. He opened up his arms in a semi-taunting fashion.

"That's right, I'm here. I've waited for this day for a while. It's because of your guys' stupid system that I've been forced to live my life in solitude. I'm done with that," he said. As he spoke, he noticed his emotions starting to build.

"And what do you think you're going to do? What happens when we go away, you foolish mortal?" she asked him.

He thought about the question for a second. "I'm going to let people decide how they want to live their lives. As things are now, they are merely the pawns on your chessboard. That isn't right, and you know it."

The one on the right shook her head. "You foolish boy. Don't you get it. If we don't control the events of nature, everything will spur into chaos. The world as we know it will be burned to the ground."

"What about me?" he asked rhetorically. "Apparently I'm a part of this chaos, yet I haven't seemed to wrong anyone. In fact, I've done my best to help people in the process."

The middle one narrowed her eyes at him. "Do you really think that your intentions are as pure as they seem, boy? You think you do these things solely from the good of your heart? Who exactly have you been serving?" she asked. They had no clue what he had been doing with his life, since his timeline was disconnected from them.

"I've been serving the Hunt, trying to clean things and fix problems when I can," he replied. He didn't know why they cared what he was doing.

The one on the left pointed her crooked finger at him. "See, that's the problem. You think you are doing things with goodness in mind. Yet you are choosing to serve the one you love. You act out of selfishness. If you couldn't see that maiden goddess, you wouldn't be happy. You're not helping them. You are helping yourself in your life of loneliness."